Sunday, August 18, 2002 Your week of weeks It is Wednesday, and you are dancing like there's no tomorrow as Moby jams onstage. And you laugh at the funny bald man's jokes and your eyes go wide as the lights rise and fall and BLARE with the syncopated beats that make you twist your ankle and strain your knees as you dance and dance and dance on the grassy sloped lawn of Shoreline Amphitheater... It is Sunday, and you are trying not to go insane as the road stretches before you, an endless six hour drive that has never seemed so tedious before. You reach Gilroy, rolling down your windows to enjoy the garlic roasting smell, but the air feels empty. In the end, the only thing that keeps you sane is Microserfs on audio tape, and the usual dream of shaping it into a film, of making that last scene come alive on screen. It is Friday, and you are wincing as the Pirate King in a community theater production of The Pirates of Penzance goes off-key again. But you still applaud heartily for your cousin, a pirate in the first act and a policeman in the second. Afterwards, he mentions that his friend, the Major General, wants to make connections in LA, and can he have your email address? And you want to say, "Dude, I'm really nobody" - but you write it down on a scrap of paper and think optimistic thoughts for the Major General, who was always on key. It is Thursday, and you are winning yet another game of dominoes. You play your last tile and your grandma and brother glare at you as they calculate their new scores. But you just smile modestly, knowing your luck is going to run out eventually, and watch out for your grandmother's next move. It is Tuesday, and you are eating a veggie burger at a local burger joint with your mother. You joke and talk and debate, and there's something worth savoring in that moment when you both explode into laughter. It is Friday, and you are laughing as you spin your oldest cousin's one-year-old daughter in your arms, watching her face light up at the sensation, light up when she sees your smile. You watch her play with blankets and toys and water bottles; you help feed and bathe her, and it strikes you that most people wouldn't think to themselves, "This is so amazing..." It is Monday, and you are walking through downtown Palo Alto with your dad, talking about the movie you have just seen. And you can't help smiling, because there was a joke about Sue Mengers in The Kid Stays In The Picture, and while there aren't many other people who know who Sue Mengers is, your dad is one of them. It is Thursday, and you are singing along to Barenaked Ladies and REM with your brother, whose voice is deeper than yours, and always sure of the words. But you can more than keep up when the verses to End of the World as We Know It kick into high gear, and you both grin at the effort as the highway signs whizzing past begin to say Sacramento. It is Saturday, and you are driving back to Los Angeles, munching on almonds and searching for a radio station that can permeate the mountains surrounding the Pacheco Pass. You find an pop song from your high school years, struggling to overcome the static, that you still remember fondly, and you half-listen as you lean into the curves of the road, thinking to yourself... What a week it's been. | permalink blog • archives • photos • about • contact This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License. All content © 2004.