May 09, 2005

10:21 a.m.

My Litany of Complaints

1. We just spent the whole weekend playing at a festival where the accommodations sucked, I couldn't hear myself for 3 out of 4 appearances (sound anomalies), and we made no money. I mean, the money we made didn't cover the expenses to get there. AND they took 10% of our meagre CD sales. It was like... not working for the weekend. I could have stayed home. I mean, I made about $67 and drove 14 hours. And Carol was so into it. Into the community of it all, the networking, the sharing. I said, hey, you know, rent?

I'm not a community oriented person.

And then there was the traffic on the way home. I got in about 1:30am after a seven hour drive, much of which was in very congested traffic.

And my stomach was dicey all weekend, which leads me to #2.

2. My stomach. I now have a predictably recurring stomach ailment which doesn't seem to be an ulcer and doesn't seem to be reflux, and is not exactly responding to Prevacid any more. It hurts. When it hurts I can't eat, and nothing helps it. I had to curtail a rare visit with Dar a couple of weeks ago because of it.

3. Money. Oh, money. I'm going broke. How can I be this busy and not be making enough money to live? I'll have to get a job by end of summer at this rate, and not sure how to effect that, as much of my midweek is involved with touring as it is.

4. Stress. I hate leaving home now. We haven't had a great gig in some time, and I no longer look forward to them. I still like actually playing them (when I can hear myself), but everything else seems a drag.

5. Ambivalence. You know I went on this retreat last month, and a lot of stuff came up over that, and then I took the initial Reiki training, and that was stunning -- and it seems that all that might have stirred up things inside that I'm trying to resolve, but mainly I'm still so angry and bitter and depressed that it's affecting my outlook on my relationship with Steve. I was doing pretty well, imagining maybe someday moving up there, and he wants to enlarge his house so I can have a space of my own, and it would be cozy and financially more feasible, oh what good companions we'd be, blah blah blah. But now I've swung back in the other direction. I can't imagine myself living with him any more. I'm rather disinterested in what before seemed like a really good solution, a good place for me to land, with someone who adores me and is willing to take the time and make the effort to make it work long term. We said, let's date for a year and reassess it. If we still want to be together by next Spring, maybe we'll break ground in your backyard.

I don't know what happened between then and now.

I felt something a few years ago, unlike anything I'd felt before. It was more than just passion -- we've all felt passion -- it was a personal magnetism, what? a karma, a chemistry, I don't even know what the HELL it was, but I don't feel any of that here and I miss it and I think it would be a big mistake to go forward without it.

I feel like I'm holding out.

I've had love that bowled me over, and I've had love that just grew like a slow plant, comfortable, soft, and unsurprising. It's not that I don't want comfortable; I just need surprising.

I haven't talked with Steve about this yet because I'm still forming my thoughts. And it's not that I don't want to keep seeing him. It's just that my relationship worldview has shifted. Something is missing and I can't even explain what it is. But I can't ignore it.

6. My schedule. My fucking schedule. Now it won't let up til the end of June. And we have another two week trip next month for negative money. I'm not exaggerating; we're losing money on two weeks of travel and "work." Oh, the exposure! The networking, the community! Then, when we DO get a break for two weeks at the beginning of July, it's because we have no work. I honestly don't know if I'll make the rent all summer.

********

On the brighter side, my brother-in-law bought me a massage table so I can practice Reiki without throwing my back out. It should arrive this week. We have to leave Thursday for the midwest, so I don't know if I'll actually get it by then. But he's generous and kind and saintly to have done it.

I'm going to go cry now.