2005-10-19 - 11:12 a.m.

I used to be so on top of things.

Musically I mean.

Honestly. When I was in my early 20's I was in the know about nearly every musical genre (save for country music, which I abhorred with the hatred of a thousand Katie Courics). I was the go-to person for what was up to the second hip, or old school cool. I knew my punk, my new wave, my pop, I was skilled in predicting the next new R&B sensation, I could pick a rap hit at a million paces. I could name that classical piece in 3 notes and hit you with an opera selection that would blow your mind. Jazz? Bring it on.

That was then.

There's nothing to make me feel so old as hearing the name of a band absolutely freakin EVERYWHERE and having no idea what they sound like, what type of music they play.

For years now I've accepted the getting older thing. I've come to terms with the fact that kids today (and by kids I mean people in their 20's) have clothing and hairstyles I don't neccessarily appreciate aesthetically and music tastes that I find unlistenable. I don't shake my head at those things the way older people (good grief) did at mine when I was young and I don't, for the most part, try to take it on and make it part of my experience. Few things are more pathetic.

Lately though, I'm hearing more and more people I would consider my contemporaries talk about music I've never heard.

Case in point: Death Cab for (I had to go look up the last word, so far detatched am I from "the scene") Cutie.

Yesterday I downloaded real player so that I could watch the ANTM video clips from their website (I know Crate, I've lost you, just insert - Look at pretty pictures of latest gay boyfriend-and you'll be fine). I got the free version because I'm completely broke.

With this free version comes "Rhapsody" which I guess is a music download service and online jukebox sort of thing. (It's not that I don't know what these are, I'm not that far out of it, just that I downloaded it all of 30 seconds ago and haven't really figured out what it's primary function is yet).

One of the first things I saw on their jukebox was Death Cab for Cutie. I clicked with trepidation, fully expecting something I was completely unable to relate to , even if it were listenable.

Surprise!

Why didn't someone tell me I was going to love this band? How did everyone know before me? I don't understand.

You might think that was enough musical exploration for someone of my advanced years for one morning. You would be wrong.

Let me preface this next bit by telling you this, lately, and pretty much consistantly, there has been this vignette, or occasionally video snipped, running just at the edge of my consciousness of a time when I used to hang out at this bookstore cafe in Boston (Trident, for those of you who know it).

The last time I was there was probably 1993 or so, and yet it is so vivid a place in my mind that I'm there every single day, it even showed up in one of my CSI fics, though I never named it as such.

I've thought about talking about this phenomena of having it dancing on the edge of my mind here in the diary before but I was never sure what to say other than, it is there.

I don't know what else to say about it now. I'm sure though that there is a reason that it stays so close to me.

Perhaps it is to remind me of how different I was when I was there all the time. My life was certainly more free, more progressive. I was probably more open minded. I felt more artistic on a daily basis and very connected to an urban life that I've long since distanced myself from, sometimes purposefully and sometimes not.

I'll interupt myself here to tell you what triggered the swirl of this concept from the edges of process right into the eye of the storm...I was reading xzqwyml's new diary thingy and he was talking about listening to Julie Doiron.

First I was all caught up in her being from Canada and how that's 2 people in as many days from Canada that at least one person I know has found to be useful.

Then I thought, well, okay, I'll bite, I'll follow that link, turn on my ITunes and find out who this Julie Doiron chick is, because, yes, again, I've never heard of her.

So I did.

If this isn't a soundtrack for the coffeehouse/bookstore in my mind I don't know what is.

I'll tell you something else, about this recent reverie of images urban, every time I've seen a cityscape at night in the past month or so, on tv or in a photograph, any image of a window looking out over city lights, I've been compelled. I think about it for days afterward and wrap fantasies all around the things going on in a room with that view.

I extrapolate out to the lights below, the stories of the windows visable from the initial window.

I create an entire city full of fictions, all in rapid seconds of neurodowntime. All without realizing I'm doing it, or inviting it to continue. It's infrequent that I catch myself doing it but when I do I realize that it's been on autoprocess while I'm doing something else, like counting green crabs or aruging the merits of obtaining a new lobster boat.

Add all of this to my recent onslaught of pretend gay boyfriends and I believe we have what amounts to my subconsious telling me that we've lived the quiet suburban life long enough and it's time to get a little city in our swing.

Maybe the gay boyfriend part doesn't add in as neatly for you as it does for me. If it doesn't you've never been a fag hag in Massachusetts.

I say in Massachusetts because I've only ever been a hag here. I have no idea what it would be like in say, Wisconsin.

Here though, when I was doing daily "fabulous female companion to the queer nation" duty we would hang out close to home only when completely necessary. (Meaning when we had to you know, work) Most of our time though was spent running around Boston. Club Cafe for brunches and then it depended on the night and whether we were looking to hook my boy up or just get drunk.

I loved Luxor. It was such a tiny little video bar with the kind of seats you could just sink into. The crowd was slightly older and the bartender was a darling hot boy who was in deep lust with my boy but whom I warned to stay away from him. Bar boy was sweet and romantic and would have been crushed by the nameless sexploits of my boy.

I only ever drank beer at Luxor. It was my "sobering up before we head home" bar. (Mind you I was never driving. That was the boy's job, my job was to drive home with my head in his lap, watching the city lights disappear into suburban trees as we sang the exact same Annie Lennox song over and over).

I loved Quest too. Quest is gone now. Well, I say gone. It's straight now, which will completely ruin a good club.

Quest had the best bouncers. One was this fierce black drag queen who I worshipped and the other was this 4'10" rock hard, bald, angel who pulled my ass outta a bunch of scrapes I had no business starting.

I loved sitting on the rooftop at Quest, drinking, smoking and holding court. I was almost always the only straight girl in the place and I ALWAYS had a circle of fabulous boys draped around me, held captive by every glimmering word that would drip from my slick and shiny lips.

I put on makeup yesterday for the first time in a year. I know it was a year because the last time I put on makeup was for Boobs2's wedding.

Before that I couldn't begin to guess when the last time was.

Back in the day though I was arched, brushed, glossed and curled to perfection every time we ventured out.

I hadn't missed it at all until now.

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