Downtown

 

September 24, 2022

Planted white iris. 

Two days of adventure. Journeyed downtown last night into the thick of Ashevilliana, roving beer floats blocking the streets, throngs, drunks, buskers, street people, drummers in the park surrounded by tourists and dancing children. I looked for a place to park-- a search which was, of course, futile-- so I resorted to the garage on Biltmore, where I did an amazing thing. The sign said “Flat Rate $20,” so when I drove in I saw the apparatus where I thought you put your credit card to pay the $20. Slid my card in, nothing happened, so I jammed it harder, to make contact. Turns out it was the apparatus you press to get your parking ticket out, and I’d jammed it up trying to force a credit card in. Spent the next few minutes trying to dig my card out, a line of cars forming down Biltmore, wondering what the hold-up was. By some miracle I actually got it out and went on my way, and the cars behind continued their interrupted procession. A very Senior thing to do. Crossed town. Early, of course, I watched the drummers at the drum circle and had a cocktail at Jack of the Wood. I’d gone to see JC’s SoR at the Bebe. The Bebe is terrible, but it can’t be helped. John is a flawless performer, and the material was solid, engaging, impassioned, enthralling, the performance (a one-man show) totally without a glitch. The tiny black-box half empty in the midst of a teeming metropolis reminded me of all the best nights of theater I’ve had in Dublin, London, wherever, when some miraculous thing unfolded before me somehow hidden from the scrutiny of the many. Of course, a performer doesn’t want to be hidden from the scrutiny of the many, but for the onlooker it may be a secret and selfish delight. 

This AM it was Pride. AVLGMC sang–well, it was reported– and I wandered about in a daze of exhaustion which cleared enough for me to realize what I was doing most of the time. Had the worst lamb gyro in the history of the world. Staggered home and slept, rose, and now prepare to return to the theater. Each activity requires recovery time.