Thursday, March 1, 2012

The Settling In

Minivan Morrison was a dutiful steed throughout the tour, though the space : luggage ratio was a bit awkward. We figured out early on the best method of packing would involve building a wall of supplies between the driver and the back of the van, which effectively soundproofed the front from the back. There was just enough space between the rows of equipment for three people, but today we will be adding a fourth en route to Richmond, VA.
I don't know how he fit in the back, there just wasn't enough room.
Today Or remarked that this was our last chance to turn around, and it was true. Once we broke through Virginia it would make more sense to keep going. For a fleeting moment with the madness of the last two nights still awake in me, home was all I wanted. But really, our apartment in Brooklyn was a shit hole and we'd just received word that a sewage pipe had broken in the basement, so I wasn't that anxious to return. We bought omelets at ihop.
Arrived in Richmond outside the Sprout and crawl our clustered bodies out from between seats and immediately outside a man stops us and starts rapping and Fernelly starts beatboxing and there's a recording of this somewhere and skinny means what you're bringing to the table. Exeunt and stash equipment on the stage and our host finds us for coffee and leads us down the road on his wobbling bicycle to his big beautiful house where Abi, Barry, Fernelly and he disappear into the basement for impromptu jam session, leaving Or and I on the porch as the sun sets.
Head to the venue early to take advantage of the delicious free food, great setup here, restaurant, bar, back room with stage, beautiful waitresses, menus on old record sleeves that look like heads. We meet the other band and they're from Queens and we're all wearing suspenders. By the time we play we are full and happy and this feels like we're finding a groove. A sudden a crowd materializes and when we play the reticence that usually takes half a set to break down is thrown asunder thanks to one unwieldy dancer who gets it from the first moment and then everyone is stomping and clapping and encouraging that divided man. You Bred Raptors closes the night and blows our minds, moving against light with a motion just as fast and doing it all in masks, such a wonderful meeting.
We return to the house to find a party in full swing taking place. The room with our suitcases is filled with the half clothed wild eyes of dancing girls and we sneak in and out and have a drink and join some people outside. And at the end of the stairs, the very bottom of the stairs, on the earth, someone is in a fully grown body but staid and arrested on their insides. This isn't an argument, it's something sadder that I refused to expect and don't know how to handle. Maybe best if it's dealt with as a bad smell and we wave it away, move to a different area if this will not leave, no?
Or, poised like a nun, balances the scattered equation and becomes brighter to me.
That's all I recall, I don't know where we slept. But we slept well.      

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