The dressy-dress was hung in the minivan with care while dress shoes and stockings were packed neatly in a canvas bag along. By this time today, I should have been winding spaghetti around a fork in a Jefferson City, Missouri restaurant with poets and composers before performing at the Governor’s Voices & Verses event at the state capital. Instead, I’m contemplating putting on my pajamas right after another hot bath in a few minutes.
The culprit is a nasty little virus I picked up from Forest, who spent the last four days largely in bed or playing video games in a haze. While I hope to avoid the video haze, driving for three and half a hours and then being a part of any dressed-event was beyond my reach without taking a large amount of the kind of cold medicine you need to show you ID to buy. I woke constantly last night, feeling increasingly sicker, and hearing the voices in my head argue over whether I could leave town today. By the time I got out of bed this morning, the voice calling for a sick day had successfully pinned the voice coaxing me toward caffeine and a lot of driving.
So here I am, unexpectedly home, and oddly unpacking everything packed late last night. The good news is that none of it goes to the laundry room. The bad news is that I’m not doing a gig I was very excited about, one that included a stay in a B & B in the neighborhood in Columbia, MO where I used to live. I had planned to show Natalie all the places where I got wasted, dumped and depressed when I was her age, but such reminiscing will have to wait for another time.
Meanwhile, it’s a day of sun, light and very big wind when all kinds of things around me seem to finding some kind of resolution. Much of my resolution is coming through frequent baths, reading Isak Dineson’s Out of Africa (not so coincidently because I’ll be presenting that at a nearby library next week) interspersed with one of Carol Burnett’s autobiographies, and considering what stupid, funny movie I’ll treat myself to in the basement come nightfall. The animals and house seem happy to have me here, and I’m at peace with letting the day take me, or keep me, where it will.
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