last gig

so I did my last gig yesterday. it was pretty unnoteworthy in and of itself but it could end up being my last gig as a professional audio engineer. it will almost certainly be the last for the next year, but who knows if I’ll do it anymore when I get back. I am so burnt out on it now that I really have a lot of trouble imagining running back to it, but who knows how I’ll feel once a little time has passed.

saying goodbyes

last night was my going away party. it was really a super-combo party, falling just a day after my birthday and featuring the record release performance of my band. with all of these stars aligning as such it was pretty fantastic. there was a good turnout and and good energy about the whole thing. lauren and mallory organized a roast of me, which featured plenty of digs that made people squirm in their seats.

the next two weeks are rapidly filling up with farewell dates. lunch with this person, dinner with that, all for the express purpose of hanging out one last time before I go. I am glad to see all of these folks, but it is a very taxing process. each one of these meetings is features a full-on emote fest of farewells, which cumulatively take a toll on a guy. I guess the alternative is no good either, but there are moments where just disappearing into the sunset has some appeal.

now to continue the packing and archiving of my life.

ticket purchased

I bought my ticket today. I fly out the morning of May 10th. a month and change away. visa paperwork is all being processed. everything has been set into motion.

domestic

I’m sitting at some super-deluxe laptop charging station in the Hartford, CT airport waiting for my flight back home thinking about the last few days. much of the time was spent doing the typical things one does while visiting old friends. but this trip had a new dynamic that had not been present in previous outings. Brandon planned a daytrip to Boston for him and I and his girlfriend Stephanie, with surprise guest Kyle and Stephanie (Kramer, too many Stephanies). this was, although a lot of fun, not the thing of note. what I have taken away from this is that the great “coupling” has begun. this is a phenomena that is experienced by all passing through their twenties and approaching their thirties, so I needn’t go in to great detail. suffice it to say that an ever increasing number of my contemporaries are married or in relationships where that is a very real possibility. I am not pointing this out in any kind of alarmist fashion, prodding myself into a fearful, desperate grasping for that which it is to be single. this is a neutral development, but a development which is worth taking note of.

I can remember my old man predicting the romantic futures of my friends. so far he his predictions have been overwhelmingly correct. those who he said would marry young have married young. those who he said would divorce nearly as young have divorced. those who he said would remain single are still single. unfortunately, his powers of precognition are unable to see through the fog to my future, so we shall see.

to Vermont!

I am taking off this weekend to visit a good friend in Vermont. This is a highly anticipated trip, as I have not seen him since the holidays and will not see him again until I return (which may be a  moot point, as it is doubtful that I’ll survive this trip to go on to my next).

The past few weeks and the next month have been and will continue to be consumed with tying up loose ends and spending time with friends and family. I spent last weekend at the ocean cabin of my friend/teacher/former employer David Bishop. With no cell phone service, internet access, or cable television it was a much needed forced sensory depravation. I could no obsessively monitor the New York Times with CNN on in the background while reading the Economist. The world was far, far away and wholly irrelevant, at least for the weekend. The Etherin Wright EP is coming together, with the last song being mixed now, which is a relief as I began to have serious concerns about whether this project would ever get done, let alone before my departure.

In other news, my buddy Ed has offered to pay for the tattoo that I’ve been thinking of getting for the last three years, as a means to prod me forward in the process. So I guess I’m going to have to do it.

Now to Vermont. Good luck and good night.