any time at all

i hit the wrong button. good luck with that.

Wieniawski Etudes

last week this time i was full of it. one week later, deflated. i'm home and i miss my life.

*

fuck this shit. how does everyone else but me find a way to make it work? so tired of all this crap...esp since i still have a minor headache from last week. done.

correlli, vivaldi, whatever.

at some point tonite i realized how stupendously idiodic this all is. i get back from three days trying to figure out where my life went (thank you ATL) and then i set myself up for the idocy of hosting a party for my restaurant fold because they want their potato cakes.

so here i am still just trying to put stuff away and minorly concerned about all that crap and...well, i guess shit happens, you listen to old tapes and remember that you still care.

especially about everyone else.

*

listening to 400 years of the violin. so majestic, so clean, so pure.

tell me why you cry

and why you lie to me

*

trying to work out my schedule for this week is a bitch. i talked with my GM here in ATL (also one of the company directors...she knows her shit) and hopefully i'll get out on Tuesday early enough to be able to get the train that night rather than on Wednesday. otherwise i've got four hours on Wednesday/Thursday a.m. to do laundry, repack, and get my ass back on board that morning. i swear, this sucks. thing is, i originally had Tuesday off. whatever.

*

restaurant openings are fun, especially when you already know 95% of what's going on. wish i could do them all the time.

*

here's what sucks: i finally get all my crap back in one place, and then i'm on the road for nearly three weeks. all i want to do is get my life organized again for the first time in years and i just don't have the time. hell, i'm not even there.

we held each other close that night

we prayed it would last forever

*

damn modern technology. i somehow found a quote from a movie that i like that actually sums up everything with the x and i can't get it in here. so close yet so far. it basically goes like this:

in hindsight, i realize all our good times were based around two things, sex and watching tv in bed.

regardless, i still highly recommend LA Story. the second to last good thing he did in the 90's (can't forget The Spanish Prisoner).

*

still no tv, but i'm finding this to be ok since the next three weeks are on the road. i've watched movies i forgot about (The Celebration) and others i'm finding i like simply for their score anymore (Highlander). i look at my place now and am amazed: i have so little, yet have more than i thought. my desk, bitch that it is, finally here. my great-aunts dining room set, the most comfortable green sectional you'll ever sleep on (i should know)...music, clothes, books, things i forgot about and stir memories of such things i tossed aside.

*

and i look at myself in the mirror, scrawled with my plans for tomorrow...so much to do, so little time. dry-erase markers are great, btw. my typewriter is on my desk for the first time in 5 years. i cleaned out most of the drawers a few days ago but the financials, need to find out about those. seven years? what do i know.

*

the one thing i've learned from the past several years of having my life in storage: hold that which you hold most valuable close and never let go.

if it was any other year

or any other life

*

it sucks to be still this mobile at this late age. i'm 33 for fucks sake. as far as i'm concerned, i've seen and done a few things: the Badlands once a decade, multiple religions, several cars, a couple careers, how to cook pasta, a good alfredo, quasi-decent taste in music, how to adapt to the surroundings with no help...still makes for a lonely existance.

*

i'm actually thinking of a house party here in the next few months...need to get my shit in order but at least i'm trying...

i'm in a mood for you

or running away....

*

it's all falling away, this life...making me realize things i don't like to admit. the loss and gain of everything, it's...so strange. i look beyond my bedroom and i see my desk, a thing, yet it makes me happy. i didn't even know what i had in there until today. a little time and forgetfulness makes everything right.

i recall all these cards, letters, hopes for a better me, and i'm resolved again to do something better. it's an uphill battle.

i just took my two sleeping pills

and now i'm like a bridegroom standing at the altar

*

random notes from having one's lifetime crap in one place for the first time in over 4 years:

1. don't assemble IKEA bookcases at 5 a.m. you will end up with bruises on your palms and wrists from getting those pegs to line up.

2. moving stuff that was comfortable in a 1200 sq. ft. place to one that is barely over 800 sq ft. is daunting at best, let alone impossible. ditched a dresser even before it came inside (although it did make the trip down...)

3. one invariably ends up with odds and ends that have no place: eight glass plates that go ??? books that the x will want back... randomness keeps popping up everywhere.

4. sorted thru the crap in my desk...so much stuff that i'm surprised i cared about. intervention letter from an x right before i left the church (toss), letters from dead relatives (keep, depending on circumstance), old bills and checks (how long do you need to keep this crap? 7 years?), crazy shit (i have six Zippo lighters but my one-hitt...hey, who's reading this?).

5. the worst thing is realizing how much you lost. i had this other space where i pretty much mailed out some keys to people long forgotten and they picked thru everything and then i sold everything else. kinda forgot that my box of Theroux was there, all my cookbooks, the philosophy, the religion, a few speakers, and the sound system. at least i sold the bike beforehand (still a bad choice in hindsight, i could have thrown it in the other storage unit...). live and learn.

6. it's weird to walk into a place with stuff in it, let alone my stuff. especially after not having any of it for so long. i've been so used to not having anything that having anything is, well, wrong.

7. what really sucks is how many books i don't have anymore. probably half, at least. sux sux sux.

8. no lights either. all lamps gone. no story for that. who knows.

9. geez. pots and pans, flatware, cutting boards, i had this great set from the 1950's for Irish Coffee, cups, holders, even an ice bucket and carafe...gone.

10. what did i gain? my life, in one place, for the first time in a few years, and looking at my time in WI as my lost years. gone personally, and only existing to fill out my resume.

i have two copies each of The Collected Poems Of Robert Service and Seven Years In Tibet. let me know and they are yours.

*

i'm in ATL next week thru 7/14, and then back in DC on the 16th. and in the meantime i'm trying to update my resume shit just so i know where i've been. that really sucks.