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Wednesday May 31, 2000, 19:55

I was writing last night and I fell asleep. On my couch. Again. I've been doing this a lot since I've gotten my couch back to my apartment. Have I mentioned that this couch (which is actually a futon folded into a couch) has cowboys on it? I bet I have. I love my couch.

But I fell asleep on it last night while writing. I wrote something about cats, I remember that much, and then the next thing I remember the phone was ringing and it was Kristie appologizing that she hadn't called earlier but they had run into a friend and they had hung out all night and oh, did she wake me? I think I actually said yes. I never say yes. But this time I said yes, yes you woke me. And then I went back to sleep.

I have a theory about this. The theory about my falling asleep in the middle of projects. There are a couple of holes in this theory, but I'm going to go with it anyway. The theory is that falling asleep on my couch is comforting to me because it means that I am so engaged in what I am doing that I don't even notice that I'm tired until it's too late and I just fall asleep where I am. See, if I was distracted at all, and if I noticed that I was tired and that I should get up and brush my teeth and change and go to sleep in my bed, then I obviously wasn't so engrossed in my work. But.

But if I am plowing through whatever it is that I'm doing and I am working so hard and I am in that zone (that zone in which I have not been for so many months now) where I don't even remember to go to the bathroom, let alone get up and go to sleep, then it means that I have passion. I have drive. And I live on that feeling. It doesn't matter what I'm doing. If I'm writing, if I'm coding. As long as it has me and won't let me go, that's what I love.

This would not explain why I fall asleep at work. That we can probably pin on sheer boredom, but I can't say for sure.

Remember where we last left off? I was in New York for the weekend, a whim as it were. And I had just taken a shower with a towel that had been used by the cats in the apartment as a bed. Aparently. And on the 5 train uptown I was picking little white hairs out of my nose.

I walked out of Catherine's building, turned myself in the approximate right direction (after asking the doorman for some help) and headed towards the subway. The same line that I used to take downtown to work when I was commuting in from home. To iTurf. Over half a year ago. In New York. Hello again.

Enough. I walked through the city, and I think, though I can't be sure, I think it was talking to me. It was making fun of me. Making fun of where I am living now, teasing "you want me but you can't have me!" it was saying to me. "Well!" I huffed, as I carried my trendy (are they still trendy) Manhattan Portage bag and blue and brown overnight bag through the financial district, "We'll see about that!"

We shall see.

Uptown on the subway, some of the nastiest public transit I've had the pleasure of riding. The T is a treat compared to the New York City subways, except for the, well, we don't need to be discussin this again. Suffice it to say that if I did venture out on the town in New York, I could get back home when my night of merriment was over. Regardless.

I visited Amy, and found a person who actually knows what she is doing with herself right now. Well, that's not actually true. She has no idea, but she's going full force in a direction that might help her along her way. She's started a theatre company of her own and actually has gotten some funding and is actually making art. Now this is art which does not quite appeal to my particular aesthetic, but she's doing it. That's more than I can say for myself. Though I did venture today off to find a community theatre nearby. I couldn't find it. But I tried.

An aside on the state of theatre in Boston. As was noted when I was doing a project on the business plans of the American Repertory Theatre in the late 1970s, Boston just does not have a large theatre going audience. I think that there is plenty of theatre in Boston, it's just that people have a hard time getting to it because the people who support the arts, mostly the better-off middle-class all live in the suburbs and don't particularly want to come into Boston for a night of theatre.

I believe that there is plenty of art going on around here, it's just that none of it is very good, or rather, not much of it is very good, because it just doesn't have to be. After all, there really aren't that many people to see it.

So breakfast with Amy where I once again complained about my current situation and outlined my plan of moving back to New York and doing theatre in a smallish capacity, and doing freelance computer programming things. And she said that it seemed to make sense, as it makes sense to me and as it makes sense to everyone else I talk to.

But of course I'm not going to do it and of course I am going to stay at my job for a while and of course of course.

She doesn't know what she wants. She knows that she is running her theatre company. She knows that she is running a show right now and she knows that she is going off to teach kayaking for the summer. She knows that she wants a full-time job. I, on the other hand, think that I have had enough of this full-time shit and am ready for some "me" time. Whether or not I can actually get up the nerve to do that for myself remains to be seen.

[ catherine with soda ] Shoot crosstown on the shuttle from Grand Central to Times Square to meet Catherine to attempt to get Rent tickets by lottery. Show up a couple of minutes late, of course, but it's ok. Catherine is wearing a green skirt and black leather jacket and funky white sandal things. I don't have any reason to mention this other than. No, I have no reason to mention these things at all. I think that in my old age (it's coming, just wait) I've gotten more style conscious. Me. I know, it's ridiculous.

As for the old thing, well the night before, when we were at JCS, I noted that this girl that we were talking with whom Catherine had known from (from where? from online, from the line? somewhere.) looked young. She was eighteen. Eighteen. And now that's young to me. Me, I'm certainly getting old if I can say things like "boy, she looks young." I have to watch out or I'm going to start saying things like "Kids these days!"

Well, we didn't get the lotto tickets, which was kind of a bummer as I'd wanted to see Rent again (and at $20 at that!) when we find out that friend Joel, who, as number 1 Rent fanatic has seen the show 474 time or something like that, has won the lotto and has an extra ticket. Well, I debate for a minute and then, of course (I say to myself) and tell Joel that I will take the extra ticket.

This man is insane. He has seen one in every four performances that has been done since the show hit Broadway. Over the course of four years. That is a lot of theatre. Or rather, that is a lot of the same theatre. He is greeted at the door by the ushers, and was actually refered to as "Mr. Rent himself" when he won the lotto. It's a way of life for him. At this point, there is more to seeing the show than just seeing the show. Chances are, if you go to see Rent, Joel will be there. And he loves the show, so there is definitely the thrill of seeing the performance. But there's so much more. It's a lifestyle. He buys tickets and sells tickets. Eighty dollar tickets bought for twenty and resold for forty. He has a thing going with the homeless guy, Robert. Robert complains that he never buys a paper. Joel points out that he gave him a walkman once.

It's more than just the show.

It was then interesting for me, this being only my second time at the show, to be a part of this world. A part of the world of the Line, which I never experienced, where people would camp out on the street just for the chance to get the first row tickets. That's where Catherine and Joel met. There's a community there, or at least there was one, until they shut down the Line and switched over to Lotto. And here I was, hanging out with "Mr. Rent," talking with Robert about how nobody's buying the papers, being part of this inner circle, so to speak. Them? They're tourists. Of course. Check this out, I just sold two more tickets.

I was part of something again.

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