So. Have you ever not been able to find something, a tool maybe, a stapler let’s say, and so you just finally end up getting another one, and then you end up finding the first one?
Please say yes.
Great, whew, well, then this’ll be a fun story.
In an effort to live bold, wild and free, I erased 9000 computer files this week. All of them were copies of copies of backups of other copies of files relating to the music I’ve been talking about for the last eleven weeks. In total, it looks like there were about 250 core files created, scores and sequences and notes and mp3s and even QuarkXPress digital mechanicals, which is kind of an inside joke for people who do that sort of thing. It’s like finding an Betamax tape or a rotary phone.
In any case, I made one copy of every file, and then backed it up JUST ONCE, to one other drive.
I felt better. Responsible. So much hard drive space… maybe I could put a plant there now, or a little bookshelf.
But I found a file called “ballet plot lines”. It’s a pretty well thought out and kind of expansive set of liner notes for this work. I mean, it’s extensive, it explains each movement in terms of an overarching theme and an inspirational mythical figure and a key element. I wrote it for a friend who was interested in choreographing the piece, she worked in the San Francisco office and I was shuttling between there and the New York one. I remember emailing it to her, so I wondered what happened, or why exactly this didn’t happen?
The last “date modified” on that file is September 10, 2001. 2:56 PM.
Right.
This file didn’t get lost on a hard drive, it got lost in time. In 24 hours it would be forgotten, completely, as the world became this other place. My next project file, in chronological order, is dated January 2004.
—
So this week I wanted to create something that would allow you to see my ballet in your head as you listened to the music, but of course I’m not quite ready to have you listen to it. It’ll be a few weeks. I wish it could have been today, that would have been so delightfully unlike me, we all would have been so surprised, victorian hand fans would’ve unfurled to cover shocked and whispering faces. But it’ll be a few weeks. Thank you for your patience; I’m honored that you’ve taken this experimental journey with me, and if you’ve been here for all of Season Three, thank you so much, I hope you haven’t found it an entirely aimless ramble.
In any case, the liner notes I found on that old file are so much more detailed than what I was trying to write, but they’re not what I wanted to write. I didn’t want to send you off with words about a dance, I wanted to make the words dance, kind of.
The beginning of that original piece reads, “The World And Me will tell the story of a woman’s life, from wonder to knowledge to wisdom.”
It is now 1:30 in the morning. I normally write these a bit ahead, but life has been pretty persistent if not entirely daunting, so I may not be making the best decisions right now, but I offer you this poem, which is kind of like words dancing, if you stretch that premise super thin.
It’s not fancy, but neither am I; it’s an emotional outline of six movements of music you haven’t had the chance to hear yet, but you’ve supported its creation through your presence here, so I thank you for that kickstart…pun kind of intended.
Oh, and what’s next? I don’t know.
If I keep this up for 8 more weeks, it’ll be a year. That sounds fun.
As always, thank you so very much for your time.
At first, she wonders what they’re for
since they never touch a floor, but dangle
or are trailed behind
two feet she sees but bears no mind.
The world is safe. That’s what she’s feeling (mostly)
as she faces ceiling,
sky and happy faces, smiling
down at her. No moment wasted,
every breath her new tomorrow.
She begins to see, and although
there’s no mirror
she perceives a sense of who she just may be -
but someday is so far away;
for now there’s now.
——
She stands one day,
and that’s a new surprise, she’s taller.
After she learns not to fall, she
runs and jumps, her feet her own.
She plays with joy.
—
She’s not alone. Her feet atop a grownup’s shoes,
softly counting ones and twos as
they dance on the kitchen floor.
A moment she’ll remember for as long as she will be.
—
Frustration. Formal shoes and schools.
—
Elation at the thought of being free:
but now there’s work to do, so she
must stand in lines, and walk in time.
Conform for every single dime…
—
until she stops.
And stands.
Defiant? Maybe not, but uncompliant in a sense of
who she’s made and what that means.
The girl who played, and danced, and ran
sees herself, and makes new plans in tempo with her own heart’s beat
Standing on her own.
Two feet.
Lost And Found