I feel like I need a vacation just from having been away for 8 days… plus catching that darn cold. But, alas. It’s not to be.
I know I’ve said this before, but I honestly can’t even imagine what a vacation would feel like, or where I would even go.
It, of course, has come to my attention that the first full-length staged reading of Tell My Bones will be happening in NYC directly before I’m supposed to oversee my first Writers Retreat at Villa Monte Malbe, so that’s interesting, right?
Not that it can’t be done. It certainly can. I’m mostly just concerned about what will likely be my intensely frazzled frame of mind. Going back to NYC, dealing with the rehearsals, then the actual reading and all that that will entail, then fly off to Italy, go deep into Perugia, all by myself, where I don’t speak the language (even though I study it every single darn day– the only way I will be any good at Italian is if everyone there just gives me written quizzes and doesn’t attempt to actually converse with me), then attempt to communicate with the staff at the retreat– the kitchen staff, housekeeping , none of whom, I’ve been assured, speak English; and then try to help about 15-20 writers that I won’t have met before have some sort of magical relaxing creative ethereal sort of experience.
You know, it’s always really important to me that when other writers work with me — either in a collaborative way, or they hire me to be their editor, or they come to me as a writing student — I always want the other person to find something truly expansive in that experience. Help people approach their writing in an empowering way, or maybe in a way that helps them understand themselves better as someone gifted and born to write. That type of thing. It matters a lot to me. I would rather not be out of my fucking mind while I’m trying to do that.
I guess we’ll see.
More wonderful photos out of Canada last night! This time, Toronto. Although I don’t think anything is going to compare with that theater in Montreal. (I’m speaking about the Conversations with Nick Cave, in case you’re new here and wondering what the fuck I’m suddenly talking about.)
Next he will be in Chicago — a mere 45 minutes from Crazeysburg!! (By plane, that is. ) I really like Chicago. I have some wonderful memories from the old historic Palmer House Hotel there!! And their Art Institute. I wish I were going…
Anyway. I’m gonna scoot here and get to work. I’m kinda hoping the Universe has something figured out for me because, left to my own devices, all I manage to do is work too much. Oh, and a web site for Tell My Bones will be forthcoming in the very near future, gang! Meanwhile, please follow the new facebook page:
Okay. Thanks for visiting, gang!! Have a super Sunday, wherever you are in the world!! I leave you with this true gem from Tom Petty’s Highway Companion solo album, “Square One.” I think he wrote it about himself & Dana, but then I think he wrote everything about Dana… She was his angel. Okay. I love you guys. See ya.
“Square One”
Had to find some higher ground.
Had some fear to get around.
You can’t say what you don’t know.
Later on won’t work no more.
Last time through I hid my tracks.
So well I could not get back.
Yeah my way was hard to find.
Can’t sell your soul for peace of mind.
[Chorus:]
Square one, my slate is clear.
Rest your head on me my dear.
It took a world of trouble, took a world of tears.
It took a long time to get back here.
Tried so hard to stand alone.
Struggled to see past my nose.
Always had more dogs than bones.
I could never wear those clothes.
It’s a dark victory.
You won and you are so lost.
Told us you were satisfied, but it never came across
Square one, my slate is clear.
Rest your head on me my dear.
It took a world of trouble, took a world of tears.
It took a long time to get back here.
Wow, the photos from Nick Cave’s Conversation in Montreal last night were positively STUNNING.
The theater itself was gorgeous, and he looked incredible on that stage. (And not meaning it as a backhanded compliment — that theater was so gorgeous that I think any one of us would have to work pretty darn hard to not look kind of stunning up on that same stage.)
Anyway. Every time I think a show looks like it was incredible, another batch of photos & comments comes through Instagram that makes another show seem even better.
This is the very reason why I need to be attending every single show. But I have this pesky thing called “my life” — you know? It’s always getting in the way. Needing things, like, my presence within it.
Wow. Okay.
This darn chest cold is not yet gone. But it really feels like today will be the last day of it. Meanwhile, though, my brain has not been able to really focus on those intricate details it needs to focus on in order to get the rewrites underway. But I’m not stressing. There is still time.
Yesterday, Gus Van Sant Sr got in touch with me again re: my trip to NYC and my meeting with Sandra and the director, and he did something that I can’t really discuss on the blog, but I can say that it absolutely blew my mind. He is so kind. So generous. And it came on the heels of that intense phone call with my dad, so what Gus did just felt even more like a miracle from Heaven, you know?
That man has been such a blessing to me. I don’t even want to think about what my life would have been like if he hadn’t walked up to me out of the blue that morning, not knowing me from anyone else on Earth, only going on something his barber had told him out at his country club — “I hear you’re a writer and that you need work. Do you want to come work for me?”
Oh my god — yes. I sure do. How amazing, right?
It changed everything in my world that was truly spiraling downward at that point. He is just the nicest man.
Well, okay. I actually have to scoot here, gang. I think I need to go back to bed for a little bit. I’m still sort of wiped out.
But have a super-duper Saturday, wherever you are in the world! Thanks for visiting. I leave you with this. I have no idea why I started suddenly listening to Let Love In again while driving home from NY, but I just love this album. It is truly a bonanza of darkness set to really excellent music. I love every song on this fucking album, even though I have to assume that the worst happened to every girl who’s ever left him. Like, in this song below, “She’s Nobody’s Baby, Now” — did he kill her? I mean, it seems like he killed her, right? Or somebody did. The entire album is like a Rape & Murder Festival, so it just sort of seems like she met with foul play. And that song “Thirsty Dog” just cracks me up. It is, like, just so deranged. The lyrics, I mean. Anyway. It’s such a cool album from God knows how many years ago now. But I leave you with “She’s Nobody’s Baby, Now”. Okay. I love you guys! See ya!
“Nobody’s Baby Now”
I’ve searched the holy books
Tried to unravel the mystery of Jesus Christ, the saviour
I’ve read the poets and the analysts
Searched through the books on human behaviour
I travelled the whole world around
For an answer that refused to be found
I don’t know why and I don’t know how
But she’s nobody’s baby nowI loved her then and I guess I love her still
Hers is the face I see when a certain mood moves in
She lives in my blood and skin
Her wild feral stare, her dark hair
Her winter lips as cold as stone
Yeah, I was her man
But there are some things even love won’t allow
I held her hand but I don’t hold it now
I don’t know why and I don’t know how
But she’s nobody’s baby now
This is her dress that I loved best
With the blue quilted violets across the breast
And these are my many letters
Torn to pieces by her long-fingered hand
I was her cruel-hearted man
And though I’ve tried to lay her ghost down
She’s moving through me, even now
I don’t know why and I don’t know how
But she’s nobody’s baby now
The chest cold lingers but I slept really great, all things considered. I only did that “lurch awake and suddenly hack my brains out” once during the night! Otherwise, I slept like a wee bonny babe.
I try not to take OTC cold remedies because I use Flonase due to allergies– that’s a steroid and has some indescribably horrific bad reactions when combined with most OTC cold remedies. I found that out the hard way — twice, because I didn’t know what had caused it the first time.
If you’ve never accidentally combined Flonase with OTC cold remedies, it feels like you’re heart is going to explode and like your lungs are collapsing and your whole chest starts heaving, as you try to get air. And that only goes on for about several hours.
So now, I do the apple cider vinegar stuff, the ginger-honey tea thing, the endless glasses of water, and good old-fashioned, delightfully-scented Vick’s VapoRub!! (It works, too, because, of course, Flonase is doing all the somewhat dicey chemical stuff…) (And by “dicey,” I mean that Flonase has a potential side effect of glaucoma.)
Anyway. So I’m better and I slept great. And I felt suitably armored to call my (adoptive) dad on the phone and tell him how my trip to NYC went.
If you’re not a regular reader of this lofty blog, my adoptive dad and I have a tumultuous relationship. That is putting it super mildly. I am always either in or out of the Will — depending on things like my politics any given year, and whether or not I use the ‘F’-word constantly. And a whole lot of other, way more serious stuff that I don’t want to go into here because it will just depress me beyond your abilities to comprehend.
Anyway. I try to be nice. And sometimes, he does, too. But I can never just pick up a phone and call him without suiting up in every conceivable type of armor there is — emotional, spiritual, psychological. Protective Voodoo chants and empowering aroma therapies. (I would put on the actual armor of the knights of yore, but it would make it ridiculously hard to use my iPhone, plus I don’t own any.)
But, seriously. I really have to do that kind of protective mental stuff before even picking up the phone. And when I told him how great the meeting went with the director, and what the plans were for the next 9 months, and how the meeting was just a great success, he said, “Can you imagine how devastating it would have been if everything had gone wrong?”
ME: “God. Dad, why would I want to think about something like that?!!”
I always have to erect this huge mental blockade against everything he says. He is so negative and sort of mean. (When I was almost 15, and really just at the nadir of my existence; Greg was dead, the boys at school would not stop assaulting me, I was taking 15 sleeping pills a day, etc., my dad was dropping me off after his monthly “taking me to dinner” and I was afraid to go back into the house and be alone with my mother, who was on this weird ‘punishment’ rampage, where I had to stay locked up in my room, 24/7, and I could only come out to eat my meals — and only when everyone else was done and had left the table; I couldn’t play records or watch TV or listen to the radio or talk on the phone or see anyone at all. Not even my brother. She allowed me to have my guitar in my room, but that was it. For a couple of weeks this went on, and my room was a hot little airless box that got up to about 100 degrees because it was the height of summer. Anyway. I was afraid to go back in there. And cut to the chase: my dad said, “You’re on your own here. There’s nothing I can do for you anymore. If you’re going to kill yourself, just kill yourself.” So, you know, I went in there, went up to my room and tried to do as he advised, then wound up in the sunny wilds of the mental hospital…)
Yeah, so. Me and my adoptive dad… a unending perilous journey in the making. Until one of us dies.
But I got through that phone call by just not giving an inch of ground. And he attempted to point out every negative possibility for my life that he could imagine, and I kept my arsenal of handy vocabulary words as close by me as I could. And then the call was over and I could sigh and say: Okay. I called my dad. What’s next on the list of death-defying feats today?
You can see why you might not want to make that kind of phone call, though, if you’re not feeling well…
But I am feeling better!
And my cats are so frisky! Darting all over. Playing. They really love this chilly fall weather, and I think they’re actually happy that I’m home. Even Francis seems happy to see me, in her tiny mean way! She hunkers down and stares at me, growls a little, thumps her angry tail — but the fact that she does this and doesn’t run away and hide, means that she’s willing to allow me to occupy the same space as her for the time being!! A small act of love. Which I cherish.
My cats. Thank God for my birth mom, right? I’m going to have to travel so much next year. It gives me so much peace of mind knowing that she got along so well with my crazy cats.
Okay, today I am going to try to map out some of those rewrites to the play — which are actually pretty substantial. Not what has to be taken out, but what needs to be added to what’s already there. Without weighing the play down or making it go on for too long. And one of the ways to handle that is to weave additional character development throughout the entire play. So that it doesn’t just come at you in one big chunk, you know? Sort of like re-weaving a tapestry or something, right? Introduce the storylines sooner, without changing what’s already written there. “Expanding” what’s there, I guess is the word for it.
Then I’ll do some more notes on this new “Litany” development for Girl in the Night: Erotic Love Letters to the Muse. That really came out of left field, gang, but it feels really exciting. I am really curious to see how that’s going to ultimately land on the page.
The Conversations with Nick Cave move into Canadian territory today — Montreal, then Toronto. Golly, I really wish I could be there! It’s so hard for me to believe that I won’t be able to see one of those things again, because it was so cool. But I’m guessing next in line is a tour for Ghosteen.
And next week, there is the listening event on Youtube for the record, but I cannot figure out what time zone that thing is in! Honestly. It’s some time zone I’ve never heard of before. I’m guessing that google will attempt to help me figure that out. And I do have it set to stream on Spotify when it drops, however, me and Spotify are just not real cozy. I’ve been on there since the company launched and I still cannot really figure out how to use it. I always have to flag down some random 27 year-old guy and shriek, “Can you help me figure this fucking thing out??!!”
RANDOM 27 Year-Old Guy: “Just click this and then that.”
ME: “But I tried that and it keeps taking me back to Tropical Fuck Storm!!”
Honestly. Old as it makes me sound, I really miss the days when I just went into Woolworth’s and bought the record and took it home.
Okay! Gonna get started here. I hope you have a great Friday, wherever you are in the world and whatever it finds you doing!! The 2nd anniversary of Tom Petty’s death is rapidly approaching, but I am doing really okay about that. I really am. I was listening to An American Treasure at breakfast this morning (I was listening to it while driving across Pennsylvania — that and Let Love In and Abattoir Blues/Lyre of Orpheus for 500 miles…) and when I played the song below — a really, really great rockabilly song that they never released until after he died — instead of thinking how sad it is that Tom Petty is gone, I thought about how fun it was to listen to him in the wilds of sunny Pennsylvania, trees turning to autumn everywhere I looked.
It felt bittersweet but, overall, I was happy.
So. Thanks for visiting. I love you guys. See ya!
“Lonesome Dave”
Well, whatever happened to Lonesome Dave?
Used to play in a rock ‘n’ roll band
He’d be up and on the stage
All the kids would raise their hands
But oh, then disco came
Nothing lasts for long
Oh, it’s such a shame
Lonesome Dave is goneWell, he’d be up there rockin’ out
Three-hundred-sixty-five days a year
Lightnin’ Boogie and Amy’s Blues
Play it so loud that it hurt my ears
And oh, somethin’ went wrong
Yeah, the times have changed
Now it’s a different song
Lonesome Dave is gone
All right, Dave!
Yeah!
Well, three P.M. at the Holiday Inn
The room service coming on a tray
Tuna melt and an orange juice
It was heaven there for Lonesome Dave
But, oh, that disco came
Oh, the times have changed
Now it’s a different song
Lonesome Dave is gone
Well, I wish I was Lonesome Dave
I’d lay up with the girls all night
I’d run round in the parking lot
I’d drink some beer and get into fights
But oh, it’s only me
Now it’s a different song
What will be, will be
Lonesome Dave is gone
All right, Dave
Hang on, Dave, yeah!
Well, whatever happened to Lonesome Dave?
He used to play in a guitar band
Three-hundred-sixty-five days a year
God, I know, we all love him, man
Yeah, and he’d go wild
Yeah, the crowd would yell
Time is moving on
Lonesome Dave is gone
The photos on Instagram from Nick Cave’s Conversation last night in Cambridge — photos that, indeed, you’re not supposed to take — look like the show was fantastic. So, like, how am I supposed to not click the “like” button??!! Damn it.
When you’re sitting there, in the audience, and people have their phone’s out and are doing that, taking those pictures or making those little videos, it is beyond annoying. It truly is. It is absolutely distracting and maddening to have that going on around you — privacy issues not withstanding. And yet!! My god, it looks like it was such a great show last night!! (How would I ever know this if they didn’t do that??) (Do I actually need to know this, though? I guess not. I mean, God knows, life would go on. But I sure do love knowing this.)
What’s interesting about the comments from the American shows so far, is that a number of people seem to be going into it with a lot of skepticism. And then, literally, coming away from it saying how incredible it was and how blessed they were to be able to see it, and that they will never forget the experience for the rest of their lives.
I’m not being sarcastic here, either. A lot of people are saying that in their Instagram posts. So interesting — the American skepticism. And then it gives way to this sort of ethereal astonishment.
Well, I think it’s so cool!!
Okay!
I’m back here in Crazeysburg, in my own little world. And I have acquiesced, finally, to this fact that it is indeed fall. Yesterday, in Rhinebeck, as I stepped out onto the front porch with Kenn (Sandra’s husband – Sandra was sound asleep in the boudoir, so I didn’t see her when I was leaving). But he and I stepped out onto the porch at around 7am and, man, it was totally fall. You know that feeling? It’s really crisp outside, there’s that chill in the air. The leaves are turning. Some leaves have already fallen. There’s dew on everything. The sun is just barely spilling into the sky and all the colors in everything all around you seem sort of saturated with autumnal light. That’s how it felt yesterday morning. Fall had arrived.
And then during the drive, the leaves everywhere were changing. And as much as I wanted to still believe it was the height of summer, I was forced to face the facts of nature that were staring at me for 500 miles.
So, rather than resist the beauty that was all around me by insisting it was still summer, I relented and looked at all the beautiful trees and had to admit to myself: okay, Marilyn; it’s fall.
And now, here at home this morning, my new fall coffee cup! (This was the cup my mom chose from the cupboard, like, the moment she arrived last week. I thought that was so cool! That she chose the cup that I knew I was going to use the minute I was willing to believe that it was actually fall.) (Apparently, she figured out that it was fall an entire week before I did.)
First cup of coffee back home! How autumnal!
You will notice that things are actually reflecting on the kitchen counter top. This means that it is clean. I did not do this! My mom is the best!! My entire kitchen is so fucking clean. My whole darn house is so fucking clean.
My room (which I posted a photo of last evening) is so amazingly dust free that I can’t get over it. What I also noticed, and I don’t mind it, is that it’s evident that my mom read the manuscripts that were in a stack on my desk. I can tell because they are slightly different than how I left them and they smell a little bit of cigarette smoke.
I absolutely don’t mind that my mom reads my stuff. She’s incredibly supportive of me. She still keeps the original typewritten manuscript for Neptune & Surf in her night table drawer next to her bed. (That’s more than 20 years, gang, because I sent her that manuscript long before it got published.) She’s really proud of that book, and really, everything I write, even though her only comments are always: “You’re just like me.” (Although she’s not bisexual, which is interesting because she has one bisexual daughter, one bisexual son, and one lesbian daughter.)
Anyway. I’m happy that she’s interested in reading my stuff, but then I realized that the three “Letters” from Girl in the Night: Erotic Love Letters to the Muse were in that stack and I could tell she’d read them — in particular, “A Beach to His Waves,” because the top page was crinkly, and that really made me kind of sad.
I’m pretty sure I’ve told her that I was raped when I was growing up, but I’m not positive. I might never have told her. And I don’t think I ever would have told her that my adoptive mom’s boyfriend raped me. Any of the things that went so horribly wrong between me and my adoptive mother are very hard for my birth mom to hear. (She never actually “gave me up” for adoption; I was taken away from her by her dad, and she never forgave him for that, for the rest of his life, even though he remained alive for well over 30 years after I came back.)
It’s just doubly hard on her to think that it was supposed to be better for me to be raised by other people — total strangers up north, in the city; educated, married people, who could provide me with all kinds of better things. Aside from the relentless abuse from my adoptive mom specifically, my adoptive parents became extremely affluent as time went on. By the time I was disowned, I was being disinherited from, literally, millions of dollars. I was left with nothing. Zero. Just a ton of really difficult memories and an endless supply of words.
This kind of stuff is very hard on my birth mom. She feels that having me taken from her, and all of her heartache over it, was all in vain. So, when I realized what she read about in “A Beach to His Waves,” I sort of cringed a little. Shit, you know?
I love my mom so much. She’s really quiet; introverted. She’s had a very hard life. Back when I first found her, I wrote her a pleading letter, asking if I could meet her. And when my letter arrived, she had just gotten out of jail that day — six weeks in jail for too many DUI’s and driving with a suspended license. And she gets out of jail, comes home to the farm in the Appalachian foothills, and my letter from NYC is waiting for her on the kitchen counter. She read the letter and allegedly threw it down on the counter and said to everyone present in the kitchen, “Well, I need this like a fucking hole in the head.”
So when she does say something it’s usually something like that.
Anyway. I love her. And the simple fact that she even knows my name means everything to me. When she left that letter for me on my kitchen table yesterday, it meant the world to me. Even though she’s not saying anything poetic or anything, she’s just talking about laundry and watering the flowers and borrowing my sweatshirt, and my gardening gloves. But it still meant everything to me.
The fact that she was willing to look after my crazy cats for a week — and then bonded with them? Cleaned my house? Weeded my garden? It means so much to me to just be loved. Really, it felt like it took me a life time to get her back. (I was 25 when I finally found out who she was and where she lived.)
Here’s the note she left for me yesterday. Her handwriting is so incredibly tiny and perfect, isn’t it? And I love how she dots the “i” in my name with a little circle like she isn’t 72 years old now!! So sweet. But I look at this letter and it just fills me with love.
Note left on the kitchen table from my mom — yes, we live in America! In case we are ever in doubt, it is embossed on our notepaper…
(Don’t read the letter! It will mean nothing to you! Just look at her handwriting…)
Okay, gang. I have a ton of Helen LaFrance stuff to gather up from storage and ship out to the director in NYC, overnight express — insured to high heaven because it’s all one of kind, irreplaceable stuff. And then I need to hunker down and get to work on the rewrites of the play.
I hope you have a wonderful, wonder-filled, Thursday, wherever you are in the world!! Thanks for visiting!! I will cease posting here 4 times a day because now I will just be at my desk writing and that looks the same, 24/7. I leave you with this because I just can’t stop playing it! Okay. I love you guys. So much. See ya.
“Shivers”
I’ve been contemplating suicide,
But it really doesn’t suit my style,
So I think I’ll just act bored instead
And contain the blood I would’ve shed
She makes me feel so ill at ease
My heart is really on it’s knees
But I keep a poker face so well
That even mother couldn’t tell
But my baby’s so vain
She is almost a mirror
And the sound of her name
Sends a permanent shiver down my
Spine
I keep her photograph against my heart
For in my life she plays a starring part
All alcohol and cigarettes
There is no room for cheap regrets
But my baby’s so vain
She is almost a mirror
And the sound of her name
Sends a permanent shiver down my
Spine
She makes me feel so ill at ease
My heart is really on it’s knees
But I keep a poker face so well
That even mother couldn’t tell
But my baby’s so vain
She is almost a mirror
And the sound of her name
Sends a permanent shiver down my
Spiii-yi-yiiii-yi-yiiii-yi-yiyiyi-ine
As most of you know, my birth mom has been staying at my house, taking care of my cats while I was away.
She called me on the phone yesterday to tell me that she will probably still be there this evening when I get home because my sister is coming to pick her up after work and she has to work late.
I’m actually really happy that she will still be there and I can see her again— plus it’ll be nice not coming home to an empty house.
But listen to what she said: “It gets so warm during the day that I go around and open all the windows, then in the morning, it’s freezing so I go around and close them. Then midday, I open them all up again!”
That’s so funny, right?! That’s how I spend every single darn day! Just hearing her say that, and that weird tone in her voice— the one that perfectly matches the voice in my own head — made me feel way less crazy about all those windows. It was too funny.
And you are all my witnesses: you all know that I tried really hard to get that house clean before she got there. I did my very best. However, she told me yesterday that she dusted and vacuumed and swept the porch and cleared off the cobwebs there—and cleared out all the weeds from the front of my house!!!
Jesus. I must say, I’m kind of excited but, you know, I was really trying not to let that happen. I really was. But since I sort of failed there— well, wow. Yay!! Coming home to a clean house and no weeds!!
The other amazing thing that made me so happy, so excited: She actually bonded with all those crazy cats! Well, all of them except Francis, who is just one mean little cat. But she said they come out in the morning to get fed, and then come out again in the evening to get treats! This sounds simple to you, but is unheard of in my house because my cats are feral and terrified of people. They will hide for literally days on end if people are about.
I had a feeling that my mom was going to make some progress with them. I’m so happy. Plus this means they didn’t act out while I was gone by pissing on everything. Yay!!
Okay, well as sad as I am to not be attending anymore Conversations with Nick Cave, they do indeed resume tonight in Cambridge. Lucky ducks!
There were some great photos on Instagram from both shows in NYC— both from onstage and offstage, so that was cool. Even though, specifically at Town Hall, it was really distracting and annoying to have those people around me taping everything with their phones, especially when the whole theater was dark and he was singing. Those annoying phone lights. Then of course, it makes the ushers have to come over and flash another light at the culprits to get them to put their phones away. Just maddening all the way around. So distracting.
But of course, people like me then go on Instagram and hit all those little “like” buttons, saving all those great photos, and only reinforcing all this bad behavior!!
Okay, gang. Gonna go say my prayers and offer some gratitude to St. Francis, St. Christopher, and Christ himself, in preparation for another 9 or 10 hour drive.
It really was such a successful trip. And the Airbnb wasn’t horrible. I might do it again next time, I’m not really sure. As much as I love hotels, I did like the casualness of just trotting down the stairs and hitting the street. So we’ll see.
All righty. Thanks for visiting!! The next time you see me, I’ll be up to my eyeballs in rewrites! Have a great Wednesday, wherever you are in the world, gang. I love you guys. See ya!
Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds sent out an email this morning listing the upcoming listening events for the new album, Ghosteen, and apparently they accidentally left Crazeysurg off that list and so now I have no idea where I’m supposed to go! It looks like maybe Belgium is my closest option.
I am really, really tired of the lousy air quality in NYC and cannot wait to get back to Rhinebeck this afternoon. My throat is, like, raw.
While the audience at Town Hall last night was really fun and enthusiastic, they were the most fidgety bunch of people I’ve ever been anywhere near. First of all, at least half of the balcony arrived “late” — and I put that in quotes because they weren’t late, they were out in the upstairs lobby drinking and ignoring the flashing lights. So about 700 million of them came in and tried to find their seats after the Conversation had already started. And then I have never seen so many grown up people get up & down and go in & out— going for more drinks, going to the use the bathroom, etc. I really just wanted to smack all of them throughout the entire show.
The man in front of me — who arrived late and then left early to catch his train out of Grand Central— was really tall and it was a constant challenge for me to see around his head until he left (early) but then 10 minutes later, the show was over.
I have never seen so many people get up and go catch the last train out of Grand Central at the very same time as I saw last night (meaning: 10 minutes before the show ended).
Overall, while indeed enthusiastic, the audience last night drove me a little nuts.
Other than that, though, the Conversation itself was great. Very different energy from Lincoln Center, yet both were somehow equally great. And even though I was in that balcony with all those fidgety, constantly moving people, I still had a really cool view— dead center. I could see everything easily— except for having to contend with that tall guy in front of me.
I still think it’s better than being on the main floor if you aren’t seated right up in front. And even though Nick Cave himself seemed to be in a different headspace last night as compared to Lincoln Center — where he was sort of more subdued or something— Town Hall is now just a really sucky place to be in the audience after experiencing that specific theater at Lincoln Center, which was just incredible.
Okay, so I’m gonna get a Lyft here in about an hour and try to get through the insane Midtown traffic in time to catch my train out of Penn Station at 10:20am. Sandra is taking a later train but, truthfully, I just can’t get out of here quick enough. I just feel like I need some decent air.
I did spend a few hours with Valerie yesterday afternoon and that was really nice. I have had a ton of quiet time during my stay here in the city, so it was just so great to spend some time with someone who knows me so well, who laughs a lot, and who is such a huge part of the “old” New York. That old vibe— meaning, not militantly-politically correct. And Valerie is a really tall, butch dyke who drinks and smokes and is extremely liberal and has been for 60 years, and yet she, too, has to contend with the constant onslaught of the intolerant zealously-politically-correct hordes. It gets so tiring.
I’m not sure if I prefer the Mongol hordes to this current horde of zealously PC liberals or not. I have to give it some thought. I’ll get back to you.
After lunch, we hung out on the stoop so that she could smoke and we did indeed discuss Mick Jagger’s weird inability to age— how it was sort of spooky. (And I wasn’t the one who brought up this topic, either, so clearly, I am not the only person who’s kind of creeped out by him nowadays.) But I did fess up to my recent discovery that, like Mick Jagger, I, too, prefer the idea of having sex with much younger women over having sex with 70-year-old women, and so I can’t really call that particular kettle black anymore.
And, of course, she concurred. Which, in itself, is kind of weird because we were lovers for 20 years, and now I guess we’re agreeing that even we are too old to seem like an appealing sex option to each other.
(I’m sort of just kidding. However, under our breath, so as not to be overheard by the PC militant zealots scurrying around us, we agreed that when it came to girls, we liked them “really young.”)
All righty!!!!
So!
Wednesday, I make that drive back to Ohio and I’m not 100% psyched for that trip yet, but I’m looking forward to spending the rest of the day and evening in Rhinebeck and I guess spending some more time discussing the theater projects with Sandra in person.
Sandra works a lot, mostly in television in Canada, and it can be really hard to get her complete attention (or to even get her to reply to a text) when she’s working. So I need to get as much out of her as I can whenever she’s directly in front of me.
That said, though, I’m still not ready to tackle the next round of rewrites on the play. I can tell that all of it is gestating inside me, so I’m not concerned. I just know that I’m not quite ready. I know I will be once I’m back at my own desk, with my Muse suffusing my entire room. Although, Peitor texted, wanting to know when we can get back on schedule with the micro-scripts. So I guess I’m getting ready to be really busy again.
Well, needless to say, but I’ll say it anyway, it has been so great to be able to see Nick Cave in the Conversation environment— twice. It really was just the best time and I’m feeling a little misty over having to move on. But on we must all move. Who knows when I will ever see him again in that specific, focused way. But it was just so wonderful. I just love him so much. And last evening— I can’t recall which song it was that he was singing; maybe “Love Letter,” maybe “Shivers,” — but for several fleeting moments, I saw the young Nick Cave coming through in his face, his expression. It was really interesting. Beautiful, I guess.
And now I must open the Lyft app and get that underway. Have a terrific Tuesday, wherever you are in the world. Thanks for visiting, gang. I love you guys. See ya!
I was just sitting down to do the blog and I checked my email, and what to my wondering eyes should appear? A Red Hand Files newsletter (two, actually) announcing a new double album from Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds coming next week.
Ghosteen.
It sounds like it is going to be sort of intense. As if SkeletonTree wasn’t difficult enough for me to listen to. Of course, it’s worth the emotional payoff. In spades, but still. A tiny little voice, deep in the center of my mind is fearfully fretting: oh no, now what?!
Because I don’t ever just listen to Nick Cave; I react on every level.
It’s funny, during the night, I awoke and was thinking about the Conversation from Saturday night and when a guy in the balcony asked him when a new album would be coming out, Nick Cave didn’t reply to it. I can’t recall now if he literally did not reply or if he said something that was not a reply. Anyway, I was pondering that during the night; wondering why he didn’t reply. And now, voila. The real reply.
I was also thinking last night how interesting it is that the 2 songs I remember most from Saturday night were 2 songs that he didn’t write. I remember all of the songs, but just the 2 that stood out most for me emotionally were songs he didn’t write: CosmicDancer and Shivers.
I think that Shivers is such a beautiful song. It seems like it always bothered Rowland Howard a lot — how people responded to that song. I don’t think he wanted people to like it so much. He seems maybe to have written it from a perspective of ironic contempt and then people responded to the ironic beauty of it, instead. (Well, there’s irony for you!) I personally think it’s a song of truly timeless relevant beauty. I really do. I was wondering if Rowland Howard has a different perspective on it now from where he’s at. I’m guessing he does. I think that when we die, we immediately embrace and embody the love of everything beautiful that we created while we were physical, even if we were at odds with it and couldn’t see its beauty while we were alive.
Anyway, Nick Cave sang it so beautifully on Saturday night; it was spellbinding.
Last night, I looked it up on YouTube and there’s an extremely old live version of it. I don’t remember now if it was the Boys Next Door or the Birthday Party, but it was really cool to watch it.
There is something sort of cosmic in just that process. You know, on the one hand, experiencing the emotional beauty and intensity of hearing Nick Cave sing that song live right now, at his age now — a song of such precise teenage angst; and then holding a little phone in your hand and watching him sing it so differently but no less beautifully when he’s so young. Maybe close to 40 years ago — something like that.
Perhaps you can see that I had sort of a strange evening last night.
I was determined to just rest and not go out walking. It was hot out and of course teeming with people everywhere. Plus, I really was just exhausted. So I forced myself to stay in and go to bed early. And I probably really and truly did relax for the first time in a year. But I did find my thoughts going to strange places. Or unexpected places, is more accurate.
For instance, I listened to an old audio interview with Tom Petty from the late 80s, when FullMoonFever first came out. Back in the days when he only just barely tolerated interviewers and you can always hear his contempt for the person and the whole process bobbing just under the surface of everything he says. The guy asked him a question about perspectives in songwriting and Tom Petty replied re: using all three perspectives at various points— first, second, and third perspectives. And I found myself feeling a little surprised that he knew about terms like that! But you know — he was actually really smart. I’m not sure why I find it surprising that he could express concepts and stuff like that. How weird, right?
Ah well. It only made me start missing him a lot, so I stopped listening to it.
And then I was also thinking about certain streets from my past that are right around here. For instance, this street I’m staying on — W.53rd. MoMA is on this street, but a few avenues east. I used to work at MoMA a long, long time ago. In fact, that’s where I met Peitor and we became instant friends. It was an important time in my life— working at MoMA. Frank O’Hara is probably my most favorite poet. I first fell in love with him when I was 15. And so for me, working at MoMA was my way of trying to absorb his spirit, his essence. (He worked there as a curator when he wrote pretty much ALL of his best poems and when he died, he was still working there. Modern Art was a huge part of his emotional sensibilities.)
Anyway. I had nearly forgotten all about that. And then W.50th Street. I’ve walked across it numerous times this trip, and only last night recalled that I used to live on it —just around the corner from here — and that my song, “Breaking Glass,” was written about a relationship I was in while living there. My first husband proposed marriage to me in that apartment — one afternoon while he was visiting me.
And then on Saturday, on my way to that incredible meeting with the director re: my play, the Lyft driver drove passed E. 66th Street on 3rd Avenue and it was in an apartment on that very block of E.66th Street that my one and only baby was conceived.
I thought last night about how strange it was that I have always retained that. Not the actual apartment number. I would not recognize the building if I saw it again. I just always remember that it was on E.66th Street, between 3rd and 2nd Avenues. So sad.
Well, anyway. I must say that blogging on a phone is a wee bit annoying… this one-finger typing business.
Okay, so I’m gonna close this now. I’m gonna try to wash my hair before Valerie arrives. And then I will be indescribably eager to see Nick Cave in Conversation again tonight. I think it will be an entirely different experience from up in the balcony, though — even though, normally, I actually prefer the balcony at Town Hall. (Tonight, however, I think that I will not be preferring it.) (If only I were one of those people who felt really comfortable defying public convention; I would look to see which seats remain empty down on the main floor and go sit in one! But I’m just somebody who totally behaves in public and does not wish to draw undue attention to myself, ever!!)
All righty!! Have a great Monday, wherever you are in the world! Thanks for visiting. I love you guys. See ya!
Lunch was great. Sandra was awake and up and about, so she hopped a Lyft and joined me & Wayne.
We went to the West Bank Cafe. I hadn’t been there in maybe 25 years— something like that. From before my marriage to Wayne. Back when I was having an extremely intense short-lived affair with a bass player who was engaged to be married. He mistakenly thought I was a dyke so he used to flirt with me rather recklessly. I guess I turned out to be not such a dyke…
Anyway, it turns out that— lo! — these many years later, Wayne is friendly with the owner there and he introduced me today as his wife!! It was weird. Both Sandra and I were, like — actually we didn’t know what to make of it. Right away, I said that I was his ex-wife, and then I felt kind of bad — you know, the blinding speed with which I clarified that. Like, you know, please don’t think for a fraction of a second that I’m married to this perfectly reasonable, well-groomed man sitting here or anything. I did feel kind of bad.
Yes, I did talk a little tiny bit at length about Nick Cave during lunch, but only because they FINALLY got around to asking me how the show was last night. Wayne, of course, knows at least some of Nick Cave’s music, so that was cool.
Now I am back in my room. I have been quite busy! I’ve taken about 30 naps; looked for photos of Nick Cave on Instagram— of which there were many; not just from the show last night but because it’s also his birthday today, so everyone’s posting his photo and wishing him a happy happy.
I also spoke at length on the phone to Valerie, even though I’m spending several hours with her tomorrow. Luckily, even after nearly 40 years, we still don’t run out of things to talk about.
I’m not sure I will make any progress on rewrites of the play today. I just want to lay in bed, drift in & out of sleep. Listen to all the crazy traffic outside.
Here is what it looks like directly across from my (extremely filthy) window at the Airbnb.
Outside the filthy Airbnb window. The no longer quite so hellish Hell’s Kitchen. 5 pm.
Okay! Have a terrific evening, wherever you are in the world, gang!! I love you guys!
There’s nothing at all wrong with this Airbnb. As Midtown Manhattan apartments go, it’s totally okay. But hotels are 100 million percent better.
For instance, another guest is here and sharing the bathroom with me. I don’t know who it is, but it showered during the night and used my one and only towel!! Now I can’t shower again until the magic towel fairy mysteriously shows up from wherever she actually lives and brings me a fresh one.
I would rather remain my own unshowered person indefinitely than use a damp towel after some total stranger in NYC used it.
But other than that, it’s a perfectly serviceable room. The bed isn’t terrible but it’s incredibly noisy right outside the window, so I only slept 3 hours. I have nothing to do today but write and have lunch with Wayne, so I’m guessing I can just nap off and on all day if I want to.
NYC has gotten so crowded and so congested with traffic that it’s really just a pain in the ass kind of city now, with no charm, no character. All the things I used to love about it are gone, but it’s still fun to visit for brief little periods.
And I’m thinking that the plays will bring me back to NYC more and more, so I’ll deal with it. But seriously, it isn’t even the tourist season right now and it’s just wall to wall people.
I’m not sure yet how much of that meeting that I had yesterday is suitable for posting to the blog. I guess right now, the only thing I can say about it is that it was nothing like what I was expecting— in essence, the director hit the ground running, in terms of the things that will be coming quickly into place to begin getting the show off the ground. It was the start of a dream coming true, gang.
In the cab ride after the meeting, Sandra said, “Do you know how lucky you are? To have someone doing all this for your play?”
Yes, I do know. But it’s not luck. It’s a lot of prayer and it’s several years of paying really close attention to everything imaginable. 3 and a 1/2 years ago, I first saw a play he directed and I knew he was the director I wanted to work on Tell My Bones, which I hadn’t even adapted satisfactorily yet. Then it was all about connecting with him on social media; talking to him during the intermissions of every other play I saw that he directed.. Saying hello to him every single time I ever saw him anywhere, even though I knew he didn’t know me. Interrupting him at dinner once to tell him I was a writer. Then getting to know his significant other, meeting him for cocktails in NYC and in Ohio , when the director was too busy. Then telling the significant other that Sandra and I had a play I wanted the director to direct and, after he googled both me and Sandra, he said, “I’ll talk to him.” Finally, 3 years on, I emailed the director my script so that he could read it on an airplane because it was the only free moment he had….
I don’t really think of that as luck. It’s 3 and a 1/2 years of just staying incredibly focused. And also spending an enormous amount of time writing and rewriting and rewriting that play. But that aside — wow, gang. I could not be happier. We haven’t even raised one dime yet in production costs and yet he already has his game plan in place to get the play off the ground. By the time I came home from seeing Nick Cave last night, I saw on my phone that the director was already beginning the social media campaign.
And that said!!
Wow, Nick Cave, gang. I am so glad I get the chance to see him again on Monday. It was so wonderful and the time just flew. I will be up in the balcony on Monday so it won’t be the same but at least I’ll be there. The venue last night was really just a fantastic place to see him In. Sort of small. Great acoustics. Really comfortable. The reason why my 4th row Orchestra seat became the 7th row, is because 3 rows of seats were set up in the orchestra pit, since there was no orchestra last night. But it was still a great seat — and it wasn’t over to the side; it was dead center.
Anyway, it was just perfect. A totally perfect night. And his fans are really interesting people. I’m not saying that to flatter myself. But they really do seem to be a whole different type of person. A lot of foreigners were there. Really different fans, overall, from the old days. Still there’s also something about some of the old days that I kind of miss.
But I’m just so glad I got to go. I just love him so much.
Okay. At some point within the next 30 days, Edge of Humanity Magazine will publish my new installment of In the Shadow of Narcissa. I’ll keep you posted! And any day now, that excerpt of my new novel, Blessed By Light, will appear in the Exterminating Angel Press Magazine, so I’ll keep you posted about that, too.
And now I will scoot! I’m leaving you with a shot of my Airbnb room at dawn — my carry-on exploded. And then I did take one photo at Lincoln Center last night before the show started.
Have a wonderful (Nick Cave’s birthday) Sunday, wherever you are in the world! Thanks for visiting, gang. I love you guys. See ya!
Marilyn's Room 