What I'm Like

[Whew! The pissy, cranky part of me wondered several times this weekend whether, if I'd known about all the other stuff that was to pile up in the interim, I'd still have accepted my sister's wonderfully kind offer of a bonus birthday present. I'm thankful that the other parts of me (yes, there are too!) managed to assert themselves. It was a near thing.]

[Back then, we were sitting at dinner, and the subject of summer concerts came up. I'd noticed that Crowded House were playing in Oakland at the end of August. Kate said she'd thought about getting tickets for me for my birthday, and asked if I'd like to go. I was thrilled, Kate ordered the tix with the efficiency she brings to most things, and I picked them up from her not long before I packed up to move at the end of July.]

[I put them...somewhere. I thought I put them in that cool, red, leather office supplies case with which I absconded in the divorce (cf. the Hello Kitty toaster oven and the Spice Girls Polaroid camera), but when I unpacked it after moving...you can guess the rest. I procrastinated in asking Kate to look into replacements, thinking that since she ordered them online, it probably would be no big deal.]

[Well, it wasn't (although she had to make a special trip to the concert venue - luckily, she was only coming from their new, nearby island digs), but I wasn't sure, and as I so often do, I let it build the last couple of weeks into this burr under my mental saddle, especially when Jessica actually went ahead and booked her flight up from Los Angeles aboard the glamorous and very reasonably priced new Virgin America. See, Jess introduced me to everything by Crowded House beyond "Something So Strong" and "Don't Dream It's Over." She and our friend Moira were pretty obsessed with all things Split Enz/C.H. for a period of years as the 1980s melted into the '90s (in fact, I think Moira moved to Australia to be closer to the Finn Brothers), and I soaked at least some of that up. I knew that Jess was my my most appropriate date for the show.]

[Offer doesn't equal acceptance, though, so during the period when my invite was under advisement, I house-sat for a week for my parents and for two weeks for Boss-Man; was invited to move; packed; moved; unpacked (mostly); and generally have been thinking about other things than what seemed like a far-off concert date...until the date was suddenly mere days away, I had a guest coming in from out of town, and I had no tickets.]

[Friday night came, and several things combined to make me have a little emotional meltdown. Nothing worth detailing here, and I'm over it, but after giving Jessica (still in L.A.) an earful, I felt better, put down my phone, and let the battery die. Next morning, I couldn't find my charger anywhere, so I couldn't call my sister (who was in the middle of a move herself), couldn't check in with Jess about whether he flight was on time, and started to build up a good reservoir of stress. You ever get to one of those points where if one thing, no matter how minor, goes wrong, you'll lose it? I spent most of the weekend feeling like that.]

[It happened a time or two. For example, I was rushing over to Allen's on a time-sensitive errand, and fell and banged my knee while running up some steps in Dolores Park trying to catch the J-Church streetcar. My angry howl was heard, lo, from the browning hills of Twin Peaks to the rusting, weed-strewn yards near Mission Bay. I find it almost impossible to plan my time or accomplish anything when I'm like this, and things just get worse as I careen powerlessly, seething, and twenty minutes late for everything.]

[Somehow, Jessica was fetched from SFO (of course her flight was fifteen minutes early, since I was forty minutes late, and did I mention I had no cell phone?), replacement tickets were procured, and we saw and enjoyed the show. (Feel old: Neil Finn's 24-year-old son is now the keyboardist.) (There was lots of singing along, which was a good thing, and helped with the drama relief.) (Also: Pete Yorn opened! Fan.Tas.Tic.)]

[As we rode BART home back to the foggy side of the bay last night, I was sorry that Jess (a delight who has always understood and forgiven with a laugh my Keystone-Kops-esque kapers) wasn't going to be here longer; however, I knew and know that I need some time to let this...emotional overage? drain out of me, and that's almost impossible to do when you're busy trying to make things happen while constantly getting in your own way.]

[I got up this morning, and the object whose absence I'd cursed more than once over the last few days, my cell phone charger, was sitting prettily in plain sight on a shelf over my bed as it had all weekend.]

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