Building
That’s really all life is: building. Or tearing apart. Two sides of one coin, really. Or, well, life, birth, death; it’s all about building, growing into a state of completion, then the decay, the tearing down.
You would never guess that I’m sitting at a music rehearsal, would you?
Reminds me of a story, totally unrelated to anything. My dear, late friend, Jeffrey Mont Jeffreys, was very proud of his award winning definition of a kiss: “The meeting of the distal ends of two tubes of shit.”
I guess it is related.
I was at the theatre early yesterday (yesterday being Saturday) to help build the Sweeney set. With the stress carried over from earlier in the week ( unemployment) and lifting things in a fashion unfit for my history of back issues, I, of course, threw out my lower back.
Rehearsal then, yesterday after building, was an ordeal. Luckily, there were many kind folks with pain killers handy. Also fortunate, we didn’t have to be at the theater until five today, so I could spend the day in bed not moving. It was nice. The back feels, while not wonderful, through the magic of rest and chemicals, at least much better.
And now home, or at least, for the next four weeks or so, a version of home. I’m referring to my parent’s house. The house where I grew up, and strangely, wonderously, in this ever disposable age, where my parents still live.
So I’m here, back in my old room, in, not my old bed, that was left behind many years ago in one apartment move or another. No, I am in Jamie’s antique bed that he bought years before meeting me. Did it have some negative, or pre-me, association that we didn’t want it in our own bedroom? No, not at all (at least none of which I’ve been informed), no, the problem is one of size.
Did you know that standardization of bed sizes is a relatively modern thing? Until I met this bed, it had never occurred to me to even think about such a thing.
A quick-ish web search shines little light on just when, exactly, the standardization began, other than the vague, ‘with the advent of mass production’. But one assumes it was around the turn of the century.
Oh, that’s no longer a very specific statement, is it? Of course, anyone reading this now would know that I meant the 19th into the 20th; fifty years from now, who knows? Who knows what will be considered quaint, old-fashioned, that is so very “now”, now. Showing his age, he asks: How many cassettes do you still have hanging around? “I’m gonna burn them to CD,” you say. One guesses in 2050 or so, CDs will have become as antiquated as the album is today. Ah, vinyl… Still have so much of that around, too, waiting to be burned. Onto CD that is, not in a bonfire of protest.
Bonfires. Burning. Tearing down. Building. I have no idea where this was going… Except, I know I wanted to say how wonderful these music rehearsals sound; voices blending, rising and falling together. It is truly a spiritual experience. And i’m proud and honored to be a part of this wonderful group of people.
If you are in the Reading, PA area, or just in the mood for a roadtrip, come on down, ya won’t be disappointed.
Follow this link for more info and tix. And if you do stop in to see Sweeney Todd, say “hi”, it’d be nice to meet you.
Nite,
k.
