gabe

It's always a nice feeling to exclaim "What the -" when heading out somewhere. Today it happened just before I wandered into a five-block street fair. I had some DVDs to return to the library and decided to fold a visit to Sakura Park into the trip, and on the way there, a street fair blocked my way. I had to park the bike and go on foot, which I'm not complaining about. It gave me the chance to taste a couple small-batch distilleries' bourbons.

One vendor said he drank his stuff neat. I asked if there was any other way to drink it, and he liked that. He commented on very harsh commercial bourbons and I said they're good in marinades, they burn off, and he really liked that. It got me moving, and I worked my way through the crowds, glancing around and enjoying the bright colors and sounds before stepping out to the much quieter streets. No traffic, no noise. It made the park even more pleasant once I got there.

There's some lilacs blooming, and the cherry trees are in enough variety for staggered blooms. Some are in full leaf and a good number are in heavy bloom. The gazebo's got several sparrow nests in the eaves. Biking back, I took the route by Riverside Park, and the entirety of that cherry collection is still in hard color. No reports on sparrow nests in those trees, though those might be ones who take traffic light apartments.

A sour note came when I went somewhere to buy coffee, ordering a cold brew without ice, and when someone called out they had a medium iced coffee, I kept waiting. The person behind the bar asked if it was mine; I said it wasn't, and it turned out they'd made that one in error thinking it was what I'd ordered. I'm more than a little puzzled about that.

I got the date wrong on an appointment. I knew I had something on the 22nd, as well as the adjacent week, but I'd forgotten it was the week of the 29th, not today. I understand how I made that mistake and I'm not sure what to do to keep it from happening again, other than writing it down in a dedicated weekly planner instead of on a post-it note.

But, I ran a couple errands I'd wanted to get done. I found that swings got installed at Lincoln Center for the summer and rode one for a few minutes, and now I know they're around for another sunny day sometime soon. I was able to visit a grocery store near where my appointment would've been held and got a few things there on discount - a couple dollars less than the prices at my usual store, and while the leftover dollars went to fancy coconut water, it about balanced out. Walking downtown, someone I met at a party recognized me from the street and called out my name and we had a nice little chat. I took the time I would've spent at the appointment, went home, and got some good writing done ahead of going out tonight.

So all in all, I'm not upset about how things went today.

There's some satisfaction in realizing that between the canned tomatoes, canned beans, rice, frozen vegetables, garlic, herbs, and spices around my apartment, dinner's something I can throw together for the next couple of nights while working around a couple of obligations keeping me from investing the usual amount of time into cooking the evening meals.

I don't mind the obligations - I'm genuinely looking forward to some of them - but the timing would have me choose between cooking into the evening or working on writing, and I'm pleased I won't have to make that call.

You know it's a good concert when you need two days to recover. I didn't do a lot of dancing because it got pretty packed at the end, but I did my share. At first, there was some worry about it filling up, but then I found out there were two opening acts and it made more sense. I didn't give up my spot right up front at the stage, though. There wasn't any taking me away from that.

I was the twelfth person in line about 15 minutes before doors opened. I chatted some with the people in front of me and the person behind me about things like subway lines, the last round of Voxtrot concerts about three years ago, the round about 16 years before that, how the average age of Bruce Springsteen fans stays consistent because he keeps getting new fans, stuff like that. I had to pass through a metal detector and said, "No pockets, no problem." Waiting for the floor to open, several people ahead of me got their phones scanned, but somehow I got skipped over. I waited for it and then was told we could walk right in. So I went up front row center, if there were rows. Center stage, certainly. Right in the middle.

I took pictures of people on request and kept chatting. One of the women to my left kept checking social media and I had to ask her, "Does it spark joy?" One of the men to my right was glad I reminded him of the Artemis splashdown, which was why during the first songs of the first opening act, on a cell phone propped up against a speaker, we watched the last four minutes of the mission, every parachute accounted for. It had me feeling a lot of things, and I still need to sit with it.

The first opening act was a four-person jam band, kind of like Explosions in the Sky meets Bon Iver. The second opening act was one man with a guitar, and because I was right up front, when he mentioned how nobody knew where Halifax was, he heard me when I exclaimed, "The Maritimes!"

There was some waiting. There was judging on when to go to the bathroom, the etiquette of saving spots, the general vibe of everyone being there for the same reason. There was some chatting about travel plans and museums and software engineering and public transportation infrastructure. I saw someone put out the setlists and didn't look on purpose so I'd be surprised. I chatted some more to keep myself distracted, and then I saw Voxtrot come out. I'd seen the first two opening acts come in and go out through a side door to the stage so I knew where to look. I kept checking, and I saw some light coming through.

And I saw the silhouette of a man whose work I've loved for years.

He introduced himself and his band. He talked about playing the same location about 20 years ago. I looked behind myself to take in the audience in the soft blue-white light, just a glimpse of all the happy faces behind me, around me, surrounding me on the dance floor and the flanking wings and the mezzanine. Then I looked at the stage and didn't look away. There wasn't anywhere else to look.

We all sang along. We all knew the words and more than a few times, I realized I was hearing the crowd just as much as the lead singer. I sang and shouted, I swayed, I moved a bit, and then I started dancing as much as I could on a packed floor. Jumping up and down, rocking my arms, pumping my fists in the air, not a lot of stuff moving back and forth or forward and back, but in the unit of space I had, I made the most of it. A few times I wondered if I was given more space because of my braid swinging around. Then I stopped wondering and kept on dancing. Having the stage to brace myself against meant I could seriously jump. Being so close meant I could see everything as it was happening, and it was a thrill to be so close I could feel the music just as much as I heard it.

They played some new songs and a bunch of old ones. They went pretty far back, going all the way to the first song on their first EP to the last song on the latest album, so they really ran through everything. They played the hits and they played the songs they'd come around to knowing were hits all along - all killer no filler, as the saying goes. The energy was carefully cultivated, building everyone up to make sure that when they ended on a party note, a big-sound song for dancing, we would go home with spirits running high. They talked about where songs had been written, how the tunes developed, and one of the best things about live bands is seeing how it's all done. Hearing a specific set of notes and seeing the guitarist or the bassist or the drummer make those notes as I watch, looking at their hands on their instruments and putting it all together that yes, it's human hands all along.

The band danced up on stage, jumping around or simply grooving to it. There were a couple songs where the singer conducted the audience's clapping along, and it was clear all five of them meant everything they were doing. They were having a grand time up there and played in both senses, the musical and the fun.

I didn't get a chance to print the ticket, so after the encore, I grabbed a setlist. I made it back just before midnight, grabbing pizza to eat with ice cream to get my body to slow down some and some high proof bourbon I've had saved for a very special occasion because I couldn't think of an occasion more special than seeing Voxtrot.

In less than an hour, I leave to see Voxtrot. It's hard for me to understand, even as nervous as I am about it, even though I'm already dressed up for dancing at a concert. When I first started listening, they were already over, and a band getting back together after so many years apart isn't something that happens. It just isn't. This is almost too much to take in. I'm getting tingles. I've been listening to both their albums over and over this week. I don't think they're going to play previously unknown material, as I've heard a few other bands do before - City Swans by Neko Case, for example - but I don't know how far back they're going to go. It could go all the way back to their EPs. It could be a playthrough of the second album. I'll find out when they start playing.

Does Dreamwidth load slowly for anyone else? If I'm opening it in a new tab, it takes a measurably longer amount of time to load up than, say, anything else on the internet. It could be something on my end - I mostly want to gather data right now.

The mourning doves stopped by my place today, cooing loud enough to make it seem worthwhile for me to call back to them and greet them in return. Spring keeps arriving.

I know you're supposed to meet works where they are, and there's some where I can't manage that. I had an appointment this morning and wanted something easy and light that wasn't all that many pages so it'd easily fit in the backpack. I'd picked up Red White and Royal Blue off a stoop some weeks ago, so I didn't even need to wait for a library hold - just grab it off a stack and stick it in there. It started out as little better than "just okay" but I still wanted to know firsthand what the fuss was about. The voices were flat, the drama felt cheap, and I kept going. Then it got to a moment where the main character thinks of his mother by her first name. Firmly in his point of view, suddenly shifting from "his mother" to her first name. We're given no indication his is the kind of family to do that. Any decent editor looking to maintain tone and voice should've picked it up and requested a change.

Threw me right out of the book twenty pages in. I didn't literally throw it because I was in a waiting room, but I certainly stuffed it into my backpack with enough force to count.

It didn't have be bad, either. While it suffers when put next to the other novel I'm reading, Clockers by Richard Price, pretty much everything suffers when put next to that one. But this could be better, and end up as good a possible version of this story as possible. Do more. Try harder. Deepen and broaden your goals. Be better.

I may keep reading out of spite. If this got onto a shelf, then clearly it's not because my own writing isn't good enough to do the same, it's a problem with me not pitching to more agents and the industry being less and less willing to gamble. I know I'm better than this. It's not a problem on my end, and if nothing else, this book is solid confirmation of that.

Starting tomorrow, I'll have a full week and change where every day has some obligation or appointment, one Tuesday to another. Movie tickets, dentist visits, concerts, a whole bunch of stuff. Making a cake, too, though that's more within the bounds of my apartment and doesn't require me to show up anywhere besides the grocery store, and even then it's just to buy some fresh ingredients.

Is it strange I'm looking forward to it? There's parts that are going to be slightly inconvenient, and I'm looking forward to some things more than others, and overall I'm liking the idea of having places to go, things to do. Things to get done, really.

I started the at-home cataloging gig today. I didn't do much, just a few entries, because I wanted to touch base with the client as soon as was possible within the timeline of the project. I'm waiting on a response to let me know if it's what he wants, or what he wants changed. Certainly having other things to occupy my time is going to make waiting for an email or a phone call that much easier. There's only going to be so much Lunar live footage before they have to come back to Earth.