Sigh – man, I’m just not in the mood. Heather’s been very sick and sounds like she’s coughing up bricks, Kristen thinks she’s coming down with something, which – if it’s what Heather’s had – means she’s going to be miserable. At the moment I’m holding my ground and simply can’t afford to get sick in the middle of it all. Going to SERFA in this condition is… not ideal.
The sky is hanging low and everything is grey and green as we skate through North Carolina, leaving our friends’ house in the rear view mirror and setting our sights on Black Mountain, NC. I think none of us are quite in the mood for the next couple of days. Hopefully we’ll rise to it, but it’s kind of a hard thing to ensure. I guess different people have different ways of dealing with it. Heather and Kristen are pretty confident that we’ll all get up the gumption for at least three days of almost 100% social on-ness, but having just watched a couple of Mike Judge’s music documentaries (these are really amazing) it sure seems like some of the approaches of Waylon Jennings might not be inappropriate for the next several days.
No. I’m not REALLY thinking that cocaine is the answer, but there may be a fair uptick of coffee and sugar in my intake over the course of the conference.
One thing that has come to weigh heavily on my mind, totally unrelated to SERFA but effecting my brain and my emotions and my sleep : one of the regulars at my open mic at Teavolve has been becoming a problem, is now a full-out PROBLEM and though I’ve begun picking at the issue, it’s really going to have to become a full out confrontation soon.
He’s one of the more socially unaware people that I’ve ever known – which isn’t totally a fair thing to say – it’s more accurate to say one of the most socially unaware people that I’ve ever had to associate with regularly . And though I’ve resisted throwing him out… he’s frankly making it really easy for me at this point, though I’m still dreading the confrontation.
Proudly for two years he’s been coming to the open mic, always performs second, leaves shortly after he performs, doesn’t purchase anything, at this point has become the “creepy old guy” who hovers over people (especially women) to the point that the staff have asked me to make sure he doesn’t sit up front and to demand he doesn’t speak to anyone other than people there for the open mic (that was the conversation I had with him two weeks ago)… HE talks to me about how he’s been pushed out of substitute teaching because people have accused him of saying inappropriate things to students and is just … yeah, when I put it all together it’s something I should have dealt with a long time ago.
And that’s weighing on me. Because when it comes down to it, I’m aware that this is probably the only social thing this man does – but his lack of social niceties is not my problem to solve, the discomfort he’s causing within my community is. So – yeah, gonna have to deal with that and going over that conversation over and over in my head is causing me lack of sleep. It sticks in my braincraw.
And even at this moment, rather than leave Monday’s problems for Monday, I’m giving that time in my head rather that making sure I’m firmed up for tonight’s official showcase, or the next several days’ guerilla showcases. Places where, frankly I’m an old white guy in a shifting environment where through no fault of my own I feel myself to be increasingly (at least visually) representative of the powers that be that must be deposed to allow for an influx of new blood.
Yeah – all the crap that lead to Trumpism? I grasp it. But it’s all in how you react. Lead by example. And root out the bad ones.
