Lesbionic Tendencies

Music has always gotten me through...well, all time. But especially bad. And I regress to high school and a love for the Indigo Girls. As many as my friends point out, my taste in music veers toward "lesbian" and I'm ok with that. I prefer the sound of a female singing voice to a man's. Just the way it is. And as I lie in my bed, night after night, with the door shut and my ipod buds in my ear I listed to two songs over and over again to...I don't know...dull the pain? Alleviate the pain? Encourage the pain?

The first was 'Hope Alone' written by Emily Saliers of the Indigo Girls. It goes something like this:

Let's not drag this out
Everything's in motion
Although I've only ever loved you kind
And with devotion
Remember when I met you
You were leaving from the start
I thought one day you'd probably just come home
And break my heart

It's funny what you know
And still go on pretending
With no good evidence
You'll ever see that happy ending

You were looking for your distance
And sensing my resistance
You had to do your will
I had to learn the hard way
We were just an empty dream too big
For hope alone to fill

I know I'm a dreamer
So I'll give you that
Still I hope I'm more than just a place you laid your hat
You're a land of secrets
Its only citizen
And though I paid my dues
I was never allowed in
And so I am a stranger
Especially today
Cause I get sad and lonely
And you get your way

You were looking for your distance
And sensing my resistance
You had to do your will

I had to learn the hard way
That we were just an empty dream too big
For hope alone to fill

Holding on for change I know
We never stood a chance
So I could only wait
And watch you slip right through my hands

You were always looking for your distance
And sensing my resistance
You had to do your will
I had to learn the hard way
We were just an empty dream too big]

I found this most fitting. No?

The other song was, of course, an Alanis Morissette song. I didn't really discover Alanis in the 90s. Her anger on the Jagged Little Pill album scared me then. It wasn't until Present Ex and I broke up the first time that I learned to appreciate her though the release of the Alanis: Unplugged cd. And then I became a full-force Alanis junkie. It was also at this time that Alanis was performing off-Broadway in The Vagina Monologues. It was a fairly emotional time for me (as opposed to all those unemotional times I experience in life?) and I decided to go. I also decided to call the director, Joe Mantello, and ask him to get me back afterwards to meet her. Which he did. And I did. And I was a blathering idiot. Not really, probably, but in my head I was. I still don't know how to say to an artist whose work you appreciate, Your music has gotten me through a lot. It sounds so cliched. But I told her I was a fan. And she was very sweet and had a wonderful aura about her and just seemed to be having fun. I appreciated it and her.

The Alanis song"Simple Together" was on a little heard cd called Feast on Scraps that consisted of tracks she didn't put on the Under Rug Swept album. I like this cd better than it's predecessor. But I'm always a bigger fan of the underdog.

Youve been my golden best friend
Now with post-demise at hand
Cant go to you for consolation
Cause were off limits during this transition

This grief overwhelms me
It burns in my stomach
And I cant stop bumping into things

I thought we'd be simple together
I thought we'd be happy together
Thought we'd be limitless together
I thought we'd be precious together
But I was sadly mistaken

You've been my soulmate and mentor
I remembered you the moment I met you
With you I knew gods face was handsome
With you I suffered an expansion

This loss is numbing me
It pierces my chest
And I cant stop dropping everything

I thought we'd be sexy together
Thought we'd be evolving together
I thought we'd have children together
I thought we'd be family together
But I was sadly mistaken

If I had a bill for all the philosophies I shared
If I had a penny for all the possibilities I presented
If I had a dime for every hand thrown up in the air
My wealth would render this no less severe

I thought we'd be genius together
I thought we'd be healing together
I thought we'd be growing together
Thought we'd be adventurous together
But I was sadly mistaken

Thought we'd be exploring together
Thought we'd be inspired together
I thought we'd be flying together
Thought we'd be on fire together
But I was sadly mistaken

So I was lying in bed, feeling bad for myself a lot. But with the help of Wellbutrin, therapy, friends and lesbian music I was certain that one day my heart and mind would mend. Eventually.

On one of these warm June nights, a thunderstorm rolled in and as I lay there, watching the lightning bolts and feeling the thunder shake the building I was transported back in my mind to my first summer spent in NYC.

It was the summer between my junior and senior years at NYU. I was taking a class entitled Creating Theatre With Young People through the Department of Educational Theatre. In this three or four week intensive, we had high school kids from all five boroughs under our care and the aim was to devise a completely original piece of theatre written and performed by them. It was a crazy time. The oldest of these kids was 18 and I was barely 20. How was I supposed to be a "leader"? Uncertain as I was on my feet at that time, I had a great time and bonding with those "kids" was a very special experience for me.

Anyway, I was living with my friend Maura and her mother at their apartment on Bleecker Street. Maura's mom worked at NYU and this large apartment is the building that they all grew up in. Maura and I had met doing Spring Awakening and had become fast friends and I was thrilled at being offered a free place to stay for a few weeks.

Now, when I say they grew up in this apartment, I also mean that they never threw anything away. The walls were filled with bookshelves stacked two to three deep. Papers covered the dining room table and pretty much any available space in the living room and dining room. A poor old dog named Cinnamon -- half-blind, partially deaf and matted beyond repair -- staggered aimlessly through the hallways. Two cats, Huckleberry and...I can't recall pounced on every surface. And another cat that Maura's sister had "rescued" and then left in the apartment had taken refuge in the radiator in a bedroom for fear of the other animals.

The apartment was on the 13th floor of the NYU building that has the giant stone Picasso statue in front of it, right off of Bleecker and LaGuardia. There's a big grassy plaza in front of the building and a cobblestone driveway and lots of seating in front of the building, and a playground and smaller plaza in the back. Maura ran down the hall from apartment 13A to greet me with a high pitched "JOHN-VINCENT" and threw her arms around me. She was wearing overalls and had violet paint on them and her nose. "I've been painting."

I can see that, I replied. She introduced me to her mother and I was a bit taken aback. She wasn't what I was expecting knowing Maura as well as I did. Mom, as I fondly came to call her, was perched in her armchair, her feet up, cane by her side and had a very regal aura about her despite the ordinary nature of her appearance. Something clouded her eyes on that first meeting, a steely glance that scared me a little bit. In retrospect, I realize that it was the cool gaze of a nurse sizing up a patient, trying to decide how close she could allow herself to get to this creature who would be in her space for some time. By the end of my stay, we would sit in the living room and watch Jeopardy almost every night, the sun setting behind New Jersey outside the huge picture window.

My first night there I awoke at about 4 in the morning to the cat, Huckleberry, asleep and completely spread out across my face. I am severely allergic to cats. It took a few hours for the swelling of my eyes to go down and for me to get all of the crust out. After three weeks, my allergies no longer bothered me all that much. I didn't have a choice.

One night, about 1am or so, the door burst open and through it came Maura. "John-Vincent," she whispered. "Are you awake?" I was in that foggy plane somewhere between sleep and awake, listening to the thunderstorm outside. It sounded so beautiful and it was lulling me to sleep.

No, I'm awake. Where were you?

"Jones Beach. My friends and I went to a Sarah McLachlan concert."

Cool.

"Get up. I want you to come downstairs."

What? Why?

"It's beautiful. Let's dance in the rain."

Ok. And I pushed myself out of bed, threw on some shorts and a dirty t-shirt and barefoot, plodded down the hallway after Maura. She was talking about the concert and some song called "Chocolate" which was, apparently, the only "happy" song Sarah McLachlan had ever written and how the crowd went wild when they heard it.

The elevator quickly went down the 13 floor, uninterrupted. The doorman gave us a curious look as we made our way through the lobby and out the doors. The warm air hit me immediately and it felt nice. Maura plunged into across the cobblestones and into the grass and I, hesitated a second. Then I leaned out and felt the touch of a cool raindrop on my face. It was cool and refreshing and beautiful. I dashed out to meet her and we danced to the music the rain made around a statue by Picasso.

The building shook and I was awoken from my memory. I wasn't dancing in the rain. I was in Williamsburg, in my bed, and I was a grown up and I had a broken heart.