April 30, 2016

First almost perfect night on stage last night, with a tiny audience to witness it.
   
Lunch at White Duck downtown with J D and his wife and their increasingly beautiful toddler son.  He receives $4600 for our song commission, asks what I want of it. I say $200. He thinks I’m joking. I sat in a café and wrote the text over cappuccino. Not the same thing as work.
   
Rushing home before meeting with Z, I discovered two cartons on my porch, which I knew were the turtles I ordered from Florida. Unpacked them and put them in the bathtub with some water until I could attend to them, but even then the time was brief, just that between seeing Z and heading out for Waynesville. The razor backed musk turtle was perfect. His name is Minos, after one who was a sea-king, and then went down to be a judge of the underworld. I set him on a stone at the edge of the pond, went in to do an errand, and when I returned he was gone. Submerged, I hope; I’ll look for him today. The red slider, however, was enormous. Too big for my pond, I thought, an eating machine beside whom there could not be much else in the pool. I put him back in his packing box and drove him to Beaver Lake, where I figured he’d have a home right for him. A couple was pushing their baby in a stroller by the lakeside, so I walked over and said, “Would she like to see a turtle?” The little girl played with the turtle for a moment (looking then less like a turtle than a colorful, angry stone) as I explained what I was doing. “We have a pond,” the man said. “A big one,” the woman added, “full of koi.” They looked so hopeful. I explained the turtle’s needs and gave them the box, telling them to choose between the lake and their koi pond. I figured my little friend would prosper either place. And so one turtle is kept close and the other set to a fate not fully known. I feel blessed either way.
   
Joe the tree guy turns out to be even more beautiful than Nick the lawn guy. My luck in these matters holds. Joe is beautiful and cheery, like a kid. Nick is beautiful and solemn, like a figure in an icon.
   
Planted like a maniac– two roses, more waterlilies, a witch hazel tree. The crows use the pond to soften or dampen–or perhaps to conceal–their food. Haven’t seen Minos since I left him on his rock.