Last night, I went to Tacoma with some people and crashed Conclave, the big viola da gamba powow. It was nice to see some Bloomington friends again, and it made me miss my time there. Of course, I knew when I left that sooner or later I would be struck by the hammer of nostalgia that can only be generated by incomplete satisfaction. I wonder how long it will take until I feel purity and goodness again when I practice early music. I think I take things too seriously.

Betsy was here for the weekend! Among our toury flurry was a day trip back to my old hometown of Grayland. It was nice to be there, and also sort of strange and profound. I was struck by the notion of my parents moving there. They were the same age as I am now. They moved from San Francisco to this tiny, dark, rain-drenched outpost in rural Washington, and it must have been pretty weird. Anyway, our house is still there, but nobody lives in it, and nature is quickly reclaiming what's left. Most of the trees around the house are gone and somebody mows the lawn, which wasn't there before. I was able to walk through mom's old sewing room and my bedroom, since one of the back walls is gone. We also went to the beach, which was my favorite part of the day. It was wide and stormy, littered with sand dollars and roaring like the freeway just as I remembered. I could have stayed there with my feet in the water forever, honestly.

Two Elemental Odes

Ode to Starbucks

Oh Starbucks,
how your sameness evokes memory.
Corporate continuity of experience-
The shareholders
must be so proud.
Storrs, Bloomington, Boston, New York,
every airport,
always tasty coffee
and the heebie-jeebies.
Do these people
desire this pre-fab community?
The elegant corkboard
with its solitary flyer,
A song we all like,
but have not heard for awhile.
I wonder if they fear
the real places, like Soma
and the way the Coffee Garden used to be.

…heh, I guess there could be only one Pablo Neruda. Okay, how about this?

Ode to Bahoo

Oh silken-footed beast,
watchful keeper of our socks,
silent empress of
your mystery.
As a kitten,
we brought you home,
drowsy, bottle-fed and
entirely gray.
As your body grew,
the new spaces emerged
golden beige.
Bahoo,
mottled specter of corners,
master of subtlety,
dusky mote of gentleness,
your footstep is so light
that we notice you
only after you have arrived
and are curled
on our feet.

As it turns out, I LIKE BAROQUE OPERA. I was a chamber music snob, but not anymore.

In other news, I'm in a cafe, in which they are playing The Best of John Mayer, the Worst Album Ever (if it exists). Especially unbearable is the song about fathers and daughters. "Fathers, be good to your daughters," he croons, "so they will be nice to me" (paraphrasing). Misogynist crap (however unintentional), which voids Mayer's dreaminess utterly.

Apart from that, I am enrolled in an early music workshop here in Seattle this week, and am enjoying it very much. My feet hurt from the pavane. People must have had amazingly strong arches and calf muscles in those days. I suppose that's why the fellows wore tights and turned out their feet to bow and stuff. I think it would be fun to walk around in a big hat covered with ostrich plumes with a sword on my belt. Much more interesting than those big dresses. I wonder if I could have been the George Sand of the baroque....