Taking a page from Pam Uphoff’s post, I’m out of the house, on the road, going to a concert for a group I’ve danced to since the 90’s.
Back when I was young and broke, I thought the older goths in their very nice clubbing gear and their reserved seating in the special area must have it made when it comes to being cool. Now that I’m into 15+ years of avoiding knee replacement in, I know that some of us with our lovely long skirts are hiding braces, the decorative canes were fully functional and in use, the corset might be hideously expensive to a broke just-barely-not-teen, but it’s also lasted me *mumble* many years, the boots were a recommendation from Paramedic friends for comfort on steel and concrete for long shifts… and the reserved seating is because it’s worth it not to try to stand on a concrete floor for several hours. (And the hotel room costs more than the concert, alas.)
Tonight, I shall watch the baby bats on the dance floor, and wistfully envy their knees and their energy. When I lean over to my friend and fellow elder goth, it’ll be something like “Look, you get the hips, I’ll get the knees, my love gets the back, and we’ll fight over the lungs.”
But mainly I shall just really enjoy the music.
So while my Sunday shall be spent recovering from forgetting that my ego can very easily write checks for dancing to the beat that my body can’t cash… especially if they play too many of my favourite songs…
Here’s something for you to enjoy! Alma’s new book!
Think of every overly-dramatic, “I watched the Hollywood remake for my research!” book set in Transylvania with werewolves and vampires and hunters and villagers…
And then play all those tropes straight with an author who knows the history, the ecology, the current politics, and more than a little about what werewolf foresters would actually do for a living. Mix in the petty vicious power politics of…. grad students and tenured professors. Stir with truly evil vampires, and werewolves who are trying to tae care of the land, and fix the maintenance problems on a castle that’s been built on top of itself for thousands of years…
It’s side-splitting on the meta level. It’s a damned good story just read for itself.
Warning: may cause grad school flashbacks.
Mad Genius Club 
4 responses to “Getting Out”
My best methods of getting out these days usually involve performing music.
I sing (tenor) for both Barbershop groups and a classical chorus (gotta be careful not to mix up who gets the diminished 7th chords). Just last night, we performed (classical) a “Silly Opera/Madrigals” concert, the only opportunity an amateur singer like me will ever get to belt out the Anvil Chorus and Va Pensiero at the top of my lungs, like a real operatic tenor. (They so rarely ask me to sing more loudly.)
For 20 years, I fiddled for Scandinavian dancing (I learned the violin for the purpose in my 30s) and put up a website of 2000 tunes (still heavily trafficked). In that situation, if you screwed up, maybe the dancers fell down, too. 🙂
It’s a great contrast to writing books. I don’t get to carefully write and rewrite some particular scene and hesitate before a release. I gotta commit, and if I get it wrong, it’s going to be very public indeed. Even the minor errors are apparent to the folks standing next to me. (We may all be amateurs, but we have our standards and our judgments.)
My Belgian-born mother, late in life, took to ballroom dancing and making her own (sophisticated) ball gowns. Not my thing, but I can understand the impulse. The form doesn’t matter – it’s the involvement with serious intent that counts. (I inherited a lot of slinky materials and beads and feathers, which were handy for the Renaissance Street Singers I was involved with at the time…)
It’s not the size of the audience that matters – it’s the putting-yourself-out-there, with limited editorial control.
*Throws confetti in honor of new book*
Did a week long trip to another state a couple weeks back, first half tourism and second half touching grass. It was fun. Finished rough draft of WIP while I was at it. But I spent so much time moving around when I was younger, that I tend to have a rebellious desire to just stay put.
Dancing? (Eyes knees dubiously) I used to square dance. Don’t think I’ll try it. But a concert would be fun.
It is the nature of things that tenors are always in demand. They may eye the package a bit dubiously, but I’m a much better tenor trumpet than an alto cello, and they just don’t have a lot of choice. (The amateur singing world is full of basses and altos as people age… )