July 15, 2004

11:07 p.m.

The Butterfly Conservatory

...is where Dar and I went today, along a circuitous route that included lunch with my brother in law, Mike, one of his coworkers, and a poet named Magdalena. We ate at a really excellent Vietnamese restaurant in Springfield. Mike has been all hyped up on Magdalena since he saw her perform her poetry at the college. She's hard hitting, streetwise, and political. He gave me her poetry CD and I loved her voice -- she's an actress as well, and she uses her voice beautifully, switching characters and attitudes in a blink, one second down & dirty and the next, spreading those intermediate "A"'s like butter over white bread. It was interesting to have lunch with her and her friend (Mike's coworker) and hear them talk about their passionate views -- about most of which subjects I have, in comparison, only tepid or poorly informed opinions -- and I didn't feel I had a lot to contribute until toward the end when her friend asked for her phone number and Magdalena gave it, but confessed that she felt awkward on the phone and didn't really like talking on it. I turned to her and asked, "When did you decide it was all right to tell people you were uncomfortable on the phone?" because there was a point when I made the same decision -- gave myself permission, as it were, to not answer the phone if I didn't want to. We had an interesting exchange about that, and as we were all walking to our cars we talked about committed language (she'd seen the same Yogi Tea bag) and I told her about how I'd lost my voice on tour last year, and she suddenly asked me, "Do you dance?"

I said no, and she said, "You should! I don't know why I think that, but I feel compelled, almost like I'm channeling this, to tell you that you should be dancing!"

I told her she's the second person recently who has "channeled" that to me. My friend Red in Texas went to a psychic recently and when she asked about me, he told her I should be dancing.

I just never considered myself all that flexible or coordinated or... really, inventive about dance.

So what's up with the dancing?

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Then Dar and I drove up to Magic Wings in Deerfield, MA. They have an 8,000 square foot glass conservatory with thousands of butterflies wafting about among tropical flowers, a heart-shaped goldfish pond in the middle, and three Chinese Button Quail, which are VERY cute and run amok in the underbrush.

Aside from the many children who made plenty of noise, it was quite wondrous. We were only disappointed that no butterflies landed on us. But I got a lot of pictures and movies. They're very clear on telling people NOT to try and touch the butterflies. There have been fatal accidents (to the winged ones, not the people). I was very good and didn't break the rules.

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On the way back we stopped at a farm stand and got produce for dinner at Rose and Mike's. We also stepped into the Dinosaur and Fossil Store, a cheesy little building with a big fake dinosaur in front. We didn't see any actual dinosaurs inside, nor did we identify any real fossils, though there were some plaster reproductions among the shelves of very ancient and undusted rocks (which, we gathered, were for sale), the humorous cartoon kitties made from some unidentified fur, the "panning and mining" kits (complete with a bag of debris for your panning screen) and the completely unrelated, carved soapstone candlesticks. It was quite bizarre. I wondered we didn't see any ashtrays made of shells.

Once at my sibling's house we more or less relaxed, though the dog chaos is unending and Calvin the Shepherd still doesn't have ANY manners whatsoever. I'm starting to count on not having to move in with them at all, which makes me more anxious not to have heard from my friend Joan about an apt. opportunity in CT. She called all excited a couple of weeks ago, saying things about early birds catching worms, and since then I haven't been able to get a peep out of her.

We had a great dinner and I brought Dar back here for a little coffee for the road. I know my sister just wants to smack me in the head with a rolled up newspaper for not being in love with him, but that's the way it is. We have a lovely time, and then I want him to go home.

Anyway, after he left I finished writing out some sheet music and called it a night. Tomorrow I see if a luthier friend can take one of my guitars for a little work. I also want to see Farenheit 911, and tomorrow would pretty much be the day I could go.

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I had another dream that I had longer hair last night. It was just past my shoulders. I've had these dreams periodically ever since I had my hair cut short, and that was a few years ago. I hope growing it out, as I'm doing now, will complete something for me. I haven't a clue what it means.