February 07, 2004

7:55 p.m.

Skirting Loch Ness

Our school gig was cancelled yesterday so we slept in a bit at Carol's friend's house in Greenwich, where we'd travelled the night before. I slept in the basement (kids' playroom) on the fold-out sofa -- more specifically, on the mattress from the fold-out sofa which I put on the floor so that the metal bar from said sofa would not chop my spine in two -- and had a nice shower before anyone got up. Felt logey all day and kept trying to nap, but between the kids playing and Carol making booking calls, I pretty much just closed my eyes. Still have a little sore throat that I haven't been able to shake. Anyway, the storm came and there wasn't much accumulation but it was icy and then just terribly slushy, and the roads were a little slick, and then it just rained coldly all day and night. We did proceed with the evening's gig, and it was in a beautiful carriage-barn-turned-art-gallery. Fine acoustics and some very impressive photographs. About twelve people braved the sucky weather and, of course, gushed all over the place about how great we were. There was one large black woman who came and spoke to me (I don't know what it is about certain large black women who are very astute and articulate, and full of strong and loving spirit, but I'm drawn to them like a magnet) and she said, thinking carefully about each phrase, "I have never heard an artist, or a group, for whom every note is so precious." It turns out she runs a little coffeehouse in the state, so we'll probably play there in the next year or so, if she can afford us. :)

We decided to do the gig unplugged although we'd brought the PA; the room was live enough and it wasn't as though we had to project all the way back.

One long set and a two hour drive later, I was home in bed.

On this "sandwich" day (one in between gig days, when I'm home), I started entering my 2003 receipts for taxes, did all my hand wash of gig clothes that I wore in Florida, went out and got a firewall (FINALLY), did some more windows updates (I was way behind), made and ate an almost-but-not-quite-great ice cream sundae (sorry, but the "No Pudge" brownies do NOT make it in a real brownie sundae), picked up a couple of new houseplants, discovered back at home that I didn't have any bigger pots, went out and didn't find any (hence the sundae ingredients; one can't go out for nothing, after all), and handled various emails and database updates.

And cried over "Wong Foo" which was on tv again; I hadn't seen it in years and had forgotten what a sweet film it is.

And read diaries. That's all I really want to do. I want to sit and read diaries until my butt is three feet wide and exactly the shape of my chair. Okay?

Will is coming on Friday and I'm wondering how the visit will go. So many ways to think, so many choices. Or, choosing nothing and letting it be. I know there are some profound thoughts deep in my head but I can't get them out. I'm having dreams about my dad, dreams about my mom (she looks really young now, and she's been to Hawaii). I'm reluctant to answer the phone. I'm in escape mode because we've been so busy and I'm feeling the need for down time. Trying to grab as much of that as possible.

I want to make sure I tell Will that I had The Talk with Dar after that phone conversation with him (Will) a while back; I want him to know that he gave me the last modicum of courage I needed to bring everything up, and that I appreciate his caring enough to support me. I also want to invite Will to my sister's for dinner, because he wanted to meet my family before (when he couldn't come to the birthday party) and she wants to meet him. We'll have to have a special menu; because of the cardiomyopathy he can't eat any salt at all. In addition, Rose is vegetarian, so I suspect it'll be a very... well, lemon-peppery-tofuey dinner. Anyway, we're all so busy I don't know when we'd even be able to plan it; but I want to extend the invitation anyway. It's a chance for two things: a) to see him for more than an hour at a time, and b) to get feedback from Rose, who is smart and compassionate and provides the glue that keeps my life together, and, having finally met him face to face, she will be able to tell me what she thinks of him. It will also give me proof that Will exists, in a way, that I didn't make him up.

I remind myself that I can get to know him now. I think that I've almost forgotten how to do that, to get to know someone, and then I think, no, you're just so attracted to him that you forget you're SUPPOSED to get to know him, nitwit. Just relax. But we have so little time, I cry; once every month or two for an hour is not even a real friendship. How can life be so short, and so drawn out, at the same time?

Yet, I don't want these meetings to be heavy, all heavy and emotional and deep and profound and (yawn) full of angst and buried longings and suboceanic tremors and (yawwwwwwn) tremblingly revealed secrets and held breaths and silent, excruciating hoping (zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz)...

I have to find a balance between speaking my truth - and there is a lot of it and it's loud and booming and it echoes in vast spaces - and skirting along on top of the water, being glad for the breeze and the warm sunlight. I run deep. It's part of my pact with myself that I won't deny that any more. I wish I were more like people that I know who don't let what others may think of them shape the way they express themselves. Maybe that's what I see in those large black women full of spirit. They are so unafraid, and so present. Can I be there with myself every minute? Saying, okay, you feel this? Don't cringe? Somehow I think it is tied in with the breath. I just have to remember to breathe.