Wednesday, March 12, 2003

Copland is on to something. I wonder if he and Walker Percy ever drank together. A New Yorker and genteel Southerner. Modern existentialists both. But to express in music, to grab emotions with music. There are no, as Copland contended, words. The conductor tonight reminded us tonight of Copland's famous words to an interviewer. When asked whether or not music has meaning, Copland answered, simply, "Yes." When asked by the bewildered interviewer whether he could explain music's meaning, Copland answered, simply, "No." That would be an interesting play. Percy and Copland. Maybe even a ballet. This was a happy performance, lively in music and resonance. I wish there were some way of convicincing the St. Louis cultural community to have more events centered around my schedule. 11:07:34 PM

The beauty of working a working job, a working class job, is that when I'm done, I'm done. My Tuesday nights are real Friday nights, from Sqwires at least. I don't have any tables to wait when I get home. No reports to write. No nothing left to ponder in my mind, earning value for some other entity with my subconcious while I sleep. I'm done. I don't have to think about anything other than. Than. Which, tomorrow anyway, is Syzygy, which is fun again, now that I know what the Zoo project LOOKS like. I don't have time to do the research tonight, but I remember reading or hearing, probably on NPR, about marine mammals, trained in captivity, and how they exhibit signs of depression sometimes when learning a new trick or series or tricks, during the plateau between training and absorbtion. And then, BAM, they get it. Their subconcious minds divulge the truth, and they understand, and do the trick. I've felt that plateau in many other areas of life, mainly sports related, or music, or language, but applied now, even more so, to my profession, it profoundly explains the doldrums I've experienced over the last couple weeks. That and the flea infestation. Which started, I realize now, approximately the same night as the party, when I had everyone's coats on my bed. Jamie woke up the next day with a strange bite on her arm. I, unfortunately, don't react to bites, neither do Snack and Loki. Which I hope doesn't reflect some inordinate lack of hygiene. That we're accustomed to being flea bitten. But last week in particular, I had a hard time sleeping, feeling antsy, which was literal, as those little parasites bit me throughout the night, without any evidence to show their nasty nocturnal homoglobin raids. Until Sunday, when I noticed, on the fresh, white duvet cover, that some of Snack's dirt was a little red. Yuck. So I bombed the room. Treated the cat. And slept a full six hours on Sunday night. Which was crazy refreshing. It does make me wonder, now, if the plague was really a flea borne disease, and not just fleas. Making people grumpy enough from lack of sleep to burn one another. I had a Shirley Temple at Mike and Mins before coming home. Emily, when I ordered it, after doing some nasty shot with some patrons, whispered in my ear, "I love you, Ben Jones." And it was so entertaining, as possibly the only sober person in the bar, watch the bar dynamics, the sexy drunkeness. And it made me laugh aloud. And tonight, to drive home, slightly tired, slightly lubricated, without thinking of grasping for the impossible love, but rather to come home, alone, and know that as something so much more loving, of myself, than making or taking any booty calls or glances, made me happier than ever to see the monkey tower man, with glistening waves in the falling rain. I ate probably two dozen oysters tonight as well. And could have eaten more, had  I started earlier. In some nod to indigineous traditions, probably the world over, I thanked the oysters for flying here so I could eat them. Which was the best I could do to honor their spirits. And they were tasty. I asked all the staff before I snarfed if they wanted any, and was relieved that Tracy was the only one. God, I should open a restaurant, just to get that shit wholesale. But you can't be a pusher and do the product. I think I'd just be one mucopolysaccharide engorged walking erection, pumped up on that nautical aphrodisiac.Wow. It's probably less the nutrient content, which takes time to build up in the system, and more the sensuous factor, of sucking that delicate flesh, that makes it work so effectively immediately. Or maybe it's just the smile it puts on my face. Because I had some wierd mojo working tonight, that made me keep looking, literally, behind me, from the looks and hair tosses and all the other flirtatious feints I kept getting tonight. Crazy. Made me even happier, my Yoda voice, to be going home without working all that, even if I knew how. Especially since I'm damn tired. 1:21:42 AM