Now as I look around, it’s mighty plain to see / This world is such a great and a funny place to be; Oh, the gamblin’ man is rich an’ the workin’ man is poor / And I ain’t got no home in this world anymore.

Woody Guthrie

Marisa came to visit and this morning I was up early to take her to the train station after a weekend of revelry. As we stood in Zeitgeist waiting for our tea and coffee she pointed up, and I listened; the cafe speakers were playing an almost inaudible version of I Ain’t Got No Home, a song we used to perform back in Chorus days.

Do you want to sing? I asked.

She laughed and shook her head. I’m too tired!

We’re probably the most reticent of all the Chorus members, but if a few others (Stevie, Mina, or Erin, for instance) had been around it is likely the cafe would have been regaled with an impromptu performance they might not have appreciated on what looked like a hungover Sunday morning.

The two of us were exhausted and running on perhaps three hours of sleep because last night we went to the opera to see Jeffrey singing in The Flying Dutchman – an excellent show. Our seats were great, center front row dress circle, a special treat to celebrate her birthday and seven years of friendship.

Marisa loved the music, and I tried not to pay too much attention to the fact that I was allergic to something or someone nearby, sneezing as discretely as possible. At the second intermission we met Byron for drinks then tracked down the smokers outside.

I asked Jody what he thought about the work, other than the anti-semitism of the composer, and he quite sensibly replied that he didn’t like the love story because She spurned the human person who loved her in favor of the creepy ghost pirate.

This pretty much sums up what I thought while watching. It is easy to fall in love with a concept, portrait, ballad, story – an abstract representation of another. It is far more difficult to take care of the people right in front of you, and of course more rewarding in the long run. Love may be ephemeral or it might last, but it is an emotion, not an action. Relationships are complicated and messy and if they are sustainable require commitment, attention, and work.

Give me Erik the Hunter over the Flying Dutchman any day.

Standing around on the sidewalk with friends old and new, I was thankful once again for the honor and privilege of knowing these people. Walking back toward the theatre Jody playfully smacked me in the head with his program. I blinked in astonishment and then said brightly Oh look – I didn’t even have a flashback!

Not that anyone should feel invited to repeat the experiment. Later we went to the Whiskey Bar for a Himsa record preview party, where I said goodbye to BP probably for the last time this summer, abandoning Byron to the vicissitudes of the metal kids and running away to the Bus Stop with Marisa.

We talked and laughed for hours until closing, when it was time for the (probably last ever) nacho party at Jeffrey’s bachelor pad. Sophie moves in this week – times are changing – and it was genius to stay up too late with dear people I will miss when I leave:

Shopping for beer in opera clothes:

David & Tamara:

Brian and Sophie cooking:

Jake and Genevieve:

Nachos:

Marisa playing the guitar:

If it has been nineteen years since I met Byron Number One then the anniversary of my car accident came and went without the standard acknowledgment. Guess I was too busy.

Though I have been thinking about those years, since I continue to meet fellow Kitsap kids. I find it entertaining to spend time with people from the same place who do not share my DNA (or at least, we aren’t exactly sure if we’re cousins – the original dozen or so families are intertwined to an extent nobody can trace).

In fact, one overly dramatic evening I abandoned the party I was obligated to attend and went out in search of hometown friends – specifically BP, whose brother worked for my grandfather, and Helen, a girl I met on the first day of kindergarten and knew until we graduated. I’m so glad we had the opportunity to meet again as adults:

Last night I was hanging out at the Bus Stop with a whole bunch of people who don’t speak a common language and we kept dissolving into laughter as we tried to translate and communicate. Like I pointed out to Niki Sugar behind the bar, I barely speak English.

He agreed and replied Yeah, I only speak Hillbilly and Slur!

At some point Natalia walked up and said I was just in the bathroom and heard you giggling and it made me so sad because you are leaving!

Just then Byron Number One materialized and I shrieked with delight – I thought he was out of town! He said I heard that laugh from down the street and knew it had to be you!

Apparently my voice carries – how strange! He was rushing away to play Ms. Pac Man at Pony but told me that he is staging a new opera at Aldeburgh, on the coast near where I live in England. Hurray!

If you are local consider checking out his performance of Piao Zhu: Flying Bamboo this weekend at the Arts in Nature Festival.

My son flew in from Colorado at eight last night and he departs to see the other grandparents tomorrow morning.

What do two days of the summer with your mother look like if you are growing up in Chez Lavender? His choice: dinner at Typhoon, roller skating around a warehouse towed by excitable friends on bicycles, candy shopping at midnight, and snuggling up to watch several episodes from the first season of the Simpsons, of course!

Then what? Driftwood houses on the beach, playing at a park on Beacon Hill, and Uwajimaya:

Then on zero notice I rounded up whoever could attend to go bowling, including my daughter and three teenage girls I’ve now known nearly half their lives – it is so amazing to watch kids turn into adults!

My daughter brought the ashes of my dead aunt in a pill bottle (eerie, but I think Mary would have appreciated the excursion), guests included Susannah, Jake, Nickle, J9, Ailee, their children, Susan and Paul plus their girls, Jeffrey, Sophie, Ramona, Jessie, and Ivan, who kept bowling strikes!

Jody turned up with a friend who knew none of us and sensibly hung out in the bar – quite a hilarious scene, wish I’d known when I lived in the neighborhood. Jody nominated himself as bouncer but the evening featured no drama whatsoever. In fact, I laughed so much I lost my voice once again!

My son brought fortune cookies to share, and I definitely believed mine. The whole outing was, simply, genius!

If you are local and have the cash you should check out this show because Anouk is awesome:

Last night I decided that I was exhausted and wanted to go home early. Except of course I had to drop by the Bus Stop to say goodnight to everyone. In other words, I surrendered to the vortex – I wasn’t even planning to have a drink, but Ade turned up followed by Xin and Anouk and…..

At one point I was standing around outside and one of the smokers said Hold this! and stuck a cigarette in my hand.

Staring down in wonderment, I realized that yet another of my statistical anomalies has been amended. Before last night I had literally never even touched one of those devil sticks!

I was alone on the sidewalk taking photographs of my hand when I realized a stranger was talking to me. This is normal – people always ask me for directions – but get this: dude was hitting on me. Blatantly!

I started laughing and answered Oh my goodness, strangers never dare! Can I take your picture?

He found that response baffling and kept trying to get the conversation back on track, at one point even trying to impress me with ghetto cred, NW style.

Since I grew up in the projects and had the most chaotic childhood possible this just elicited more wild giggling – yet still he persisted! How very, very impressive and strange.

Jody and Rachel (his sister, not Cambridge Rachel – but boy would that be interesting to watch!) were tired and on the verge of skipping karaoke on Sunday, but I persisted. Lucky thing too, or we would have missed Bethany singing The Pina Colada Song to celebrate her birthday.

Ade kept shouting This is illegal! No nipples! NO NIPPLES!

Yesterday I stopped in Olympia to get water in the midst of an epic quest to get back to Seattle (five hours, people! And the I-5 closure was not even the source of the problem – we didn’t drive faster than ten miles an hour until we hit Centralia).

Normally I feel queasy when visiting that picturesque little college town. This time? As I exited the vehicle I bashed my permanently injured right elbow on the door, causing my fist to swing up and punch my own in the face – hard.

This was excessively hilarious and I was still giggling as I tried to pay for my two liter bottle of water. But then I somehow managed to jam my broken finger on the bottle and it went flinging out of my hands and flew across the aisle, hitting a salesclerk in the back before rolling away across the store.

Of course I literally could not breathe because I was laughing so much.

Creating a huge spectacle in the town where I wish to remain invisible? No problem!

Though that was not the strangest thing that happened on the drive – oh no. You know that billboard with the cranky and extreme political views? I agree with the sentiment for the first time in my entire life. How peculiar!

Ana Erotica starts grad school at Columbia in the fall (I even wrote one of her recommendation letters!). Yesterday she called to say she wants to visit before school starts, but can’t make up her mind, and thus has officially put me in charge of the decision.

What would we do during the proposed trip? Hmmm. Remember the Hunt for Bad Boys and Lumberjacks? Well, she finished her Christmas-theme smutty novel about the lumber industry. That means she will have an entirely new variety of Bad Boy to research!

Now, I am a pragmatic sort – in her position I would be thinking about which notebook to buy, not planning strange and murky adventures. But since I’ve abdicated adulthood, I cannot in good conscience give her that advice.

Last night I could have gone to a Smores Extravaganza – I even had the secret Smores Code to find it (aka the address and name of the house). In an effort to convince me Dawn said I’ve never dated anyone better than smores!

This is an interesting and hilarious point, but I had to take a break from my PG-13 lifestyle to hang out in bars and talk about life, love, and immigration with Marisa. What can I say? I wish we still lived two blocks from each other; our friendship is one of the most significant relationships I’ve ever had with anyone.

I miss her every day, and I moved away five years ago.

Somewhere in the course of the conversation we covered the Learning Ladychat issue and I pointed out that we’re both dudes. Marisa exclaimed You’re way more of a dude than I am, Bee. You can write that down in your little black book!

Noted! Though I still intend to pursue this line of research.

I’m living a backwards sort of life but the last few weeks have been extraordinary – it really is like being sixteen again without, you know, the cancer!

Genius moment of the day: Stevie driving me around in a decrepit Volvo, blasting AM radio and singing along:

Today as I walked from visiting Erin Scarum at Citybikes to Three Friends to hang out with Dawn I was startled to pass a window that featured, um, Gabriel. I knew his gallery was around there but not the exact location.

There were people standing on the sidewalk extolling his virtues so I dared not enter.

When I texted to tell him that he replied Chicken!

My answer? Damn straight. Except, oh, that would be a lie…..

Some images from the homestead: