My fingers are all cut up.

It was visceral, last night. A full load of emotions all built up to singing, screaming and playing to the maximum intensity as I was capable. I recall almost passing out at the microphone.

And if I fell, who might catch me?

I am dehydrated. My body aches. My head is slowly beginning to ease up on the pounding. And this old heart weighs heavy in my chest. Yours would too, were it half made of stone.

It was not easy. But nothing worth having is. Says I. Though I suppose others may have more fortune in certain things. But through all the uneasy things, I’ve come to understand at least a few points I hold true.

I’d rather be on stage than in the crowd. And strange enough, I don’t believe it to be an ego issue. After all, the eyes I looked for in the dark were not there. Plenty of eyes, just not the ones I had hoped to see. The ones I want to have seen me.

Something I have come to know. And love, in a mildly sadistic way.

But we succeeded. The event succeeded. The most funds raised to date and they haven’t even finished counting. The best sound equipment setup. The best organized. The most sponsors. The most heads bobbing about the crowd.

And yet, I am off this morning. Perhaps it is feeling right that feels weird. Or I have yet to let go of the anticipation.

But despite whatever I hoped would happen and what ended up being, I placed stature upon the day. Symbolically, my attempt was to use it as a turning point. That there would be the start of a new version of your narrator the next day.

So, is he here?

I think so. Or the seeds of so. Some sort of something resembling evolution. A molting. A shedding of one thing to make growth for something else.

The deciduous man, as it were.

And the truth is, I’ve always been that. Which is an interesting thing to claim to be. Something that is never quite the same. An entity that transforms itself, be it for internal or external reasons. But that’s life. And not in the Sinatra sense. In the biologist sense. Life is a thing that moves, grows, changes, consumes. It is dead things that are static. Unmoving. Unchanging.

And as it just so happens, I am still among the living.

Just found out my grandmother is no longer. So it goes.

She was the Irish one. She was the fireman’s daughter. The fireman’s wife. She used to sing to me. To all of us, her grandchildren. Not that she was all that good at singing. But she always kept a song.

A fine, full life.

I should have visited her more. I had the thought of going to visit just a few days ago. I was going to bring my guitar and play for her. She likely wouldn’t have even known who I was. But she would have enjoyed it.

But I didn’t. And now I can’t. I’ll have to live with that now.

Now she exists in whatever parts were caught by those descended from her, myself included. And it just so happens that the culture I got from her is a very prominent point in my identity.

Something about those Irish. Or those damn Irish, as her husband would say. The fireman, my grandfather.

That’s why we do that benefit to begin with. And as a fellow from another band said last night, there’s something about how many folks named Michael, or Brian, or Meaghan/Meghan, or Sean, Laura, Kevin and Caitlin find themselves in the same place. A strange magnetism. Whatever that means.

And the song. Always the song. Many forms, but a tune is a tune and can survive most anything. No one song in specific, just that vague and varying impulse that pulls people towards melodic words and tones. And the dissonant ones as well. A strange way of communication that we all either participate in,or consume.

So, I’ll be working on the final record for this year soon. And the universe either saw fit to line my emotions up in such a way, or the indifference is just convenient- but there is something potent going on here. A soul strong from holding a heavy heart, day after day. And this heart needs such output if it hopes to stay from turning all to rock.

But that is not a project for here. In this place. In this moment.

This was to try and make a construct of my thoughts and emotions this morning. The ones I was having and the ones I thought I should have been having.

And success in this is hard to define. But I know I have some work to do. The good work. The kind that keeps my soul alive. For that is what you’re supposed to do whilst you live.

Keep moving. Keep working. Keep dreaming. Brush the dirt off and wipe the blood from your mouth. Stand until you can no longer, then stand some more.

You might just be glad that you did. Someday.