olly-olly-oxen-free

when i was a little girl, my mom and i went on the Ferris Wheel at an amusement park in California. As we click-click-clicked slowly to the top while more and more people were being loaded on, i remember loving the view. But my mom didn't. i was totally confused when she shouted for the ride's operator to let us off. and as we click-click-clicked back toward solid ground, i felt a mixture of disappointment and relief. i figured that she was maybe protecting me from something. (it turned out to be less active omniscience and more outright acrophobia. the woman simply doesn't like heights, and being up there scared the bejesus out of her.) but i also had a feeling deep down that the ride would be really fun, and then it would end...so maybe not going on the ride at all was best. (OK, i was about five, so i'm quite sure i'm making most of this disappointment/relief/emotion memory up...but regardless, liberties and all, something resonates.)

oh-so-many years later, i stood on the side of the stage at the Reading Festival in England, watching kurt cobain being pushed onstage in a wheelchair. He was wearing a ratty platinum wig, a white lab coat and was feigning frailty (at least of the physical kind) ostensibly because he felt he had to make an attention-grabbing entrance that wouldn't disappoint. As i stood still in that magical moment before the lights go up and the music blasts out, i turned back and forth between the commotion on the stage and the bedlam in front of it. the shadows of the band picking up their instruments, feedback and tuning noises noodling away while the crowd seemed to hold their breath and flashes from cameras gave pops of light to show their faces, lots of mouths hanging open, eyes glazed. i remember thinking, Damn, I'm lucky. then, almost as swiftly, the twins of disappointment and relief stepped in to play. this was not an altogether unwelcome entry, because my happiness felt on the edge of being too much to bear.

what is that? the funny dance that embraces a let down more than the flying. the anticipation that exquisite happiness can't go on, so better to just get it over quickly or not have it at all. some say waiting for the other shoe to drop. yikes. maybe it's a matter of the intensity.

a few years after the Redding fest, i was working at Elektra records and in San Francisco for an mTV/metallica contest. one lucky guy had won the band for a day in which he would go for a boat ride with them, then to the bass player's house to jam with them, then to dinner with the band and friends. all caught on tape for mTV to replay over and over again (and naturally timed with the release of some Metallica album or another). it seemed absolutely perfect that the guy who won resembled Beavis not a little bit (and his buddy for the day fit the Butthead description pretty well, also). when we got to the boat basin where the day was to begin, the band was already onboard. i waited for the winner to get out of the car to join us. and i waited. and i waited. finally an mTV publicist came over to tell me that little B would not/could not get out of the car. the cameras stopped rolling and i went over to talk to him. he was in the backseat alone (his friend had practically flown out of the sunroof as soon as they'd pulled into the parking lot and was no doubt drinking jagermeister with James at that very moment). i got in the front and asked, What's up? It's all too much, he said. I wish you guys had never shown up. i could have handled the disappointment. But now everything in my life from here on out will be downhill so i'm just not gonna do it.

I remember being stunned. it was so fatalistic. i honestly don't know what it was that finally got him out of the car (maybe we got Lars to come over and cajole him. that guy could annoy anyone into doing anything). but this kid's words made a mark: it was almost too painful to be this fortunate, bring on the disappointment and relief. (Needless to say, 10 hours later said-contest-winner was standing on top of a chair at the pizza restaurant trying to pour beer on the bass player's head....and that ended well.)

disappointment and relief are a cocktail that i've been known to shake up together. maybe it has to do with the responsibility of what will come if the situation unfolds as i want it to. the responsibility for sustaining the good stuff...but i'm also realizing about balance, acceptance and the art of doing nothing in the face of happiness. I had a moment with that last week in class, when halfway through my song&movement I realized all i wanted to do was curl up in a ball on the floor. give up. i was done. wasn't feeling it. but i ignored that voice and kept going. it didn't work to keep going and i was disappointed. i crawled away and shut down. but what followed changed the course of my reaction profoundly. i was offered another chance to give in and i took it, just followed, didn't think. it made me really happy and no relief from disappointment followed.

I can handle it. each week i sit a little longer in the bliss of my life and let the warmth of that float me. i do nothing but sit, whether i'm watching the beauty of my ladies dance or my eyes are closed, wherever, whatever, i go a little longer each time and know i can stop hiding behind the shadow of those D&R twins.