Enough For Now

Glad to be working just a little, just a little glad to be working

“Got any gigs coming up?”

As the words were leaving my mouth I regretted saying them.

A musician I admire and am friendly with was standing in front of me which felt like a miracle in a way. She is so cool in my book it’s hard to believe she actually exists as a real person, and that she would know me and say hi.

I could see her almost flinch when I asked the dreaded question and immediately tried to backtrack: “Forget I said that, I’m so sorry, I know I know!”

“It’s…hard,” she said and I understood completely. “It’s all kind of challenging right now.”

In the quiet times, when we were all stuck at home - 2020, 2021 off and on, again in 2022, such a question never came up. Not being able to go out and play gigs was hard, it was painful BUT it was also a relief. For the first time in my artist life, I was just working for myself.

Unemployment helped. I have never not had to struggle to make a living. I’ve been really broke a lot of my adult life. Part of it is being an artist — if making a living at this was easy, more people would do it— part is a lack of caution/ a devil may care “I’ll think about that tomorrow” attitude. I’ve been lucky to have family and friends who would never let me be without a home or a car, though I’ve been close to the carless part a few times. And I have a partner in Eric who  has negotiated the valleys and peaks forever and knows you just keep working.

So in 2020 and 2021, through unemployment benefits I actually made enough money to pay off some debts and keep up to date with bills, without ever leaving the house. I tried to stay productive but I missed the beautiful parts of playing live - the communication, the high and the intimacy. The sense of purpose - so this is why I write songs! My identity: this is me, loading my guitars in the back of the car. Looking for a place to park as close as possible to the door of the venue. Setting up, worrying if anyone will come. Checking the sound. Seeing some familiar faces. Ripping a piece of paper out of my notebook and writing out a set list, even if it’s basically the same one I played the night before - it’s some kind of meditation before a show. Trying to amp up the eyeliner and smooth down my hair, hoping for the best. Then - playing and letting all the planning and desire to do a good job and look good doing it go out the window - I’m here to feel something and make someone else feel it too.

See, even typing all that out, I get giddy. Playing live is LIFE, condensed into an hour and twenty minutes. The highs, the lows, the oh god why did I do or say that but what does it matter if it was real? The transcendent moments where you know you’re not really in charge of anything, some greater power is driving it all. What a privilege, what a joy.

But then I remember all the other before parts: what should the ticket price be? Is this a fair deal? Oh god I wish I had a more current photo I like, and who wrote this bio (oh right, I did). Is anyone going to care when these tickets go up for sale? Oh I’d better share the show again, and again. What if nobody comes? And on and on for the months, weeks and days leading up to the show. I miss that part not at all.

Throw in uncertainty, competition from super well-loved high ticket artists everyone has to see after years of being deprived. Travel costs and hazards, the inconvenience, the angst. When it was all a centrifugal motion machine you just did it and never stopped to think. Nearly three years of stopping and thinking.

The competition - festivals; cruises! Opening slots. I get envious, wishing I could be on this bill or that. Maybe when I have another record out? Maybe I already had my chance and should just be happy with what I do have? Then I remember I have a festival to play, in June. A few gigs. That’s not nothing. Fire the machine up again.

I’ve been working on a new record in the studio with Eric. His new one is done and mastered, another masterpiece. He sets a very high bar. I put my draft of a second book away to spend every day on this set of songs, some written earlier in the pandemic or just before, some from the last year. It’s starting to take shape. If I already said all this in the last post I’m sorry but it’s a few weeks later now so the tracks really are moving forward.

Getting serious in the studio

I miss just tinkering around though. So much of making stuff - writing or visual art or songs, is puttering and playing. I have to grab a few minutes here and there to pick up a guitar and learn a new song, keep reading and trying to get out to walk. That kind of freedom really was the best thing during the quiet time of the pandemic, and felt like a luxury I hadn’t had since I was in my twenties four flights up in the East Village, living on nothing and falling in love with songwriting.

14th Street

After a weirdly warm winter spring feels like a vague concept. We sat in the coffee place in Hudson and that annoying guy with his dog was in there. I don’t really know why he’s called “that annoying guy.” It might have been a certain hat he wore for a while and just a sense of him taking up too much space. I remembered him coughing in March 2020 and everyone jumping back. Someone even sharply told him to cover his mouth, we don’t know what we’re dealing with. He’d joked that he was sure he was fine.

No one was fine.

Now we were back in the same spot and his dog wanted a taste of my cupcake. It had snowed and that feeling of an event bonded us. We smiled and laughed a little and I was glad to see the guy and his dog and have even sort of started to warm to him, just for that sense of familiarity. Maybe it’s kind of like that with life now in this “post” phase. Maybe it’s springtime coming again, but not the 2020 kind. It’s 2023 now. New work, a few gigs.

That’s enough for now.