whatever you do, don't press that button

In many of the situations I find myself in, I feel like I am living out the exposition to some bad action adventure flick. For instance, everything is sunny and beautiful and kids are frolicking, while I walk through the park and all the while a meteor is hurtling towards earth. Even the crappy days feel like that. I have had a fight with someone, or am feeling sick, or am having money issues...but soon that will mean nothing once the aliens invade. The more I know, or read, or watch, etc. I find myself running into, what seem to me to be, characters from art, literature and the media. I will not be exaggerating when I tell you that I had dinner, over the weekend, with a denizen of Fargo. Not the actual geographical Fargo citizen, but someone that belonged in that movie. It was not that she had the accent (which she did), or that she dressed a certain way or talked about certain things (oh..the conversation, it was so priceless), it was the fact that she seemed to evoke a caricature (which of course I am sure she is not). I could barely speak for the whole night because I was so enamored of watching this person speak, and gesture. I mean, surely this could not be real...no, it was surreal and I kept waiting for zombies to attack. Some others folks I have also met in my adventures are:

The Baptist preacher from The Poisonwood Bible,
Ignatious from Confederacy of Dunces,
The Artist's Wife from a painting by Thomas Eakins,
Fletch,
Shakespeare's Mercutio,
and all the characters from Animal House.

I know that 'life experiences become art, which in turn become life' (I cannot remember who said that), but it still is surprising to me. I sit quietly typing away, so blissfully unaware that someone has found the secret button that, when pressed, will detonate the world....