(May 30, 2012) NEW YORK CITY — I leave on my “Jazz Or Bust” tour on Friday. I’ve really started to feel the “full reality” of it, as Douglas Adams might have said. The stack of boxes pictured above is going into storage today. It’s mostly books of poetry and the shelves to keep them on. Just about everything else I own was already in storage — or ditched when I moved from Albany to NYC last year.
Just last year? So much has happened since I came here at the end of March in 2011. Huge changes in nearly every part of my life. And now this big one — saying goodbye to friends, my sister … even a place to live. This is the first time I’ve ever moved from somewhere without moving to somewhere. It’s a little disorienting, although certainly exciting, too. I’ll definitely be depending on the kindness of friends and strangers from here on out. For who knows how long.
This week I’ve been saying goodbye to people. In a Tolkein-y way, I hope. Off on a great adventure, rather than off to never be seen again. Although I guess the latter is also Tolkein-y. I’ve been reading The Hobbit, too. Also on my Kindle: the Lord of the Rings trilogy, On The Road, two books by adventure cyclist Jill Homer, Thoreau’s Cape Cod, Dogen’s Extensive Record and a lot more of the same ilk. And I’ve got quite a few more on my travel wish list.
I bought my Greyhound pass the other day. So the first two months of travel are covered. (Big thanks to everyone who donated to the tour so far. You can still do that here.) I leave from the Port Authority Bus Terminal on Friday to head to a friend’s house in Wilmington, DE. I’ll be interviewing the guitarist Judith Kay on Saturday, then heading to Pennsylvania on Sunday to see my kids before I head south. I think I’ll be doing an interview in the town where they live, too. By coincidence, a cellist friend, TJ Borden is on tour this summer and will be there the same day I am. Then I’m off to Shepherdstown (WV) to do an interview with Jeff Cosgrove and maybe also a poetry reading. I’ll let you know as soon as I know.
And now I should stop writing this, go rent a UHaul truck and put all this stuff in a Park Slope storage unit to be retrieved … sometime.
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