Rock Star Hour

Life's a garden. Dig it?

You know what I'm looking forward to a whole, whole lot? Riding on an airplane. Getting to look down thousands and thousands of miles. And writing and taking pictures from the window seat. I think flying is better than any drug. I think being at such high altitudes really does something to the chemicals in your brain.

And I love the perspective it brings, and it brings a lot. I love the epiphanies I have in mid-air. And I love that you can get onto this vessel and get off two thousand miles away.

I wonder what the trees look like in Washington. And I wonder what the air smells like. And if the wind feels the same. What the clouds look like. And what music is playing on the Jukeboxes of Seattle's neighborhood bars.

Pretty soon ...

Oh, my awesome inspiring cool as hell boyfriend moved to Canada so we broke up, but we're still friends, and now I have someone to visit in Vancouver, which rules because I was going to go there anyway.

What else is new? I played open mic at Helios last night. Thanks for coming Jonathan.

Less than three weeks until I see the horizon from a different space. The countdown has begun ...

Fuck yeah

I was going to start looking for a job in Seattle today, but it turns out the listings everywhere are the same.

No matter where I go there will be classified ads.

I was stressing myself out about writing a resume, trying to get a "proper" job.

The truth is it doesn't really matter what I'd do. All I want to do is write and make music.

This is the cliché story about the girl going out to the big city to find herself. The difference is the little girl is just leaving a big city for another one.

But there's nothing wrong with wanting a new start.

I wrote another song last week. I have six now. And I just bought my guitar in March. This is what I want to do.

I'm playing my first open mic Thursday, and I'm already itching to record.

I have to do it. What have I got to lose?

Nothing. Nothing, like my pal Dave told me last night -- nothing I can't have back in three years if it doesn't work out.

I'm lucky because I know a lot of people love me. I have a lot of friends, and everyone I have played for has liked my music. Now it's time to test it out on some strangers.

And if they don't like it, someone will. And I don't care because if no one listens I'm going to do it anyway because I have to.

This is the way I look at it. I've been looking at colleges in Washington and Oregon, but I've got to work for at least a year to get in-state residency so I can afford to transfer.

And I know that a year is a long time. Look at what I've done in my life in the past six months, even. Or ten.

I might feel differently about all this in a year. I might want to come back to Texas in a year. Or six months. But I can't paralyze myself with the realization that my consciousness changes with each new experience. That's suicide. What I've got to do is go out there, go after it, find out what it is and grab it by the balls.

With every great success there is a risk ...

Wish me luck.›

You want something done, you've got to do it yourself

Hey, everybody, I'm going to Seattle! I just booked my flight. It's for damn sure now.

I've been really taking a lot of time to think about what I want to do. And it's really paying off. I am so excited about all this.

Sometimes I feel like I'm high as a kite, but others, I feel this pain in my chest like I'm lying on the ground and someone's got their foot on me and their body weight's just crushing me, making it hard to breathe.

It's cooler than it sounds, though. It's not what I have decided that makes me feel this way, but the aftermath of making the decision. I'm doing something that is going to change my life. I've done it before, in smaller steps. Like the first time I went to camp. I was 20 years old. I couldn't afford my apartment. I had just started working two summer jobs and was looking for a third. Then, a very good friend of mine left to go work for his second summer at camp. I had been listening to him talk positively about it all year long, and when he left, I told him to call me if they still had any openings when he got there.

And that is how it all happened. With one phone call I was hired, and then I had to move, quit two jobs, get a physical and a ride to the camp three hours away, prepare however I could -- all in one week. I got there having missed training week because I was brought in last-minute, and two days later the first group of campers came ...

I did that because I knew something needed to change in my life. I didn't even like kids, but I didn't like the fact that I didn't like kids, and I wanted that to change, and camp did that for me.

Camp did many things for me. Some things I still haven't fully realized. And it set off a chain of positive energy in my life, and then extended on to the lives of others. I know it did because the next summer half the staff were my friends. And even though I'm moving on this summer, some of them are going back for their second and third summers, and they're bringing their friends, and I know that means it did something for them, and that they brought something special to the lives of everyone else there too.

If this sounds cliche, oh well, because I don't know how else to say it except that I feel it in my heart and my bones. I feel as though now, I've started another chain. And I don't know how long it is or where it's leading, but I know it's good because inside I know I'm good.

And I know that if I have nothing else, I have the knowledge of self love, my experiences and the hope to continue on because I have something to contribute to all this chaotic yet steady and periodically peaceful, ordinary and in between extraordinary, unexplainable thing called life.

The latest and greatest

No longer a slave of ambition, I laugh at the world and its shams, As I think of my happy condition, Surrounded by acres of clams.

I am so excited about going to Washington. I got a job at a summer camp for disabled persons one hour from Seattle. I haven't been this happy about anything in a long, long time. With the breakup in January, and then my cat dying. And a lot of other things.

I really haven't been that happy with school the last couple years. The newspaper and Jeff gave me enough to think about, but after being editor and breaking up, I started thinking about what I really want to do. I've been wanting to move for some time now, but I've been afraid and stayed for other reasons. I'm so glad I found this job. I've never been to the West Coast.

After that, I'm going to take the Fall off to work and travel, and if I find a place I like, I'm going to stay there and go back to school. But I'm pretty tired of UH. I never really liked any of the degree plans here.

My Mom is being so supportive. She's always much more understanding than I think she's going to be. I thought she'd be mad about me taking time off school, but she's not at all. She said she wished she had done something like what I'm doing. A lot of people have been telling me that lately, and I feel like if I don't do it now while I don't have so many ties, I might not get the chance again.

I do have a new boyfriend. He is really great. He is smart and talented, and he inspires me a lot. He's a waiter, and a musician. He's the most amazing guitar player I've ever met in person. He's actually moving out to Austin this summer to take a couple classes at Austin Community College, and to work on his music. He's moving there with his best friend, and they are both going to go to school and play in the band at the Hard Rock Café there. We sort of met when we already were making plans to move someplace, so we're not really planning on any serious future, except to remain good friends and stay in touch. I'm going to miss him a lot, though.

Lonely and dreaming of the West Coast

Not lonely in the sense loneliness is associated with commonly. Lonely for an adventure.

I'm not going to Odessa.

I'm going somewhere else. I'm going somewhere I've never been before. Somewhere I have been wanting to go for years.

Should I tell you where? Nah. I think I'll tell you later.

But it's a good thing, I will say that.

d