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Jan. 31st, 2025 02:36 pmStage banter asked "what are the five stages of grief?" while introducing a new-to-me song. We shouted out "anger!" and "denial!" and "bargaining!" and made it to four when he suggested Buc-ees as the fifth stage of grief. we all laughed, at least some of us familiar enough with roadside haven to get the joke.
I was filming, my phone battery low, or I would have googled it for him. I think that was closest he got to ever saying his wife got sick and died, but i'l have to listen to it again to be sure. my phone completely dead about 5 songs from the end, I wasn't able to to fill in the blank as we grudgingly said goodbye. back at my hotel, he was online so I googled it and let him know:
I should've stopped there. I didn't. too wound up, too thrilled to be chatting, too high on the thrill of whatever this is
-----
sleeping away my day, it occurred to me that Buc-ees is a good substitute for Depression, as it offers all the things Depression robs from your life: clean bathrooms, an amazing selection of food and drinks and toys and impulse buys and light, such violently bright light. I'm told the Richmond KY store can been for miles at night by the glow of the lights, an oasis in the dark hills of rural Kentucky.
They're also overrun with tourists, and there's nothing tourists love more than swarming in on a tragedy, dispensing pleasantries and platitudes, and then scurrying back to the bus for the ride to the next stop.
Dreams of a similar sort speckled my slumber - running away, by bicycle not car, in familiar cities changed by perspective of mode of transportation. searching for help and not finding it. Eventually running into him, the tractor beam of i-still-don't-know-what pulling me into his orbit, into his arms, into his promise of a steady, solid something. A message, in my ear, via his lips directly or via voice mail, assures me "I'm OK. We're OK. It's all OK." The tone is one used with an inconsolable child, a distraught friend, someone on the brink, someone who prefers the alternate ending to Cocoon. I took the "we" to be us two, not any other obvious groupings (his band, his family, his community), because that's what fits my delusional waking narrative.
-----
At the end of the night, he told me didn't know I was there until several songs into the show. Aghast, I exclaimed "I was sitting right in front of you! How could possibly miss all this?!", gesturing to my heft, my girth.
They took a break a good hour into their set, Jess's request. I stood up to move my aching bones, and he found me, said hello, and then offered a hug in case he didn't get to do so later, but then promising he would see me. I assume(d) that I was the cause for these decisions. don't rock the boat, don't anger the highly unstable woman. He hugged me again at the end of the night, and with both, I felt more the warm fuzziness of his velvet blazer against my cheek than his arms around me, disconnected from my self. We held on tightly, but briefly. The promise of Saturday's show giving me hope that it's not a "goodbye forever" but just a "farewell for now."
up until I set foot in that decommissioned church, I was a Very Hot Mess, on the very far end of the Scoville scale, crying multiple times over songs and scenarios my brain would conjure up and the brainweasels would run off with, leaving me bereft behind the wheel and nowhere to pull off. Once in the door, though, I had A Purpose - feed everyone! - and the music either melted away my worries, or threw me deep in denial and held me under for two-plus hours. I fully expected to cry at least one song more if they made the set list (not knowing the set list and show was fully Australian Rules music - "the rules are THERE ARE NO RULES!"). driving back to my hotel with a phone that was just being resurrected, but not willing to provide direction, I did mostly fine, as it was just two turns and a long dark road back to the interstate, and I roughly knew how far and which exit. back in the hotel room, well, scroll up to see what happened.
I was filming, my phone battery low, or I would have googled it for him. I think that was closest he got to ever saying his wife got sick and died, but i'l have to listen to it again to be sure. my phone completely dead about 5 songs from the end, I wasn't able to to fill in the blank as we grudgingly said goodbye. back at my hotel, he was online so I googled it and let him know:
ME:
We missed depression
Denial
Anger
Bargaining
Depression
Acceptance
Not that I ever follow directions
HIM
I knew there were more than four!
ME:
I guess when depression is the default setting, you kinda forget about it?
HIM:
yeah, kind of a 60-cycle hum going through the whole thing
I should've stopped there. I didn't. too wound up, too thrilled to be chatting, too high on the thrill of whatever this is
ME:
for nearly 25 years now one of the tags I use in my online journaling is EKRcanKMA - Elisabeth Kubler-Ross can kiss my ass.
i'm currently too manic to notice any depression. like a toddler with the zoomies at bedtime.
-----
sleeping away my day, it occurred to me that Buc-ees is a good substitute for Depression, as it offers all the things Depression robs from your life: clean bathrooms, an amazing selection of food and drinks and toys and impulse buys and light, such violently bright light. I'm told the Richmond KY store can been for miles at night by the glow of the lights, an oasis in the dark hills of rural Kentucky.
They're also overrun with tourists, and there's nothing tourists love more than swarming in on a tragedy, dispensing pleasantries and platitudes, and then scurrying back to the bus for the ride to the next stop.
Dreams of a similar sort speckled my slumber - running away, by bicycle not car, in familiar cities changed by perspective of mode of transportation. searching for help and not finding it. Eventually running into him, the tractor beam of i-still-don't-know-what pulling me into his orbit, into his arms, into his promise of a steady, solid something. A message, in my ear, via his lips directly or via voice mail, assures me "I'm OK. We're OK. It's all OK." The tone is one used with an inconsolable child, a distraught friend, someone on the brink, someone who prefers the alternate ending to Cocoon. I took the "we" to be us two, not any other obvious groupings (his band, his family, his community), because that's what fits my delusional waking narrative.
-----
At the end of the night, he told me didn't know I was there until several songs into the show. Aghast, I exclaimed "I was sitting right in front of you! How could possibly miss all this?!", gesturing to my heft, my girth.
They took a break a good hour into their set, Jess's request. I stood up to move my aching bones, and he found me, said hello, and then offered a hug in case he didn't get to do so later, but then promising he would see me. I assume(d) that I was the cause for these decisions. don't rock the boat, don't anger the highly unstable woman. He hugged me again at the end of the night, and with both, I felt more the warm fuzziness of his velvet blazer against my cheek than his arms around me, disconnected from my self. We held on tightly, but briefly. The promise of Saturday's show giving me hope that it's not a "goodbye forever" but just a "farewell for now."
up until I set foot in that decommissioned church, I was a Very Hot Mess, on the very far end of the Scoville scale, crying multiple times over songs and scenarios my brain would conjure up and the brainweasels would run off with, leaving me bereft behind the wheel and nowhere to pull off. Once in the door, though, I had A Purpose - feed everyone! - and the music either melted away my worries, or threw me deep in denial and held me under for two-plus hours. I fully expected to cry at least one song more if they made the set list (not knowing the set list and show was fully Australian Rules music - "the rules are THERE ARE NO RULES!"). driving back to my hotel with a phone that was just being resurrected, but not willing to provide direction, I did mostly fine, as it was just two turns and a long dark road back to the interstate, and I roughly knew how far and which exit. back in the hotel room, well, scroll up to see what happened.
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