This week’s been a back and forth, kind of frenetic, followed by hurry-up-and-wait kind of week. I’ve had them before. I’m suffering an almost vertiginous sense of deja vu as I write this. I’m sure I’ll write it again.
This week’s been a back and forth, kind of frenetic, followed by hurry-up-and-wait kind of week. I’ve had them before. I’m suffering an almost vertiginous sense of deja vu as I write this. I’m sure I- holy shit!
That’s neither here nor there. It feels like I’ve not been DOING terribly much this past week, and yet I spent a lot of time recouping from that nothing. Perhaps it’s the heat. Perhaps it’s the frustration. Perhaps, sans gigs and opportunities to get off the couch it’s the fact that I’m not getting off the couch enough, or perhaps it’s the fact that this past week I’ve actually been quite good about getting up and working out.
With this morning as a flopsome, bodily-exhausted, guiltily quiet (or quietly guilty) exception.
Yessssss. I’m looking over at that mantis-like exercise machine, bought with the best of intent, and I’m saying unto it : not today Satan. Not today.
I’ve been working hard at getting up and pushing my body into motion, watching an instructional video of some sort, pushing my mind with said input if not the more typical inspirational throbbing music that most use to push the body. I figure as long as I’m working up a sweat and getting my heart rate up I’m doing the job. As long as the joints of the machine get hot enough to burn a bit as I put it back against the wall, as long as I’ve got to take a shower afterwards, as long as all of that is happening, I’m not sinking into sedentary slackerdom.
The attraction of just SINKING is very, very strong though.
This past Monday I went to see my doctor, and though I’d been really bad about doing ANYTHING he’d told me to do since the last time we crossed paths, my blood pressure’s in a much better place and the “concerns” were pretty much limited to the usual medical scoldings of “eat better, sleep more, exercise” and general low-burning concerns about my mental health. As usual we spend most of our time together chatting. About Texas, COVID, fear, sex. His Nigerian accent gives me a level of comfort that is finally overwhelming my Lifelong distrust of doctors and as usual there seems to be an awful lot of mental to my physical.
Then that night, fresh bandages on my skin, I joined the Virtual Open Mic and VOMmed it up with my friends. It was theoretically a new-song night, but I think only one person brought one to the table. A lot of us had worked on the topic “Never Too Wrong” but no one but Kyla Tilley brought anything to completion. She continues to be an inspired (and inspiring) writer that I hope to meet in person one day.
Heh. Tuesday I was low-grade stressed because my calendar had “Sandy… “ on it which kept making me think I had a Sandy Spring Museum meeting or gig or SOMETHING that I kept forgetting about, but it was “just” my old friend Sandy’s birthday. Shame that whole colour-coding thing doesn’t work for me.
Wednesday was magnificent, playing with SONiA disappear fear. Jamming on a bunch of her songs, getting to know her, simply enjoying her presence. We played through the thunderstorms, Live from the Living Room Above the Lair and really had a great time. A bit more traffic than usual, a LOT of fun… I hope that that develops into something. But as with all relationships, I know I’ve got to cultivate it. Generally speaking all of us grownups have ENOUGH friends…
I filled in the cracks of the week with video production work for Institute of Musical Traditions, graphics for the City of Takoma Park, audio work for Sandy Spring Museum, and advertising, advertising, advertising.
It was the weekend that finished me off, both mentally and physically. Mentally, Saturday has been looming for quite some time, weighing on me. I was pretty excited about the FocusMusic show with Annette Wasilik and Gabrielle Zwi. I was going to finally sort out how to say Gabrielle’s name. I was gonna jam with Annette. We WERE gonna sell lots of tickets.
And none of it happened. Though we blamed COVID, privately, it was in the sense that “we sure hope COVID fears kept everyone from buying tickets” and canceled the show the morning-of. I was ashamed at how little interest the gig had garnered and I’ve got to admit I spent most of Saturday simply thinking “this is it, this is the day I simply QUIT – this is the day I stop lying to myself and throw in the towel”.
Hey. But I got up. I attacked the mantis-like exercise machine. I learned from my instructional videos and quite literally pulled my weight.
Keep on keepin’ on.
What else am I gonna do? Just sit here?
No, because this week’s been a back and forth, kind of frenetic, followed by hurry up and wait kind of week. Thank goodness for Sunday, but that’s a different story.