Like Bees

We had kind of a shitty show.  It happens.  Not a lot of people, the establishment didn’t go nuts over us, the pay wasn’t great, we fucked up the songs, and I was tired and my throat hurt, and there was no sweat but there was PMS, and I was acting when I smiled.  It was mostly in my mind, but it’s where I was.  In the middle of a song when nothing was right, I thought of Leyla.  Like a mantra, like a reminder, like a gift I get to cash in on every single time I lose touch with my own gratitude and become, for even one second and if only in my mind, a whiner.  It’s real, this thing we keep repeating—this thing that has earned an abbreviation and that so many people have inked deep into their skin to last forever: Live Life Like Leyla.  L4. 

Even before she got sick, there was a palpable radiance.  I met her late, as one of the bridesmaids in her aunt’s wedding, the bride even a new friend of mine but an obvious one—an easy one that would soon, without a gram of force, stroll her way into the center of my heart to stay.  Suave and I sang a song during the ceremony, and Leyla, along with the other bridesmaids, wore a brown dress and cowgirl boots.  She was stunning and a little shy with a quiet kind of magnetism.  I didn’t know her, but I recognized it in her.  

Fast forward to now, as she’s resting peacefully at Hospicare, drawing in a steady stream of friends and family, surrounded by photos, cards, flowers, decorations from her bedroom at home, so much snow piling up outside the windows, the diagnosis itself still a sharp and ruthless series of shocks, softened only by good company and these reinforced expressions—we will Live Life Like Leyla and feel less defeated than we do madly and wildly in love with each other and the fact of our existence, here together, with arms that hold and eyes that reflect.  Last night on stage I let muscle knowledge move my lips to sing, and I thought of Leyla.  That made it all okay.  I remembered myself—the best parts—and I dug in with the hooks of my heart.

This village is growing exponentially, evolving into a different animal altogether—a tight bud blooming into a blushing peony so ripe and so full of silky petals that you can’t cup it in both hands anymore or capture a fraction of its perfume in your nose, because it’s filling the room, it’s spilling out the cracks of the door, it’s running down the hallways and into other rooms, it’s bursting through the double doors—it’s on the loose.  It forgets, passes over, and excludes no one; everyone willing to lift the senses is welcome, and everyone who does will be changed (or reminded).  This is what happens when humans grow up with love; we respond to horror by surrounding it with the enzyme that is more love, and even if it won’t dissolve that calcified node, we begin to radiate together around it, making heat, red and real, and like bees, we keep each other alive.  More of this!  Keep it coming, keep it spreading, keep it.  It belongs to you, and to me, and to us.  We are reminded of this us-ness by way of pain, and we each choose how to tune in.  

I feel an enormous amount of gratitude and a chest-filling satisfaction belonging to this self-perpetuating, self-governing, ever-expanding, ever-evolving village—what beautiful animal could it become next?

A couple days ago Suave and I jogged beneath blue skies in the stripy shadows from palm tree fronds along a canal dotted with sun-bleached beer cans, searching for alligators—we spotted five algae-covered turtles, a bunch of minnows, and a gar but no gators yet.  Dave’s mom stuffed us with gulf shrimp, crab cakes, fresh fruit, and wine, and I met a big-bellied, blond-bearded roadie for Roger McGuinn while I was reading my book by her pool.  I collected shells for my goddaughter on Sanibel Island and jammed that David Byrne and St. Vincent album for some yoga in a sunny spot of a screened-in porch yesterday, and today, Valentine’s Day, the band is driving from Daytona Beach to Tampa to play a place called the Pegasus Lounge.  We stopped to fill the tank, and Suave came out of the gas station with single red rose and some corn nuts.  (Who says there’s no romance on the road?)  We’re critically listening to a recording of a show from a few nights ago on the way, trying to map out fixes, crossing yet another bridge, passing orange groves, taxidermy shops, produce stands, more spanish moss, churches and small cows inside rickety fences, watching the sun drop.  We are here now.  It’s good because it’s real and because it’s ours.  Leyla, you’re the reminder—my eyes are open.  Thank you for that.