beautiful, funny, sad & true

Hey, y’know, my birthday’s coming up in two weeks, on the 15th.

I’m just putting the information out there. Do with it what you will. :)

I came across this quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson today:

“Those who cannot tell what they desire or expect still sigh and struggle with indefinite thoughts and vast wishes.”

It really rang true for me.

Something tells me that RWE wrote it from the position of omniscience–as if he knew exactly what he desired and expected, and he therefore assumed that the readers would know as well–but I’ve struggled my whole life with indefinite thoughts and vast wishes. I’m working on defining them all the time, though, y’know?

Whether it’s ways I want to be treated (and ways I treat my partner, too) in a romantic relationship, things about myself that could use improvement, paths I want my career to take (and what I need to do to create them); a million things.

I’m working on believing in myself enough to do all these things; that’s what I think it boils down to. Do I trust myself enough to do what needs to be done?
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. In some ways I am infinitely strong and resilient. In other ways, if you so much as threaten to bend me, even a little bit, I break.

I’m not bummed out or anything, I’m just ruminating here.

I had a really nice weekend. The Young Immortals, Lauren, Valerie, Michael, Joan, Susan, John, and Renee all made their way into this weekend. And I still had time to sleep for twelve hours each night. Nicccccce.

There are two Breanna shows this week, both of which are Breanna/cello/violin. Should be a blast, as per usual.

I feel like I’m rambling now, but I just felt compelled to write and let you know that the weekend was relaxing but really nice, and I got to see a lot of friends I haven’t seen in quite some time. And on that note, can I just take a minute to say how proud I am of Jake, Mike, and Scotty of the Young Immortals? They were amazing to watch the other night, and their hard work is really starting to pay off.

Here are a few pictures from the play reading the other night.

The guy with the beard is the playwright.
The guy with the accordion and no beard is me.

This is Todd Sabel, the director. In the world of The Theatah, however, he’s known as T. Austin Sabel.

These readings are great fun, and I’m tremendously honored to have the privilege of attending them. Thank you, Todd, for giving me the opportunity!

Yeah, that last one was funny and everything, but now it’s time for a more ‘real’ entry.

I’ve been feeling a little strange all week; a little bit lonely, a little bit sad, and a little bit exhausted from work. I’ve even thought about writing to Kelly again lately, but I still don’t think that’s a good thing for me to do, so I’ve resisted that impulse.

In a way, I’ve been so busy these last few weeks that it sort of kept me from feeling the loss of that relationship, but now that my schedule has eased up a bit, I’ve had more time to feel it, and I’m not gonna lie; it’s been hard lately. Luckily, I have friends I can call to talk about it with, and who understand. But there are still some quiet times when I find myself missing her.

Tonight I went to another play reading with Todd Sabel and his theater group. The play they read was called “Dirty Water”, and I took my accordion and provided improvised background music and sound effects (WATER sound effects, no less. Who knew?). The play was written a couple of years ago by a local playwright named Devon Granmo for his college thesis. Hilarious and strange play, and even though it’s been performed before, it seems like it might actually be a work in progress. The playwright was there at the reading with us, which was really interesting. He stopped the group once or twice during the reading to say, “Oops. . .I forgot to change this part. Start HERE and then go BACK and start at this OTHER section.” He also asked for feedback from the group afterwards. If some pictures float up to the surface–and I have a feeling they will–I’ll be sure to post them here.

Oh yeah. . .there was something else interesting that happened at the reading. There was a woman there who wasn’t at the last reading I was at, who apparently plays the cello. When Todd introduced us, she asked how I found out about the theater group, and I told her Todd invited me to come play at one of them a month ago, and that I played cello the last time. She said, “You play cello? How would you feel about playing with twelve other cellists?” “You mean the Portland Cello Project?” I asked. “I’d LOVE to. I’m friends with Skip and a couple other people, and I’d love to come play.” “Well, they’re looking for new members; you should come down.” “Count me in, DEFINITELY.” The Portland Cello Project, if you haven’t seen them before, is an amazing group. I’ve been wanting to go and play with them for almost a year now, but so far I’ve been too busy with the bands I’m already in. Now that it’s fall and I have a little more free time, I’m going to take that opportunity, for sure. Groups like PCP are the reason I started playing cello in the first place.

The rest of the week has been pretty uneventful, quite frankly. I’ve spent much more time than usual at home, cleaning my apartment (which was long overdue) and trying to relax and deal with the hundreds of different feelings I’ve been feeling lately.

The moral of the story is that I think I could use another hug.

Today I heard two strange and memorable things.

I should warn you that this entry may be a little bit. . .uhh. . .well, let’s just say that if your sensibilities lean toward the delicate, then this may not be a good entry for you. There’s no bad language or anything, but there’s plenty of talk about bodily functions. Did I say ‘plenty’? I should’ve said ‘all’, I suppose, because that’s pretty much the entire subject of this entry.

You’ve been warned.

Still with me? Okay, then you must be the kind of person who knows that sometimes you have to sink low to catch the really big fish, so here we go, hand in virtual hand, down to the literary and blogospherical depths.

Around ten o’ clock this morning, I took a break from work and went to the restroom. While I was standing at the urinal, I heard someone in the stall doing some text messaging while they were going Number Two. Now I don’t know why that bothered me so much, but it did. Taptaptap–PFFFT–taptaptap–(gruuuuunt)PLOP/SPLASH(exhale)–taptaptap. The images that came to mind were just not good ones. I hope he washes his hands like a maniac, and I also hope that none of his friends ever has an emergency and needs to use his phone. Okay, so that was Part One.

Part Two was when he started going Number One, and it suddenly sounded like he turned a faucet on in there. I’m talking about a big faucet. I thought to myself, ‘Man, that guy must have a huge urethra!’ Then I thought, ‘IT’S TEN O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING; I DON’T WANT TO THINK ABOUT URETHRAS, ESPECIALLY IF THEY’RE NOT EVEN MY OWN.’ I washed my hands quickly, left the restroom and walked back to my desk.

Normally this is where the blog entry would end. But not today; ohhhhh no.

This afternoon, in another trip to the restroom, I was standing at the urinal when a guy walked in, talking on his cell phone. That in itself is a little weird, but then he turned, walked into the stall and started urinating loudly, WHILE HE WAS STILL ON THE PHONE. I mean, come ON, dude, not only does your girlfriend have to listen to you peeing while you’re on the phone with her, but I have to listen to you peeing AND talking on the phone to your girlfriend. Do us all a favor next time and call her back when you’re done.

SHEESH.

People, man. I’m tellin’ ya, they drive me crazy.