So many faces of fear!
I had just confronted and worked through the very real fear that if I moved to New Orleans and stood tall against the flood-waters of violence that are rising there, then I could lose my life. I beat that. It took a lot, but I did it. And, dammit if it wasn't crystal clear, as soon as I welcomed that eventuality, that I didn't really want to go to New Orleans after all. Then too, another fear replaced it suddenly, with the kind of timing that says it was simply lying in wait for me to deal with mortal fear, before it ambushed me with more. Who the hell do I think I am, anyway?!
I'm annoyed. I'm angry. I am certainly not going to make any Buddha happy today and the middle-way is nowhere to be found in the roadmap of 'Me'.
I love New Orleans. I never really saw her before the storm, so I fell in love with a city that was half-Paris, half-Beirut. Fell... In... Love. I never cared about any geographical place before she came along (even Ireland did not embrace me as I got off the plane in the way my ancestors hinted that it might). For a year and a half, I have been pulled there. I have called in favors, braved lovers and ex-lovers, and accepted that, although they are compatible, my Career would take a backseat to my Purpose... And now that the doors are opened, so is a truth revealed: It is not what I need to do.
[note: Ani Difranco's 'Untouchable Face' is playing in the background. It is a staple of the music that gets me through relationship pains, but tonite... it is saying something new.]
I HAVE a community. I HAVE a flock (to use such a pretentious term). I have a system to both support me and be supported by me. Why have I been looking for another? New Orleans has it's own support. It is small, but it is mightily strong and I am forever intimately tied to it. My community, that of traveling entertainers, artists, road-dogs and wanderers, has much less. It has accepted me as a friend to them and they have showered me with love. I have pushed through age barriers and family lineage to join the matriarchs and patriarchs 20 years my senior. I need to stay.
But, here is fear, and it is just as strong as that of loss of life and limb: The fear of looking like a quitter.
I have put so much energy into this drive to New Orleans that I am terrified that those close to me, those who I told "Hold the line, I will join you soon," will think me a coward or a promise-maker of emptiness. I am afraid to look the fool.
Do you know what I'd like? A small piece of land. I want it to be full of idols and sculptures and flowers and weeds. I want robes to be my work-clothes and I want simply to offer those that I love a quiet place to sit and think and be there for them if they need an ear. I want a stage where we can all take turns speaking and singing and being heard. I want peace and creation.
New Orleans is another mission entirely, and it is clear now that, very sadly, it is not mine. I wish it were. But it is not, and it took me finally making it to the point of being able to say, "Yes, you, you CAN do this," that I knew that I shouldn't.
Or, maybe I'm just afraid I'll change my mind again. Blah. Blah. Blah.
[Addendum: Half an hour after I posted this, shots were fired in the street in front of my house. Talk to me about coincidence.]
I had just confronted and worked through the very real fear that if I moved to New Orleans and stood tall against the flood-waters of violence that are rising there, then I could lose my life. I beat that. It took a lot, but I did it. And, dammit if it wasn't crystal clear, as soon as I welcomed that eventuality, that I didn't really want to go to New Orleans after all. Then too, another fear replaced it suddenly, with the kind of timing that says it was simply lying in wait for me to deal with mortal fear, before it ambushed me with more. Who the hell do I think I am, anyway?!
I'm annoyed. I'm angry. I am certainly not going to make any Buddha happy today and the middle-way is nowhere to be found in the roadmap of 'Me'.
I love New Orleans. I never really saw her before the storm, so I fell in love with a city that was half-Paris, half-Beirut. Fell... In... Love. I never cared about any geographical place before she came along (even Ireland did not embrace me as I got off the plane in the way my ancestors hinted that it might). For a year and a half, I have been pulled there. I have called in favors, braved lovers and ex-lovers, and accepted that, although they are compatible, my Career would take a backseat to my Purpose... And now that the doors are opened, so is a truth revealed: It is not what I need to do.
[note: Ani Difranco's 'Untouchable Face' is playing in the background. It is a staple of the music that gets me through relationship pains, but tonite... it is saying something new.]
I HAVE a community. I HAVE a flock (to use such a pretentious term). I have a system to both support me and be supported by me. Why have I been looking for another? New Orleans has it's own support. It is small, but it is mightily strong and I am forever intimately tied to it. My community, that of traveling entertainers, artists, road-dogs and wanderers, has much less. It has accepted me as a friend to them and they have showered me with love. I have pushed through age barriers and family lineage to join the matriarchs and patriarchs 20 years my senior. I need to stay.
But, here is fear, and it is just as strong as that of loss of life and limb: The fear of looking like a quitter.
I have put so much energy into this drive to New Orleans that I am terrified that those close to me, those who I told "Hold the line, I will join you soon," will think me a coward or a promise-maker of emptiness. I am afraid to look the fool.
Do you know what I'd like? A small piece of land. I want it to be full of idols and sculptures and flowers and weeds. I want robes to be my work-clothes and I want simply to offer those that I love a quiet place to sit and think and be there for them if they need an ear. I want a stage where we can all take turns speaking and singing and being heard. I want peace and creation.
New Orleans is another mission entirely, and it is clear now that, very sadly, it is not mine. I wish it were. But it is not, and it took me finally making it to the point of being able to say, "Yes, you, you CAN do this," that I knew that I shouldn't.
Or, maybe I'm just afraid I'll change my mind again. Blah. Blah. Blah.
[Addendum: Half an hour after I posted this, shots were fired in the street in front of my house. Talk to me about coincidence.]
VIEW 4 of 4 COMMENTS
Yeah Absinthe and Titus is good. Absinthe and The Rocky Horror Picture Show is better. I'll be hitting the clubs here and all of sudden I'm singing "I'm just 7 hours old. Truely beautiful to behold. And somebody should be told. My libido hasn't been controlled" and I have people singing with me. Crazy stuff!
...why don't we go halfsies on Tunetown? Idols, sculptures, Flowers and Weeds....it is small, it is "connected"...and WE are Family. It is worth consideration.
I Love You,
R.