True Love (continued from November, 2000)

I had thought that I captured all these moments on film, but it seemed to be not so. As I fumbled through too many dark pictures and then set my gaze upon the number thirteen one again, a familiar depression set in slightly. I was facing something I'd never imagined possible: I attempted to explain the feelings that were coming through me -- the ones that are only even somewhat explained by just a passing of a show from friend to friend, perhaps -- by putting them into little time capsules or something especially mediocre. And it did not work. Not at all.

The scene was changing around me, and I couldn't find my steps as well as I had once had them back when I had first was introduced to it. I was lost, but not obviously so -- so many of us were lost in there, it seemed we found solace together and on the outside, were not really lonely anymore. Until the music stopped and the cab dropped you back in your apartment, and reality was something completely different than you had ever wanted it to be.

A few months later, I found myself on a train, heading down to a little recording studio in the heart of the Village, face-to-face with a handful of people who had written music that had changed the course of my being years before. My prior woes still stood with me, taking a backseat to the current drama. They wanted me to sing -- three or four lines -- and if they're good and if everyone liked it, it would be on a new album.

"Four lines?" I would repeat to myself. "I can do four."

And two hours later, I was being shuffled home, not even sure how it all came out, but without a care in the world. It made no difference if it were to make it on the album or not; I just felt lucky to have the opportunity to create.

A little album credit and a one-hour performance of three songs onstage during the same band's New Years run later, I was more confused than ever. I felt completely out of place, yet it seemed that everyone surrounding me was in the similar place as I. Just when I thought I finally had some control over the music, as I had helped create it that day in some way, it threw me for another loop altogether. Yet this time, I was back at square one, and it felt good once again.

A girl approached me about ten minutes after I had sang onstage, an expensive camera in her hands, and asked me if I would pose with her while her friend took pictures. I don't think they ever came out. At least I hope they didn't.

I felt right again after that run of shows, but as spring approaches, I enter with careful steps. I think it may be time to stop being such a creature of habit, put on some old shows in the car to listen to, and embrace the new as best I can.