Beneath The So-Called
Glamour: A Few Unhinged Glimpses of The Sober Reality Of Day To Day Life (or just call
it VENTING, if you must).
People are fascinated; people are curious. Some well-known
musicians and writers congratulate me on my break out success (ha, if only they
knew!). Many have told me say it’s a “brilliant concept” and a “marketable
story,” but they can’t help me find a literary agent, editor or publisher What’s
it like? I’ve been trying to hang in
suspension and avoid making public any direct, fleshed-out answer, to this
question.
In the latest interview, I said three little words, “It’s
getting worse,” but then purposely tried to steer the conversation to what I
call being proactive! Thus always worked in the past---writing my way out of it, or singing my way out of it, conversing my way out of
it—to focus on the Big Picture, the intersections between activism, teaching,
and music —areas in which I can have use. I could write MUCH BETTER about it
LATER, if I can get at least a little of my life back—but the longer it goes
on, I need to consider the possibility that I may never get it back. I’ve tried so many things this last year, and am working my butt off—but
I am stuck, and on a downward spiral. I tried gracefully begging, but maybe people do want to hear the negative, the ridiculousness of my helplessness...
I do need to address
the situation soberly (without the “drug of hope”), or at least try to “grab
the bull by the horns,” as they say, and thus address all this negative stuff
in this “semi-public forum” in hopes SOMEONE will understand how bad my life
has become (I.e.---so what follows is only the tip of the iceberg,
of the “world I need to get out of”). Where to begin?
Maybe I should start
with clothes
I put on dumpy clothes, and feel terribly ashamed. Most of
my clothes are dumpy.
I do have a few pairs of at least semi-good looking jeans
and shirts that in California could work as a professional uniform while
teaching classes, but I notice holes developing in yet another pair, and I need
to conserve, with money running out.
I need to conserve just in case I do get a job interview. I
used to love dressing snazzy, especially in NYC, and miss it terribly. After I
went homeless, I lost my one good suit. I
don’t even have a place to store clothes, and comfortable, good-looking
clothes are hard to find. In the last decade especially, even living in a city,
I had to shop on line, to find tight black jeans and black sneakers. I often
would get shirts, suit jackets (and even vests) at thrift stores, and underwear
and socks at Sears. These days, I hardly even wear socks. I still cling to the
one pair of Italian dress shoes that became especially uncomfortable after my
accident. I’d wear them for special occasions. In addition, my prized electric
self-cleaning electric shaving razor finally irrevocably broke earlier this
year, and the $50 razor I replaced it worth doesn’t actually work to the same
extent that did. It doesn’t get every spot, and I need to feel clean-shaven.
Even if you gave me money to buy some of this stuff, I wouldn’t use it for
that---because I need to survive first (and let’s not even get into how hard it
is for me to shop smartly these days, etc.
The YMCA
Ah, but now, I’m sitting here in dumpy shorts, and a nice
white shirt, which I put on as a concession to not looking entirely dumpy, at
least to make it to the YMCA, where I go almost daily to shower and try to at
relieve the constant physical pain I feel. In Oakland, water walking physical
therapy at the YMCA helped me tremendously in the absence of real affordable
healthcare, and I cling to it. It’s become my only regular routine—and of
course, it’s perfectly acceptable to look
dumpy at the YMCA. There’s an illusion of democracy in the pool with your
suit hidden. People even say I look fit, but socially the pool (with most 70-90
year old women or sometimes kids) is bleak and lonely. It’s physically dark and
drab (though a respite from the sun that’s too hot); the men’s locker room is
not something I want to think about too much. It’s not a place to find a job
(as my ex-girlfriend wisely pointed out when she caught me talking about my
life in the past tense too much, when I started going back in Oakland; I’m not retired. Sure, I learned many things
from many wise things from the retirees (especially the older African-American
men) in Oakland, but it was only useful
because I could apply it to my classes at Laney College, with the younger
students who needed, and even wanted, to
know the history I learned from these men.
In Oakland, they also played good music regularly, which has
been lacking here. They don’t even play bad music at the Hollywood YMCA. It’s
either silence, or kids screaming—so I am often left alone with my thoughts,
the internal monologue, racing, the desperate thoughts, trying to shut them
off—but if you put on some Motown, for instance, that I can move to, that I can feel a I’m working
out, my brain immediately finds a form, and the thoughts stop. Sure, not
everyone needs this on an essential
level as I do, and sure there are times I dig silence too---but I don’t feel
safe
Anyway, I try to simulate it in the spirit of self-reliance,
singing as I work out, or simulating trumpet sounds, or even mouth pops, which
I can’t do because my broken partial denture falls out--a tooth even fell out
at the YMCA recently (and don’t even get me started on the lack of dental
care). But even if I’m not ssshheed, it’s hard to sustain that making music in
this environment; it takes more energy than thinking too much (alas). So I try
to focus the consciousness more silently on the muscles, and the body…. In any event, I get through it, but it’s
become harder and harder and more tedious, and sometimes I’ve even gotten
thinking that I should stop this YMCA routine---which may be the healthiest
thing I do in many ways (the only healthy thing?)---because sometimes I leave
much more riled up, and agitated, than I was before I came. Am I more
energized? Or more exhausted? Do I just work out so I can eat more? Or do I eat
more because I work out too much?
The Office (and van)
THIS IS TERRIBLY EMBARRASSING to write about. The shame
continues. I trip and fall. I’m afraid to walk far. I do a couple stupid
errands. I get in the van. I’m so sick of the van. It’s a “beautiful summer
day” (the weather I would normally crave), but it’s too hot to work in the van,
make music, and making music solo on the piano sitting in a position that makes
my disability worse, and just like at the YMCA it’s dark in here, and there’s
no good music coming from someone else (or something else) to harmonize with,
the work with---and then some say this is the closest thing to a JOB I’ve been
able to find (but it pays mostly in photographs; the tips don’t cover
overhead). $40 on gas, and I hardly drive. The van has all kinds of problems,
and I’m a terrible driver, especially of something this big. I have to get gas.
$40 half a tank. I always play trumpet while I’m filling the gas (a nice little
trick I learned, ha ha)—but that’s enough of the social, practical, world for
now. THE REAL WORLD---or whatever is left of my sense of HOME---has become the
INTERNET? And Why? Because I have to look for jobs ON LINE, and must focus the
thoughts, and see if my resume can be resurrected or resuscitated! That burns
at me, as if it’s the only hope
What to do? Conserve the clothes? Run back to the grungy
rat-infested office that I call “home”---which is basically a dying Laptop
computer. And it’s now 3:23 PM and I’ve been back in the office for the last
hour writing this. And this may be SQUANDERING MY ENERGY as much as trying to
sing is or was. And yes, it’s unhealthy sitting position, and yes I’m smoking
cigarettes---but I can’t even just “lay out” in the park without thinking too
much (again, in the absence of any music but that which I try to make, which
increasingly doesn’t even feel like music anymore).
So I might as well at least try to get something done----
But maybe now I’ve at least exhausted my mind on all this
self-worry, and more importantly KILLED TIME to get through the hot part of the
day, and see if my body will have energy left to actually play music later. I
want to lie down, and fall back asleep again---with the radio on….
This piece of writing has been another failed experiment,
another DEAD END, but in a way it did what it set out to; to hopefully GET IT
OUT OF THE WAY, or laugh at it, and move on to something I CAN DO. I could
write new songs, or make music with others again, but I do not have access to
the materials and the collaborators or context that would make that
possible---and there’s no palpable sense that anyone really wants it (there’s
already this album that’s waiting to be unlocked, and I’m supposed to put my
eggs in that basket I suppose)…This all has only been SCRATCHING THE SURFACE of
the negative, which will have to be part of the documentation of this time----but
I will GLADLY DE-EMPHASIZIZE it if SOMEONE CAN GIVE ME A CHANCE AGAIN, and
publish my allegedly “marketable story” about my “brilliant concept.”
SHOULD I WRITE ABOUT SHAKESPERE NOW? I gave myself that
assignment!---because no one else really did (though I thought there were some
possibilities I’m waiting to hear from), or something else of cultural
relevance….IN THE GLUT of culture in 21st century America, etc….