Our last two shows were in none other than my home town area.
It really meant a lot to me to be back on those shores. Where Lake Superior looks like the ocean...no end, no beginning unless you count the shoreline touching your toes.
It really is one of the most beautiful places on earth.
I have gone back and forth over the years with a love hate relationship with that place, beacuse it is where I grew up and especially as a kid, I wanted to be Hey Arnold, hanging out on stoops playing stick ball or in L.A. surfing with dudes & chilling with Gwen Stefani, but fantasies aside, real life hits you more and more as you get older & you either fall down or you appreciate the polite spank & I am grateful more and more for my eyes to open to the beauty of where I grew up.
That I was able to have myriad parks with waterfalls and woods and kayaking and camping and lakes small and large to enjoy and apples to pick in the fall at orchards...the places I frolicked and called home...I am blessed and grateful.
It's funny what a 360 life sometimes does to you. Here I am writing this from NYC, concrete jungle of sorts reminscing about nude-tanning on Lake Superior rocks the size of a house.
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Beaners:
This was the nervous I've ever been for a show. EVERYONE I knew and loved was there. My best friend Laura & all her sisters & her mom were there...her boyfriend...her friends. And then, in creeps my four siblings. And of course the rucous of boys that we grew up with.
I just felt completely supported and completely nervous for them to finally hear my stuff,a s most of them never had before. And truly to subject myself to the most important judgment of all...my loves ones...I was shaking in my boots.
I think kuh kuh kuh kuh that I properly used that nervous energy (thank you David Playfair for your advice, I will never forget it) and chanelled it into good energy.
Either way, afterwards to hug & kiss & bullshit with my loved ones...they were all so lovely and loved what we did, obviously biased, but it was a great show.
My old friend Paul Winchester had dropped me a line & he ended up playing guitar with Megan & I at this show & the next show at the Thirsty Pagan.
He is SUCH a sensitive musician and I feel like the shows blossomed because of his artistic judgments...pushes and pulls.
God I'm so hippie dippie sometimes, aren't I. ahhah
The Thirsty Pagan show was honestly, probably my favorite show ever.
Superior is a little more rough than Duluth. Duluth is known more for it's artist scene, but Superior is a lot more blue collar and gritty.
So, we went into the Thirsty Pagan which was the brewery...first time I've been in since it was switched over & I soon realized that it's habitual patrons were mainly there to drink, the kind that want to chat & will chat over the music even if it's really good, so I just prepared myself for that, to take it as no personal offence, just the name of the game.
We get up there & they're all talking and chatting. I see a bunch of friends from high school trickling in and old friends of my brothers'...
We start playing and people start turning around in their seats...everyone's getting quiet. I'm just doing my own thing...really just trying to enjoy myself & the band slamming away. We do some upbeat stuff...I'm dancing around & being myself & by the ending of our set, everyone is even silent for our quiet songs.
These are old men that work on the railroad listening to what some weird little 23 year old is doing. I felt like I was in a trance with the crowd...some private party of just bantering and dancing and clapping like fools and what a lovely party it was.
Afterwards I talked with everyone & just felt so happy & proud to call them MY people. The lives these people have lived are my life. They way we all grew up together. The rhythm of our speak and the values that we have in our lives. Even though I'm gone, it's a reminder of who I truly am. And I'm satisfied.