Things Here are Still Wonderful, even when I'm Not Sure What Comes Next

5/27/2002

Saturday Aral, Tasha and I went down to the Esplanade and saw a free concert at the hatch shell. The acts, in order of appearance, were: They Might Be Giants, Suzanne Vega, and Patti Smith. Each act played an incredible 50 minute set, filled with all the things you’d want to hear but normally would be certain they’d never play. Each performance was incredible and fun; They Might Be Giants was entertaining as all hell, with their very pale male fan base so hyper excited that they made the whole crowd laugh and smile. Suzanne Vega closed her set with an audience participation version of “Tom’s Diner”, and was achingly lonely sounding in person. Her voice was incredibly beautiful, outside, near the Charles on a perfect day.

And Patti Smith closed. She closed yelling things like “Nationalism isn’t Patriotism!” and “Remember who you were on September 10th!” She cussed at a photographer and dedicated a song to John Walker Lindt. She did “Gloria”, and I fell in love with her.

I kept looking around at the guys in the audience, because with the line up of TMBG, Suzanne Vega, and Patti Smith, I was certain this was where hippie girls and geeky guys would meet. It dawned on me with a certain horror as I looked around though that there were guys who were my type there…they were all right about nineteen years old.

Afterwards, as Aral and I walked home down the river, schools of fish were jumping all along the river bank- so many fish, right by the water’s edge, I couldn’t believe it. I itched for a net or a bucket to scoop them up – you could have even just flipped them onto the bank like a bear, there were so many so close. I flipped out, because, hey man, free food. But I daren’t take any. On the Charles, you don’t swim in the river, and you don’t take the fish. Goddamnit, sometimes I just don’t want to understand things here. I mean, I know that Boston is populous enough that if everybody took a few fish, there wouldn’t be any fish left, and I understand that if everybody swam in the river, it would get all crudded up like a TVA lake. But I still get excited when I see fish jumping like that. Look! Fishes! Free Food! Right here! I’m sure Aral was mortified.

I had four-o’clock-time-for-tea with a friend down at Coolidge Corner Sunday. We talked about books in the Brookline Booksmith and sat at Peet’s Coffee House for an hour or more just talking. Did I mention in my last post that I love having tea? Just talking to friends and having tea? It’s the best thing ever invented. My friend Ford and I used to do that all the time back in Tennessee, and I had forgotten how wonderful it was. Thank goodness Kati and Michael came up last week and reminded me of myself.

Before Kati and Michael left last week, we spent a night making books on my living room floor, discussing pop culture with Aral, and generally getting very silly. And Kati couldn’t believe I was even thinking about giving up on this city, Boston, where things are so very fine. Kati said to Aral: “When I met Elizabeth she didn’t have the GPA to get into Simmons, and had no money to move up to Boston with, but she was going to do it all by shear force of will. And she did.” Kati turned to me then and said; “I think you’re just tired.”

And that’s part of it, I suppose. I’m tired of being broke all the time. I had it in my head that getting a grad degree would be this magical ticket out of poverty, and it really just isn’t. Friday will be my last day at the Library of International Studies. The movers are coming Tuesday through Thursday to take all my patient work away, Friday I’ll be on to help in the new space for just a bit, and after that I’ll be unemployed again. Sometime during the second week of June Coolidge Hall will be torn down. From working on this job I will have gained a lot of experience, maybe a few friends, and a kick-ass performance review.

Then it’ll be time to start looking for my tenth job in Boston, or perhaps my first job in Atlanta. I’m poor, I’m tired, but I have a ton of airline miles. So it might just be time for another cross-country adventure…