Same. Change. Same. Different. Same.

Things change.

Things stay the same.

"Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose".

I didn't know Jean Baptiste Alphonse Karr said that.

I have no idea who Jean Baptiste Alphonse Karr is.

But, no matter.  Today has been warm, genuinely warm, in the mid 40's - which may seem total nonsense to my readers in warmer lands but is a real joy here.

Down in the Old Port, sitting in JavaNet's window you can see the brick of the streets, snowpiles are much smaller - everything underfoot is wet.

I had occasion to go for a quarterly blood test this morning. This is needed to track my diabetes and various other issues being watched.  It's nothing outside the range of what most men my age put up with.

The big difference is the idea that I don't have health insurance to cover it.  

COBRA payments only kick in if you've worked someplace for at least 18 months - I resigned from Lfield at the end of only one.  Mind you I think getting out of teaching was the healthiest thing I've done in several years - being an "ed-U-ca-tor" was killing me - heart/blood pressure issues alone put me in the hospital for test twice in two years (and I didn't do it on purpose just to alliterate).

So I have to think through all actions that might have an effect on my health.  Trip on the ice, break a leg, get kidney disease (Black Russians?  Really?) or have any kind of major medical crisis and this simple plan for a year of transition could mean bankruptcy and real disaster.

At the same time I have to acknowledge (or my friends whack me upside my haid widdit) that I'm under much less stress, I have time to write music and words, I work in the Orchard with wonderful people both front and back of house - that I feel a comfort and grace that was lacking in most of my life for the last 24 years.

Isn't it strange?  

My doctor's labs and offices have all been consolidated in a new building that rises 8 stories above Back Cove.  I was up early after a 12 hour fast - had to have a banana at 2:30 in the morning when my blood sugar crashed and I got the shakes.  It might ruin the blood test they drew for but at least I finally got it done.

Some more difficult was the "liquid sample" they needed.  No one told me or I would have deleted activities from my morning routine that made sitting in the men's room an exercise in frustration.

Still, they gave me a sample bottle (which I immediately tucked into my fleece pocket) and said I could "drop it off later when you're done".

Like I was going to make a special appointment to drop off a jar of "liquid sample".

Still, it was nice to go to breakfast at the rebuilt Miss Portland diner - eggs and hash, part of a pancake.

Three cups of coffee and a big glass of water

Two glasses of water.

So all that made waiting for the elevator to go up to the lab a much more impatient experience than the first time.

This time the sample appeared with no problem and I pretended I was cheating on an NFL doping sample as I gave it to the bemused technician.  I've written before about the general goodwill and humor of my doctor's staff and this was no exception.  I love people who just "go with it" and jump into whatever madness is handed them.

So the fix is in.  It only remains for the boffins to determine what my blood says and then we behave accordingly.  Fortunately I have funds set aside for this until my status changes, one way or the other.  It felt kind of neat and I was caught up in just having fun with the moment.

I even hopped down seven flights of stairs to get in my car and go home.

Penitence

I don't see how it's possible to have what the British call a "morning head" at 12:52 in the afternoon but I seem to have managed it.

I also suspect that it's my body reacting to the sheer amount of "things" I've been doing (no snarking, please) in the last week.

For someone with as much time on my hands I have it seems strange to look at my iCal and have it be almost solid with events.

The capper was last night's Mardi Gras bash at the Empire,  a fund raiser for WMPG, the local community radio station.  My friend Adira had organized a smashing (owww - I might want to stay away from that word for a while) roster of dance exhibitions as breaks in the general mayhem.

Most amazing - amongst an amazing list - was a tango demo by Adira and MD, both accomplished dancers and totally mischievous improvisers.  It was elegant and somehow pleasingly dirty at the same time.

In an appropriate way, of course.

This was in the context of -

• a classic belly dancer
• a pair of "stage" belly dancers
• a small army of jen-yoo-wine sambistas, with feathers
• and a stripper

The stripper was really cool (I know you were wondering) - probably because she wound up - or down - wearing nothing but black panties slit up to here and pasties.  There wasn't a lot to keep her warm.

At least as far as I could tell - sadly I was sitting on the floor (probably where I would have wound up anyway once she got started) looking from the back.

She had a great smile.  Somehow that was the strongest impression she made which I think might have been the ultimate point - you just had to work your way through all her other charms to get there.

So I'm glad I went.  It was a good time and if "carnivale" (i.e. Mardi Gras) means "farewell to the flesh" then this was a very fond farewell.

Now that I'm reviewing this it seems worth the morning head - or afternoon head.  And I think I actually feel better.

So if penitence is meant to lead to learning and "amendment of life" - then it worked.

I wonder what will happen next?

We've Got Our Snowbanks Back!

Facebook gallery is here.

It's very strange.  Up until late yesterday afternoon we could do several things that we'd almost forgotten was in our vocabulary of action.

Namely things like:

- passing two cars on the same street at the same time

- walking on sidewalks rather than in the plowed street because dodging the cars is actually safer than the ice on the bricks

- wearing one - maybe even two - fewer layers to ward off the cold

Stuff like that.

Last night - Sunday - I got out of the Orchard and there was just a steady cold rain falling - the towel I'd used to cover Mrs. Beadle's front windshield was soaked and superfluous.

It only took the ten minute drive to see the rain suddenly convert to heavy, clammy, clingy snow - by the time I'd left the parking garage the sidewalks were gone, the red of the brick covered by white.

The change was sudden, dramatic, slightly scary.  What was almost warm, almost clear, almost comfortable was transformed instantly into a threatening mass of heavy white

Once I was home I had to head out for a meeting at Adira's apartment about our tango community.  It was fairly productive and I learned a bit of history about how the whole thing started.

That will be the subject of a future post.

We had to break by 10 p.m. since a parking ban was going to go into effect at that time.  I walked E (TML's bass player) back to her place.  It had been snowing for a bit more that two and a half hours by that point and the world had been transformed.

What had been clean (well, somewhat clean) and dry had been blanketed.  The cover was cold, wet, clinging to the branches and muffling the sounds of cars as they struggled up the hill of State Street.

This called me out.  I had to be in it.  

A walk along Doctor's Row led me to Local 188, one of the better - or at least "open" - bistros along Congress Street.

I had time to rework the setting of my simple little camera while working on a single-malt.  Very refreshing work.

There was a very small crowd in the bistro, divided into two groups - those absorbed in their own company, either loud or intimately quiet, and those, like me, who were storm watchers, caught up the in the intensity of the moment.

Once my camera was prepped - and once I'd finished my drink - I layered up and headed out into the wet.

Local 188 is by Longfellow Square.  The Square is dominated by a more-than-life-sized statue of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Portland's Poet Laureate.

From there it was an easy walk down Congress to the Portland Museum of Art, which dominates Congress Sqaure.  The light at Congress and High was much brighter, it's the busiest intersection of the town.

This is also the home of the Children's Museum of Maine, on whose board I sit.  

All told it was a sudden, intense change in the aspect of the city - there was a lull, which frankly fooled no-one, in the hard part of Winter.

I love this kind of change, even if it does make life very dangerous for those of my friends caught out in it.  

A lot of reports came in today about lost power, abandoned cars - and the sudden kindness of strangers seeing themselves in the plights of those lost in the weather.

Perhaps we will learn something from it.

Change lights light change

Waiting for EH to call back with feedback on my feedback on his sermon.  I saw it yesterday evening, Friday.  It is my habit to look at his work for grammatical feedback.  I speak enough German to see where he is coming from when he wanders off in some strange direction - or, more importantly, where he is going to.

I wrote some notes on his computer, sitting with his small son in my lap.  They led EH to split the sermon into two parts.

Usually this feedback is given at the King of the Roll sushi shop - last night his wife was gone with two of the kids, leaving EH with the other two, or we'd be discussing this over rice and double bowls of miso soup.

This morning was a quiet riot at the Orchard as I helped teach a workshop on GarageBand.  We were supposed to have a dozen kids - two showed up.  There was also a workshop on iTunes/iPods with more than half-a-dozen folks as well as a One to One.

All told there were more than a dozen folks in the place more than thirty minutes before the place opened.

Afterwards I came home to set up dinner in the crockpot - walking by Congress Square I noticed a forklift preparing to bring down the colored lights in the Square. 

The times are changing.

The wind was fairly comfortable today.  I'd call it "warm" if I didn't know better.

Once the stew was online I headed out again to shop for Mardi Gras - specifically finding a gross of really, really cheap beads for Monday night here at the NorthStar (where I'm writing from now).  They should be a nice addition.  I'm tempted to bring masks but there are some things I just can't worry about.

Enough just to bring beads.

And so to this evening and waiting for EH to either phone or post back - or if he has any sense he'll just do the damned sermon and let God sort them out.

Meanwhile the sunset was lovely through the windows of my place looking out onto Doctor's Row.  There are fairy lights in the last basket my mother working on before she died.  They looked wistful and dramatic simultaneously.

Perhaps that is where I am tonight as well.

Full of incident and comment

So here it is, another Thursday night with Party More at the Empire.  Seated in this barber chair I can see the whole floor - which is easy as there is no one on it.  Some folks are showing up to chat, drink are out - I'm working on a Single-Malt.

It's an easy camaraderie.  We're catching up on personal details and reactions to news, politics and music.  Some discussion of the Orchard, but mostly as a springboard to other subjects.

I've been working on a new piece, something a little slower than the last milonga-style piece and the waltz that came before that.

I think it's a neat one - I'm sure it will sound different as I work out the orchestration.  That's where a tango seems to live.

Took a lesson on Tuesday with Javier Rochwanger.  He's been visiting from Buenos Aires, teaching classes over the weekend (when I was on the mountain) and giving private lessons.  I worked on phrasing and control in turns.  Afterwards we listened to the latest waltz on the laptop and talked about the theory of writing for what dancers need and making it sound "Argentine".

I felt really confirmed by the work.  It was hard, I have to really concentrate to remember the sequence of what happens.  

We had snow last night - icy, fine and dry when I went to bed.  Waking up in the middle of the night I heard rain, or at least dramatically dripping melt water off the roofs next to the dooryard outside my window.

This morning saw an end, at least for the morning.  Thick fat flakes took over in the afternoon.  Very strange, dramatic and pretty.

The rest of the day has been working in the Orchard, teaching lessons and chatting to folks about what they needed to have happen in their devices.

Not a bad day's work.

Wolf-dogs, coffins and Valentines

Well, truth be told it's really been a madhouse.

A very enjoyable, rather silly madhouse, but a madhouse nonetheless.

I should be more regular in keeping with this blog as so much happens that it's hard to summarize  and I don't like to write giant posts that try to give each event its due.

Right now I'm at the NorthStar, trying to write while a poetry slam happen around me.  It's neat, loud and obnoxious.  

Portland is the city of poets - at least if you start with Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and go from there.  A great tradition is continued here - maybe less structured but still expressive.

For myself - Saturday saw the "Valentine Bandit" strike the streets of the City of Poets.  Red hearts appeared on the doors of businesses all along Congress street - a giant heart flew from the top of Portland Museum of Art.

Typing-paper sized ones were everywhere else.

It's been happening for more than two decades.  Who does it, where they come from - and why - are still mysteries.  I suppose I could get up early (and was tempted this year) and track down this creant (a "miscreant" causes trouble - this one causes fun, so a "creant" is the best I can come up with ). 

Somehow that takes the fun out of it.  I can live with mystery.  Come to think of it I think all of my friends are that way too.

That and they have a high tolerance for knock-knock jokes.  I just seem to get along better with folks like that.

Sunday saw a trip up to the Loki Clan Wolf Sanctuary.

My friend L/A drove us up, with her two wolf-dog hybrids in the back seat.  Odin, the larger white one seemed to cotton up to me very quickly, something his owner called a rare occurrence. Naia, the smaller dark one, spent of the trip up either trying to hide behind a seat belt or throwing up.

Interesting.

The Sanctuary itself is on the side of a mountain overlooking the Maine/New Hampshire border - very lovely, but very, very cold and ice.

The animals - both full wolves and wolf-dog hybrids (still working out that terminology) are in large pens, almost an acre in size, 8 or 10 each containing a pack of 3-4 animals.  

Without exception they are beautiful, powerful animals - very much themselves, very much present in the place they are.  I can see how someone could give his life to saving such creatures.

I'm pretty sure I'm not that kind of person but it's still something to think about - the idea that such folks are out there in the world.

I'm working on a web site for the Sanctuary and it's leading me into contact with all sorts of people that I wouldn't have met before.  Just like sitting here with one ear on this poetry slam is showing me things that I might not have been aware of.

And I like words.

Oh.  yes.

I saw a strange, coffin-like box just squatting in the snow of Bosnia behind Geno's.

I suspect it was a tool box that someone had tossed off the back of a truck, but, like so many of these things it implies some kind of story happened there that I just missed by a few minutes.

Actually, it was a tool box.  I figured since it was still late afternoon and the sun was still up I'd have a good chance to open it safely.

No undead screaming in agony at the Sun's intrusion.  Just a car net, some rope and duct tape.

Maybe I'd come on the end of a failed murder case.  Who knew?

Oh well.  Enough mystery in my life these days.  I have too many on my plate.

I guess, like with the Valentine Bandit I'll have to learn to live with that one too.

The Rout Continues

Don't be fooled by the picture.

I'm writing this upstairs at the Empire Dine and Dance, sitting in a comfy barber chair that rotates way too easily for a man recovering from the day I've had.

The Black Russian sitting next to me isn't helping - or is helping too much.

Here we are, it's dance night at the Empire with Party More (Ian and Chris both from the Orchard) getting ready to DJ music from the 80's and music written last week that sounds just like the 80's.

Applets are starting to stream in and it looks like there may be a more diverse crowd than last week.

For myself I'm recovering from new shoes and their effect on my right heel - namely it hurts from wearing a really comfortable pair of shoes for too long during the first week of ownership.

Outside it feels comfortably cool - not the biting cold we've had the last few days.  The streets are clearing off, the snow piles are starting to shift and settle.  Large pools of water are forming everywhere, more water than ice.  It's still tough on shoes, though.  The damp has an effect and folks carry backpacks or bags obviously stuffed with extra shoes.

Business-people in sensible suits and skirts sport off-white sneakers under their long coats.

For myself I'm in the strange but apocryphal position between a rock and a hard place.  I've got two pieces of music on my plate - mutually exclusive, different structures, different keys and implied forms.

Both seem to make sense and like some kind of strange musical meange a trois  they don't seem to mind their apparent proximity to each other  - and to me.  Right now they seem willing to share and will probably continue to do so until some simple issue brings out their hidden, irrational agendas and they fight for dominance.

Until then I seem perfectly able to keep both pieces separate in my head, giving each just enough attention to develop as ideas until one suddenly leaps to the fore and gets finished first.

I'm getting another Black Russian.

There is a larger crowd than last week.  Solitary women dance, there's a much, much older man - older than me and much less put together - in a baseball cap (RedSox, I think) a bulging t-shirt and a jean jacket, jeans and ragged boots.  He tries to dance, kind of just outside the sphere of one of the girls.  They're neither one the best dancer in the world.

I suppose this is really not my scene - socially, directly.  But it's fun to watch folks watch and maybe someone will really dance.  

The older man has left.  Trying to steal crumbs of what - youth?  hipness?  sex? crumbs from a feast that is serving nothing but Jello.  

Not worth the effort.

So - with my own batteries recharged, in some strange, Terpsichorean way - or recharged by two indifferently mixed Black Russians (remember, this is the home of the Worst Irish Coffee in the World)  I think I'll head home and catch up on news, much as I like this funk vibe.

Meanwhile, outside, the roofs drip and the rout of February thaw continues.

Mis Ojos son más Grandes que mi Corazón

Facebook Gallery is here.

Today was a brilliant day.

And the Sun was out too.

It's been a very busy one, a lot of editing work before leaving for the Orchard.

The Orchard was neat - taught a couple of lessons, had a great chat with the managers, helped some folks to learn more about their computers.

Getting home about 3:30 I was greeted by the smell of a smashing crockpot full of fresh chili.  

The sunset sky has been very lovely the last couple of nights.  The sun has been bright on both days and the full moon dominates the cloudless sky at night.

Twilight has been a magical time, the snow on the ground seems to amplify the rich blues and crimson of the air.  I took my camera out as I walked to my parking garage to get the car.  Doctor's Row, the Hotel and even the Park all seemed to come from another world, to glow with a different light from a different star.

I stood in the Park and watched a soccer game on the ice.  Cars still crowded the streets from rush hour.

Headed up to Munjoy Hill and the NorthStar to have a cup of tea and read the paper before going to the Reiche International Dinner - I was expected to make Fry Bread like last year ...

... but didn't quite make it.  A friendly but urgent phone call came from E., the bass player for Tango Mucha Labia, telling me she had lost the bass part to my tango "Mis Ohos son más Grandes que mi Corazón" - or, in English, "My Eyes are Bigger Than My Heart".

This meant a quick trip to the Orchard (of all places) so that I could download one from my MobileMe account and print it at the Genius Bar.  It took all of 90 seconds and we were heading back out into the night.  Kind of cool.  Since we were out there and we are the kind of people we are we headed to Borders.  She wound up with a political book by an author she's trying to get a gig with - I wound up with a great biography of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain.

And so back to the NorthStar, crammed into the guitarist's car (which E. had been driving) along with E's string bass, tucked lovingly under my arm by way of the back seat.

I wish I could have been less keyed up.  I've had lot's of premiers before, in many different contexts.  It's always a kind of harrowing rush - energizing, yes, but harrowing as well.  It meant that I flittered around the room, "listening" to the mix of the band (sort of a role I've taken on) or intently following the commentary on the President's new conference on my laptop.

I couldn't bring myself to dance with anyone either - it was taking too much of a risk with other people's toes.

The actual performance was quite good.  I was asked to dance by Laurita so I got a chance to actually see if my music gave people something to work with as dancers.  Glad to see that it did.

After having my head spun around the floor I managed to spend the rest of the evening dancing.  

So, it was a good evening.  Actually the whole day was fun, if not a lot of work.

It's nice to get the confirmation that what you are trying to do, what you are trying to say, both work.  Having people you like respond favorably to something you've created is also a plus.  I'll have to work harder to bring a deeper sense of myself to the writing.

Interesting thing to consider.

I need to get back to work ...

Full Moon, Clear Sky, Swift Wind, Cold

What started as a sunny and surprisingly warm day has turned into a windy and cold night.  The sun was very bright after noon, the temperature hovered around 45.

I had finished editing my new milonga (first mentioned here) and shipped it off, around 1 p.m.

The piece is a different sound for me and I rather like it.  However this forced a different approach to certain aspects of the actual written parts.  It worked out really well but took extra time.

So when I finally rose and considered heading out it was a disappointment to see that the pleasant warmth had transformed much of our snowy landscape into a slushy mess.  Clear ice was covered by water, in some cases almost an inch's worth, rendering the footing dangerous.  You could easily be fooled by the comfortable ambience surrounding you, slip and crack your skull.

Good balance and Bean Boots can take you far.

Ah, but tonight the wind has changed, blowing cold from the North.  There is a brilliant full moon out in a cloudless sky, etched above my head as if cut from pure crystal and lit by burning candles made of diamonds.

I've been in our quarterly store meeting at the Orchard.  Driving back over the Fore River was a strange, haunted experience.  The ground had an amazing glow.  You could almost see as much detail as in daytime but the colors were all from a palate of grey and silver, with trees etched by steel pens dipped in black soot.

This picture is of the moon and a streetlight, with just a bit of the doorway overhead.  It shows the kind of night that strange things walk about in, new and glistening, old and sharp.  The cold and the wind roar through the pine trees outside, whistle in the empty branches of the elms - I hear them rasp in the chimney of my apartment, echoing in the fireplace, trying to get in, trying to get in.

Trying to get in.

Warm Colors, Warm Air

There is Spring and rumours of Spring.

Like the building said we got to 36 degrees today.  My widget said to expect 35 so we're one degree to the good.  I finally got out today with the intention of sitting down at one of my cafes and doing this post.

Sadly there was a singer/songwriter, in the worst sense of the word, singing in one of my favorite places and I just couldn't bring myself to filter him out while I either wrote or edited this new milonga.

So I wandered back here to Doctor's Row but not before noticing a signs of the intensity of our current winter travail - and signs of a life beyond it.

In many places, despite the best efforts of Portland's street crews, the snow banks are as eyeball high.  It just gets piled up, repeated warming and freezing have "baked" it into a rock-hard mass.  I'm sure it's charming and malleable if you're going sledding but slipping on ever-present ice and falling into a picturesque snow bank could cause a major concussion.

It's just dangerous in certain areas.

Bosnia, the empty lot across the door from my apartment, is blocked with a massive wall of ice and calcified snow.  I took some time today to poke around on it; almost climbed to the top to see what was beyond.

Sadly it was only Congress Street and Geno's Rock Bar.  Picturesque, I'm sure, but nothing new.

Fortunately the snow plow - and yes, it was a pickup truck with attached plow rather than a bucket loader - had to leave a gap on the right due to the layout of the lot.  If you read my post "Des pas sur la niege"  that's where the footpath was.

It's probably still in there - kind of creepy to think about it, but the whole thing is either screamingly funny to me or shudderingly creepy - there doesn't seem to be any halfway point to look at it.

To be frank, that's a polarity I rather enjoy.

Getting back here to Doctor's Row it was nice to sit and do some editing.  The kicker came as the afternoon gave way to sunset.  For a brief moment the Sun lit up the bricks of the houses, a warm glow, a brightness against the tops of the buildings.

There are signs of a change.  Large caps of ice form as melt water refreezes in the colder air of shade.  Walking is interrupted by sudden patches of glazed brick.  Keeping your center of gravity low and keeping watch for a safe place to take a fall is good insurance.

Lot's of my friends are sick.  The intensity of the Winter breaks down immunity.  Seasonal Affect Disorder can influence even the most stable personality.

One good thing about working at the Orchard is that the lights are so bright from the walls that you get huge amounts of lumens.  Maybe that's a part of the general enthusiasm I feel.

Lovely lights in the sky as the daylight faded.  Warm red watercolors wrapped the horizon.

It's not that I feel I need to "get away" from Winter.  It's more an acknowledgement that this particular season has been hard on people.  Some of my friends have lost jobs.  There are empty storefronts in the Mall.  We're all worried, but game to fix it if given a hope of succeeding.

So maybe these adumbrations of Spring are just things that will help us move to the next thing.

I hope so.

Maybe that's what it's about.

Eight Degrees of Inclusion

It was eight damn degrees out there.

It's thirteen out there now.

Thirteen this morning.  Eight last night.

Single digits are objects of prime importance when you're out walking the streets of Portland at night.  They lead you to think about the homeless people you see during the day who are leaning on buildings, standing at intersections.  You wonder if the spare change you did or didn't give is making a difference now, hours later, in the cold, cold dark. In my own defense it's a conversation I have pretty much year-round.

Sadly single digits lead you mostly to wonder "why the hell am I walking to the Empire Dine and Dance" - home of the Worst Irish Coffee Ever (sorry guys, you did your best).

I get there more often than I should, of course.  Enough so the staff is starting to recognize this hard-drinking (when he can afford it), two-fisted (at least when eating pub food) Native Guy.

Jim Alberty - training bartenders from one end of Portland Town to the other.

Tonight is special.  Two of my colleagues from the Orchard have hooked up to DJ a dance night.  Apparently this tends to happen at wherever Orchards open.  I know that several folks are interested in tango because of my nattering about it.  

The kind of writing I do isn't really "beat" or "loop" based and, like Mycroft Holmes, I'm one of the "most un-clubable men in London" - i.e., "going clubbing" wasn't really a part of growing up Cherokee in Tulsa.

Still, I went because there had been buzz about it in the Orchard Back Of House all week - and I had been specifically invited by Ian and John.  Since, it's only a 1.5 blocks from Doctor's Row and I got off work by 8, I decided to make an appearance.

I was pleased to meet one of the assistants from the Children's Theatre there.  She had designed the lighting setup and was there taking pics.  I wish I had brought my camera because it was a great design.

There was a whole crowd from the Orchard, from all parts.  Some were dancing, most were drinking, all were chatting and just hanging out, talking about all sorts of things springing from our shared work.  

The neat thing I experienced was how conversations went in all directions, not just about direct events of the day but using those events as springboards for politics, psychology, dirty jokes, puns - just wonderful splashes of fun and insight, very much like the colors of the lights designed by my friend.

I just can't see having that kind of fun  with a bunch of middle/elementary/high school teachers - band directors especially.  I know I'm not being fair - it's just that this kind of mix was more congenial to my poor mind.

The music was really good - and, now I think of it, is trying to do the same thing that my tango writing does - it's partly about self-expression, of course, but it's mostly about giving people something interesting to dance to.

It's nice to think that I can unwind after work and enjoy it because, basically, unlike public school teaching, I'm not being wound up by the stress of work.

How strange. 

Bits and Pieces Coming Together, Falling Apart

Wednesday.  

I woke up very early this morning, before the sun - which, even here in Maine, is pretty early.  There was a rime of snow on the cars of Doctor's Row - I couldn't see any falling, it might have been blowoff from earlier in the day, hard to tell.

Too tired, too wired.

The keyboard was calling to me.  I had stayed up late, missing my usual after-work call to C., in order to finish sketching my latest milonga.

"Milonga", for the uninitiated (or the unimpressed) is a tango term that refers to both an actual social dance event (we have one scheduled for Valentine's Day) and a dance form.

The dance form is characterized by a fast paso doble rhythm - think the words "San Francisco, San Francisco" said really fast and you'll have the basic idea.

They tend to be fast and making them work structurally and technically for the players is an interesting challenge.  I like them, but they are something of a chore.  This is why I set myself the task of bashing one out.

I'm trying to force myself to leave the dock and swim fast in deep waters.  Something like the trick of a "speedthrough" that actors will use to check how well lines are ingrained into their heads.  You run the play as fast as possible.  (This is different from a "Marx Brothers Runthrough" otherwise called an "Italian Runthrough" where a play - especially Shakespeare - is done as if the entire cast consisted of Chico Marx - quite a sight, especially for the Scottish Play).

I think if there are any bad habits in my writing this will bring them out.  Patterns and lazinesses (I just made that word up).  

So, I guess I should finish my coffee and breakfast - I'm at Mousse, which I've often used for Wednesday musings, and get my ass back to work.

Get "Em While They Last ...

Wow.  Semi-fresh veggies.  Not a bad evening snack.

They're leftovers from the impromptu Super Bowl party that C and I had.

Wait.  Am I allowed to say "Super Bowl"?  Should I say "The Big Game" - at least until someone copyrights that?

Oh, who the heck cares?  This stuff is too yummy to worry about copyright.  As long as I brush my teeth I think I'll be fine.  And I can't use any of this to make breakfast so that's that.

I had a fast, fast shift at the Orchard this evening.  One of the things I signed on for was to teach people how to use their devices, to put these years of "educational expertise" to work in helping people be better at being themselves.

It follows the same path I use to teach music (and V was using last night to teach tango), namely that you help people understand what success looks like, in their context.  

Sing the notes before you play them.

Feel the tension of movement before you use it to move.

Know your goal before you start the process.

It's funny how this also applies to writing music.   Sometimes I wake up hearing a melody or even just a pattern of sound and I have to run to the computer keyboard to play it down or grab my clipboard (and fumble for a pen) to write it - yes, I actually write stuff with pen and paper just as easily as I do with a computer and keyboard.

But every note or phrase seems like the middle of a bridge that I see in my mind, spanning the two sides of a river.  I can see the middle span but then have to build all the rest together to get what I want.

The damnable thing is that I can often sense the entire bridge in my mind's eye - or ear.  It's like a ghost of a song just out of reach and the struggle comes in getting it to come to life in the light of day.

I think I have wasted too much of my life in settling for the ghosts of songs, in the possibilities of action - rather than in trying to make them into rich, share-able reality.

Well. I suppose it can't be helped.    At least, not now.  I'm having too much fun doing all the work of bringing these pieces to life - of bringing my life to life.

On to the next thing.  And these veggies are fantastic.

There are signs ...

Lucky to have a tango class tonight.  Arrived at what I thought was ahead of the starting time and seemed to come in the middle of things.

That's OK.  It was fun to see V. teach the class.  She takes the same approach that I take to teaching instruments and marching.  It's all based on self-awareness and positioning - knowing where to focus and put your energy.  

It was a large class and a lot of the folks were new faces, people outside the orbit of our current tango community.  This is not a bad thing.  This little bunch has to grow and seeing people so willing to take the chance to experiment with movement and music - in the context of working with another person - seeing people take that chance is refreshing.

For myself I need all the technique I can get.

Other than that?  I'm getting the hang of using this new computer system and fine-tuning it so I can create and notate new pieces.

I like this.  I really do.  I may be slowly starving, but by God I like where I am - at least for the moment.

There are signs of Spring.  The snow had a good melt today - temps in the low Forties.  More snowfall is predicted for tomorrow - but I think we'll be OK.

Everyone I saw around town today was smiling, scarves were worn open rather than wrapped tight.  The sidewalks looked dry.  I think we're getting just enough Winter - and it has seemed a long one - and getting just enough of a hint of Spring to put us in context.

I think I'll sleep well tonight.