This is what I said in the doctors’ office before everything went to shit.
"If I were able to go back and talk to the person I was then.... when it all started, we wouldn't be working through how it's all gone and why I am here...where I am, with you, in this fucking room, asking me these stupid, hypothetical questions that lead me to what ifs and guilt and regret!"
I scratched at a week-old track mark and noticed my left shoe was untied.
I was insulted and defensive…. just like a Narcissist. Two weeks later everything went to shit. The pandemic hit and everyone got pregnant, divorced, or died.
Eventually I started listening to my therapist and two years later I have finally begun to talk myself.
The irony is that you have to talk to yourself to get healthy or better or find peace. I'd like to talk to you about it and I'd like to listen to you about it......so we can see each other honestly, with transparency......in the right light….with love……as it should be.
A few weeks ago, I was able to attend a few performances by some up and coming younger artists doing a short regional tour. There was so much talent on the stage.
Every night the energy was electric.
They were all so beautiful.
They were buzzing and brilliant and they were superstars and I loved them.
They wanted loved.
I worshipped them. I adored them and their youth.
I yelled at them like an old, dumb, proud parent.
My heart was full.
They stood strong on stage and owned the space....hiding themselves and then exposing themselves....so cool and so vulnerable.
They poured out like the Passion and shoved their blood and guts into my face.
The movement, the music, this ancient art was shed for us, for you and for me!
Each creator a craftsman, perfect in their nuances.
I was voyeuristic while they were being crucified, died, and would rise again....every night....for us......for you, and for me and on the third day of the tour I recognized these saviors as myself and I cried in their faces........these future creators.
It was beautiful.
It was pure and toxic.
It was heaven on earth.
It was perfect and it is broken.
This is the absurdity.
There is an absurdity to it all and here is the conversation I would have had with myself eight years ago.
“The lights. Beware of the lights. They are beautiful but beware. The lights are violent and will pick a fight with anything that is perceived as a threat or competes with its illumination.... of you. The flowers will fall at your feet and valuable things can get left behind in the promise of potential future illuminations…….and more flowers and more lights. These illuminations will present options and the options are infinite and the infinite options that the illumination has enlightened you to promise to provide a pleasurable feast for you...to feast on.....forever.”
Here is the abridged version.
“There will never be enough.
There will always be more.
It will end."
Learn what it means to say,
“This is my portion.
It is enough and I am grateful.”
If I could go back and talk to myself (which I have) I would tell myself to try not to take myself too seriously and to know what matters and that, ultimately, the lights don't matter but they will show you who and what you truly are ...and that matters.
For almost eight years I've been telling bars and clubs to please avoid using strobe lights during my shows.
This is due to my Epilepsy.
It triggers seizures.
Last week while playing one of our last shows....the lights slapped me in the face.
It felt like I had been struck by a bolt of lightning.
I collapsed on stage in the middle of a performance and had a seizure in front of not a few people.
It’s never pretty.
There’s piss and blood and slobber and I cry and contort and convulse and crumble into myself a thousand times over.
I am emptied and it hurts everywhere because now everyone knows I'm just another meat sack like them.
I recall dragging my fingers across a sweety piece of wood strung with steal trying to find sounds that made people move while I was quaking inside and singing with a marbled mouth and blurry vision.
The lights.
Those goddamn lights.
The next day I woke up bruised and sore and confused and grateful.
I began to talk to myself…….my present self and my future self.
I said these words,
"This is my portion, and it is enough. I will live in light of that freedom right now, today."
This is what I said.
This is what I would say now to you my dear friend.
May the flowers fall at your feet. It is good to be celebrated but then
Pick them up, smell them, breath it in deep……. and then throw them at a yonder stage and remember that this moment is your portion, and it is enough."
