From Melbourne.

Photo credit: Ashley Mar

My nerves vanish quickly; muscle memory returning. Oxygen flying though my throat, the pulse of rhythm overtaking muscle, the touch of instrument.  The past years of performing a mere handful of times cannot remove the cumulative miles I have put onstage.  But I savor what is new and undiscovered in fresh returning.  I am self-conscious now in new ways.  I am older, an older woman.  Aging in the spotlight seems excruciating, worse than being young in the spotlight and reduced to body parts.  And what have I to say?  What is this all about?  Twenty years ago, there was nothing to question.  Music was my lifeline, my reason, my tie to the living.  It protected me from loneliness, from my enormous feelings of loneliness, and if I did not fit in the world, I fit there.  Music had space for me, met with equal velocity.  But the business didn’t seem to — I never surfaced and rose to what was initially expected of me, and not to a place which was sustainable.  I was a conundrum, a commercial disappointment. I thought too much. 

The light show is exactly the same as when I left it.  The swirls speed up on the chorus, the lights turn pink and blue, a fuzzy, false trip.  Why does no one ever complain about that?  Am I the only one who notices this cheap trick?  Touring requires a certain turning off, a forgiveness of limitation of place.  I touch the part of myself which believes magic can happen anywhere, that leap of faith I have lent the strength of my entire imagination in a thousand clubs.  A togetherness of faces move in shadow before me.  What is the world of making music, what does it mean?  People center stage seem so sure, so convinced, but I’m not so sure anymore.  Is it really good for the world to try to be important?  I spend all day teaching Jean life is not centerstage. Celebrity and the wreckage in its wake seem opposed to what I truly believe, which is that everyone matters and that is the only way we will survive.  Some kind of relentless mission with very high personal costs seems necessary to sustain a level of ticket sales to have quality sound, a level of adulthood, a bottom line that makes any sense. 

I consider turning to Andrew —- I’ve lost my confidence, I’d tell him.  My reasons are all shuffled and I can’t bring myself to finish an album.  I’m that scared.  When I think of gathering myself to do it, I hear all the times I’ve been dismissed; I do not have a hit, I did not dress right, I tried too hard, I didn’t try hard enough, I’m not worth tickets, I’m not worth anything.  There was always a reason and it was always me.  My god, it has served me well to be away.  Growing projects, leading missions from home, making my own way with no one looking.  I love being a musician and a writer but I’ve never had a gimmick, a click, or a taste for popularity contests. I’ll never make it.  

But have I hidden behind motherhood to say no to all the things I don’t believe in about this game and left something beloved behind?  There is no doubt this business is not for single mothers. I’m a tiny, insignificant voice in a sea that wants your whole life.  I’m always growing as an artist, but the numbers have not grown with me.  I’m strong enough to have said aloud: Shouldn’t I just go home, revel in the everyday love which nourishes me, the breakfast, lunch and dinner dishes, the red radishes in my garden, the joy of living undiscovered by the world? 

The first time I ever had stage fright was with Andrew, at the Beacon Theater.  I was thirty-seven.  I’d just emptied my bank account to make a record on my own terms, without manager or label. There was a kind of now or never feeling about things that women in their thirties understand.  A timed door for life making sense —  financially, practically, emotionally — awaits otherwise having a child is simply going to blow up your life and your dream you’ve worked so hard for.  That night, I needed to sing a career bridge to somewhere other than van life. I wanted that so very much that suddenly nothing came out of my mouth. 

More than a decade later, I don’t really care that I’ll never headline a theater this size, though I know I can, musically, and have before.  My voice hits the rafters of the old theater without a microphone.  A song from 1942 flows through me and I give it to a silent crowd.  I allow all of my body the goodness of music — some portal to kindness which Jean Shepherd might reach through. Music in my hands; music, my refuge.  However daunting, whatever the scars, the words played over in my head are no match for that longtime companion. As if pulling on the hem of a coat, it tugs a please, quietly. Please place all of yourself in my hand and I will guard it.  

I’ll get right to work, I nod. 

Photo credit: Tift Merritt