3/15/2006 - Photojournal - Austinsconsin

This is the longest I've gone without writing something on this techno-contraption since September, when things started falling apart.

I've noticed, in my case, that it's difficult for me to write down my thoughts when things are going well. This past weekend was a blur of adventure and the next few months (and more likely a lifetime) will most likely promise the same.

Sometimes you're left so satisfied that the words escape you, or you feel it is impossible to do justice to the story... but I'll attempt to re-cap for the same reason I write about the low times- in an effort to document the beautiful little intricacies and details I've experienced in my short time on this planet- gathered like a storyteller's palettethat I may usesome day to tell a story that brings a tear or a smile, or a moment of connect- anything worthwhile like that is worth the effort.

In time's transgressions these sorts ofdetails lay dormant and rarely ignited... all we remember is 'this was good', or 'that was not-so-good'- and it is impossiblefor us to remember that it was once so much more.There is something magical about forgetting... and being given a chance to remember. It adds a richness to your life that spans beyond anything you ever thought you knew at any given moment.I like to think I'm storing all this for a perpetually incomplete project- what I used to think of as My Great Masterpiece, and what I now think of as Just My Life.

Toben and Ross came into town on Tuesday and I did not sleep for a few days in an effort to maximize hanging-out-time while still working. It was absolutely fascinating to spend time with Toben in my hometown. It is hard to explain, and somewhat relates to what I said earlier- in our lives chapters close and others open, and it is always stunning to see a character from one part of your life in a time and place that seems to be happening to a completely different person (me) in a completely different place (here... now). It is like turning around and suddenly seeing yourself, or rather, the person you were, staring equally perplexed right back at you.

It is not necessary for me to say that I was happy to see Tobe. But there it is.

The first night was spent laying low with spliffs and Shiners. Toben taught me to play a beautiful waltz on the guitar as Ross photographed the whole thing with his amazing camera and even more amazing eye. It was 6am before I knew it and time for me to go to work.

The next night we ate barbeque at the Railhead and then had some whiskey and beer atthe White Elephant Saloon and played some shuffleboard;back home,I was delirious from drink and lack of sleep but heard good conversation out my window and walked out to see two really Good Wisconsin boys sharing beers with my Cambodian neighbor and explaining their passion for puppetry and filmas my neighbor sipped his beer with wide eyes. I told them I wished they would sit on my porch every night, and talk about such beautiful things. Tobe showed me a music video for death cab for cutieby our friend Ace that brought a tear to my eye.

Friday I rented a little red Dodge Neon and picked up Ollie and Lynne for our adventure in Austin. We got to the Dobie Theatre just in time to plant ourselves in seats next to Toben and company as the lights went out.

It was a music video screening at SXSW and it escapes words so I will not attempt. Later that night tossed juice boxes out the window and into Craig's truckbed where Toben and Ross were sitting to follow them to the SXSW opening party. Drank quite a bit of whiskey and Lone Star on a free tab and played foosball with strange filmmakers that hailed from all over. They play foosball just like anyone else. Except those Wisconsin boys, they were pros.

Got to dance around with Tobe in a drunken frenzy which was fantastic, because nobody else can dance like Toben. Played some pool with Ross and ran upstairs just in time to see Toben give a security guard a friendly slap on the cheek, get harnessed by the nape and escorted roughly out of the bar.

We'd lost Ollie and Lynne (both underage) in the frenzy, but luckily they found their way back, they said, to Brown Sugar by the Rolling Stones blaring off the old record player and a general good-hearted rowdy house. I don't remember much of this part, but I do remember being thrown over Toben's shoulder and chipping a mug on his forehead, giving him a goose egg on the noggin. It was an accident. I felt bad, but it was funny and Toben is okay. Later, belligerently rough-housing with Ollie and Lynne, tackling and wrestling. Man do I love a good wrastle when I drink whiskey.

The next morning was bleary eyed and blurry with shirtless wisconsinites basking in the humid noonday Austin sun on the back porch... the dog (Cash) quietly seeking affection and hot coffee in ceramic mugs.

The boys went to some more film screenings and Ollie, Lynne and I wandered blissfully the city of Austin, no map necessary, because of lack of destination, finding little treasures all along the way. It did not take me long to fall in love with Austin. There is an energy to it- an at-home feeling-that I have not felt since Portland, only with the familiar grit of all that is Texas. It made me proud to be Texan so I bought a pair of beat-up cowboy boots.

That night we loaded a cooler full of beer and met everyone out at the Salt Lick, a gigantic barbeque house 40 minutes outside of Austin with an hour and a half wait blissfully spent drinking coolerbeer and playing/talking/listening to the country band/boot-tapping.

The Salt Lick is an all-you-can-eat barbeque mecca. The food is fantastic. Five of the boys ordered the all-you-can-eat barbeque, determined to get 'the meatsweats'. They served the kind of plates of meat you'd see in the Flintstones- tip-the-wagon-over-heaping.

On the way back to the city, took a beef-coma nap in Craig's truckbed with Nate and Toben, boots hanging off the tailgate next to the beer cooler, big-eyed Moon shrouded in veils of grey clouds as our ceiling,traditional americana folk tunes blaring out of the cab of the truck, which was kicking up dust every which way. It was a tranquil, perfect moment Only In Texas.

Went to an after-party for a screening after dinner but it was difficult to get drunk/rowdy at a bar with all the meatsweats going around. We hadn't the energy, only the euphoria. So we headed home for what looked like might be an early night, but then the guitars (and banjoes... and harmonicas... and washboards... and drums) came out and a 'jam session' unfolded that completely escapes words.

It all happened so naturally. A microphone set gently in the center of the room as old friends spoke and took turns playing in such a fluid fashion that it could never be duplicated as a performance. Ifelt so luckyto witness it. Craig, Chris (I think that was his name... from American Graveyard in Austin), and Toben, taking turns playing and singing in their own ways, rotating instruments, Cale on the banjo, Craig on the washboard- my little Eileen getting a blessed amount of play. Ross woke from his slumber ("Sounded real good") and began to shoot photographs of the whole thing.

We were up until six in the morning and I was ecstatic, getting a generous dose, in every way, of everything I'd been needing and wanting and lacking in my life for the past few months. Which is not to say that I have not been satisfied- I have found inspiration in every dark damp corner and concrete landscape.

It just felt so rich. I felt so rich. I FEEL so rich.

I left the next morning, blissfully reflecting on that past week's events andenjoying the company of Ollie and Lynne, two of the most beautiful girls I've ever spent a length of time with. Everything worked out perfectly, in every way. Because we just knew it would, and so it did.

There is a lot more to this story lost between the cracks of my flawed memory, and edited for the sake (unsuccessfully) of brevity. I speak of remembering things in terms of 'it was good' and 'it was not so good'- as if it werean over-simplifiedthing- but- it's just as much the truth as any detailed account would be.

It was good. Let it all fall through the cracks, because the feeling never will.

____________

I've thought about it and decided to move to Austin instead, not because I've given up on NYC. But because it feels right, and because sometimes omens pull us in directions we never expected.

I'm in love with the city and I barely even know it. Sometimes though, it just feels right. Only time can tell if that love is a lasting love. Even if it's not in the end- which most likely it will not be, because I have a tendency to wander... I still love it right this moment. Right now it is real, and right now it is right.

Spent last night playing guitar with Amanda, and it was wonderful and amazing and new, because we are at the same skill level and we could play for hours together (we did).

She convinced me to run down to Austin for the day for a bit of shenanigans, which I could not turn down, in spite of hair dying with Sally and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. You do thoughtless stupid things when you're in love, I guess. I leave in a few hours.

My ex's cousin IMed me a few days ago asking why I don't talk to him anymore. It seemed obvious to me, although I hold no malice or ill-feeling in any way towards him, or even my ex. It is a closed chapter. There is nothing more to say. He asked how I was, and I told him I was happy with my life. He told me to keep fooling myself, and I couldn't help but laugh.

It is truly a gift to be given the chance to love your life as an individualhuman being- to experience life knowing that you are complete even (and especially) when you are completely on your own. Maybe that's difficult to understand from any other perspective. But that's the charm of the whole situation... it's so good to me, and only I know that... and its validity can not be proven outside of the confines of my mind and heart, nor does it need to be.

Although it is perplexing to me why Mike even contacted me, it's unimportant. The low blow was no blow- as my distance from that part of my life is more than just physical. The good memories are like reading a good book. Nick is a character in a story now, and I'm sure, if I have even been committed to his memory, that the same goes for me.The bad memories- they're just a real simple story:

"It was not-so-good. But things are better now."