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So now I am sick. But I’m sick in Boulder which is much more simpatico than being sick in the middle of nowhere Wyoming, exit eighty-something off of I-25 "Wheatland" (the name of the town) with a fever and a blizzard and a sound check to make in Denver in an hour and a half. Here’s the (precursor to) the story: We’d driven out to Seattle on Easter Sunday to start our 10-day tour with Evan & Jaron, "Crazy for this Girl" (Their radio hit). We figured it’d be good exposure and an opportunity to get in front of another audience but what we found was that the majority of E & J’s fans are thousands of screaming 12 year old girls who have no idea of who we are and even less interest in getting to know us. They want to see and hear (and rightly so) the cute and talented twin brothers they came for and as far as I could tell I was holding the show up. I felt like a distraction, like a wall in the way of some beautiful mountain view, like an (eeek) grown up. And what’s more, after the first night I felt like I was getting a cold. So I can’t say I wasn’t thinking about canceling the latter half of the tour then and there. There in the humid frost of Seattle where I was currently sleeping between a ridgeback, a retriever (coincidentally named Taylor) and a pitbull on my friend Dave’s fold out. And I thought things were uncomfortable then! Portland was a better show and Karen Pyle had a welcoming party for us, which was the highlight to be sure. Then Salt Lake City where we stayed at Melissa Warner’s pad (she’s a bitchin’ "Low Fi" chic’in’ musician herself - check her music out at www.cdbaby.com/warner). That night I told the E & J guys that I might have to bag the gigs after Denver (the next night) due to my increasingly severe hacking cough and fever. Now, HERE’S THE STORY: The next day we headed out East on I-80 at 7:00 (too early for any musician). We were told it was a faster trip than I-70 despite the extra miles. We were making good time when we got into Sinclair, Wyoming and were brought to an abrupt and dangerous halt. "Road’s closed," said an officer parked in front of a white and red blockade "Blizzard." He continued. "So what are our options?" I asked skeptically. You can go back to Rawlins and take 287 North to Casper which’ll link ya’up with I-25. It’s a couple ‘u hours out of your way but if you wait here, you could be here for two days." He said. I looked at my watch. 1:30. "Two days isn’t really gonna work for us," I said sarcastically, waved to the officer and headed toward Rawlins. 287 was a mean trip. Wind. Ice. Tall trucks with wide loads and three cabins between that I needed to pass in order to make sound check by 5:00 in Denver. By the time Soucy took over the wheel in Casper the conditions had gotten worse and when we reached the Wheatland exit you could barely see 10 feet in front of you. But it’s a good thing we had 10 feet of visibility or Soucy may not have stopped at that barricade which again denied us access into Colorado. This time there were no choices to be made. The highway was closed both to the South and to the North of us, all that was left for us was to find accommodations and call the theater to explain why we were unable to make the gig. In Wheatland there’s a Best Western, a Motel 6, a Wheatland Inn, a Parker Lodge or something, Vimbo’s Motel and not one vacancy. The woman behind the counter at Vimbo’s Motel and Restaurant (needless to say, our last resort) said that she’d heard that the Armory was going to open at 7:00 "They’re flying in the National Guard and’ll be handing out cots and blankets. Women and children first." She said squeezing the last sip of orange soda from a straw. It was only 5:30 and we were stranded. "Let’s go bowling," I said, climbing in the passenger side of my Rav 4 "we passed a place back there on the left." The bowling ally was packed with local teens growing their first thin moustaches, kissing prepubescent girls with tight ponytails and unfiltered cigarettes hanging off their icily glossed lips. Over the green shag carpet to the linoleum counter where we ordered two size 10 shoes, one onion rings, one french fries, and one pitcher of Budweiser beer. Then we were ordered over to lane #7. We bowled a pretty good game. Soucy, bragging about his years on his highschool bowling team, won by only one point (126 to 127) while I had never bowled before. He said I must be a natural. We sat there drinking our watery Budweiser and eating our fries while the wind-smacking twilighted blizzard was raging outside in muted blue tones. That’s when Mike Urosky entered our lives. I’d seen him before, earlier, at Vimbo’s, also stranded, also looking for shelter, also being denied. "That Armory," he said breathlessly "It’s PACKED. They actually opened it at 3:00 this afternoon. You’d better get over there if you want to get a spot on the floor. They’re all out’a cots. I got one’a the last ones." Panic-struck expressions resumed their reserved places on Soucy and my faces. "I’ll lead you guys over there if you want to follow me." He offered. The armory was packed. Children, already in booty clad pajamas ran around parental legs. Halogen yellow lights hung like daggers piercing the situation further causing it to bleed its harsh cold reality all over us. I held my breath as I fumbled with other desperate hands, through boxes, for the most comfortable of the olive green cardboard blankets. No cots left, just naked splotches of cold cement floor painted in yellow lines representing boundaries for one sport or another. Soucy put our blankets on the ground near Mike’s cot, which was covered with an eiderdown, and a medicine bag he’d brought in from his overstuffed car. He was moving from Lake Tahoe to New York to be a chef at a four-star dining establishment. Turned out he was a drummer too, had his whole kit packed into the back of his car. And as coincidence would have it, he’d grown up not 10 blocks from me in NYC, gone to college in Providence, RI (as did I) and had spent every summer on Nantucket (the island adjacent to the one I’d summered on all my life). He was traveling alone and had no dining company so we offered up ours. Another girl, Candy, who was on duty at the barracks (which coincidentally turned out to be home to none other than the National Guard’s 67th Army Band) got off work to come to dinner with us. She was 24, a clarinet player and the boys (Soucy and Mike) sang all they could remember of the lyrics to The Car’s hit "Candy," as we drove to Cassie’s Restaurant and bar where elk, deer and caribou heads protruded from spruce covered walls and where we all became lifelong friends for the night. Candy was also really cute and Soucy made yummy sounds at her from across the table over his teriyaki chicken salad up til the part when she told us about the divorce she was in the middle of with a man who’d been cheating on her since they’d married at 19. Mike, being transported to New York into the arms of the culinary world, happened to be carrying approximately $6,000 worth of rare red wines in his car. "They shouldn’t miss this." He said grabbing a $60 dollar bottle from a case and decorking it. In the muddy, wind washed parking lot of the National Guard’s Armory, with our frozen backs to the wind and our tearing eyes toward the northern sky, we took sips from the brown bottle. "It has a really nice rich oaky character with subtle hints of cherries and currants," joked Soucy, smacking his lips together after a swig, making light of our "currant" situation. Severe situations called for severe measures so we all piled in the car and drove down to the local drive-through liquor store/bar/tavern/grill place and continued to anesthetize ourselves. The idea of the cement patch of floor, the cardboard blanket and 200 other sleeping bodies was unthinkable and we did everything we could to erase the inevitable destiny from our minds. We shot pool. We played every Zeppelin tune on the jukebox and then all the Hendrix ones until we closed the joint at 12. Once again, in the parking lot, we sat in my car in the messiness we’d accumulated over the past weeks and 3000 miles. "Don’t hurt my flower," I begged Mike as he sauntered into the back seat. My sunflower, the one that Dave gave me in Portland, had suffered enough. She sat in her icy, water filled, plastic soda bottle, perched strategically between two bags. She was the brightest thing left in this whole mess and I didn’t want her to get crushed. We listened to the rough mixes of "Shot Gun," the new album, as the snow outside stopped and the freezing drizzle began and the blackness surrounding us settled into our eyes and ears and hearts. The morning would not come soon enough and eventually we’d have to go inside. Tidal waves of snores came at us as we entered the armory. The sound was immense and hollow as if it came from a collective well of tragic human longing. It felt sad and contagious and continuous and like brown paper bags being crumpled and thrown away. We navigated through the blindness, stepping on the edges of blankets and stray luggage, to our corner only to find that our corner had been taken over by a family of 6. I almost woke a baby as I retrieved my blanket and relocated to the band quarters which, ironically, appeared to be quieter anyhow. Soucy curled up in a bass drum, Mike, who’d gallantly given me his cot, found a thin inflatable yellow raft and slept on that. Our dreams couldn’t have been any more surreal than our reality. And so we slept in the cold, uncomfortable, dreamless waters of sub-consciousness, coughing now and then, tossing here and there and finally waking to the sound of combat boots and fatigues swishing by our partially cracked eye lids. What a night. What a random night! June 22, 2001 - The Marin Wine and County Fair Horsehair braided in golden straw floats by noiselessly. The echo of a carousel bounces off sun-stoked cotton candy stands as the man in stilts mantises** by. Cakes and crafts and critters with blue and green and gold ribbons slant sideways in the glittering rippling moist heat that surrounds us, that bombards us, that quiets and keeps us and makes us heavy and slow. In this heat there is no "late for….."; time is elongated, erased or hushed into lisps and whispers in which "late" swims trying to find its way to the top, back into the realm of "important." None the less, technically we are late. We drive around in the white, Moby wannabe, Dollar rent-a-van looking for entrance #5, the livestock entrance, to get to our stage. "How many people we expectin’ here today hundreds? Thousands?" Kenny asks from the back seat. "Hundreds." I say skeptically looking at the hot, barren hay covered paths of the fair ground. At Entrance #5 a man is standing with a red walkie-talkie and a face which has melted into a shriveled scowl. He doesn’t want to let us in without the proper credentials but we’re already "late" for sound check so he escorts us over the livestock barricade and to the Foot and Mouth preventative mat where he instructs us to get out of the car and pad our feet to ensure our safety. "Over there," he points past the main stage where Gallagher (yes the food smasher/comic) will be performing later. "Yu’ll take a left at the candied apple stand, go 'head pass' the coin toss and the livestock tent and yu’ll see it right in frunta yu." As the stage approaches a sarcastic Soucy mutters: "I think we have to go down from hundreds to dozens." There are colorful benches set up under a tent on the lawn facing west and a medium sized stage facing the corn dog booth and a large brick wall on which, later during the show, our voices will be projected, and bounced back to us 1/2 a note flat. Not that this is a bad time. It’s not. In fact it’s probably a great time. I’m just tired from the 5 am departure from Boulder and the airplane ride on which the AC was broken and during which the stewardess kept waking me for this or that or "Don’t you want your peanuts" or "Can you please raise your seat miss." There’s another tent off to stage left. It is 'backstage'. In it, there’s water in a cooler and a beige folding chair standing crooked on the uneven grass and some shade and from there I call home to rap out with my mom awhile as the guys set up the back line for sound check. We were really looking forward to meeting Gallagher, who we thought must be really psyched to be surrounded by all of this readily available and smashable agriculture until we were told he was a total jerk. His ranting and raving about our sound check being too loud later confirmed this. I guess he needs 100% silence to prepare for his show. So instead of eating with him backstage, we went to dinner with Chris’s Parents, Judy and Bob Delucchi who generously treated us to steaks and artichoke hearts. So the hot that had been so unbearable during the day, come nightfall, turned to freezing cold. The aquamarine grass was bitter and taut against my flip flopped feet as we got back to our stage on which there stood a hypnotist and 10 shirtless teenage boys swinging their cloths around their heads, no doubt hypnotized, convinced they were members of the band "The Village People." I would have been shocked, surprised and even delighted but we’ve already had a hypnotist opener so the thrill was sort of gone. Our show was pretty good, ‘cept for the cold and the oval car racing going on behind us. Apparently the announcer’s booth was directly in back of the stage. Distracting…Hummmmm….YES. But funny nonetheless. I guess I had a great time. I was just too tired to really enjoy it. **VOCABULARY: Mantises: To move like a praying mantis June 25, 2001 - Boulder, CO I’m sorry I haven’t written in so long. I’ve been working my ____ off to get this 3rd CD ready (SHOTGUN) and get the band out on the road. Besides working on the new album and getting shows booked, this month I also: fell in love, played some gigs with my mom and brother, moved, found a new drummer (who you’ll no doubtedly hear about in the up coming months), sang at my college reunion, met my new twin brothers and played in a celebrity golf tournament with the guys from The Avalanche (did I mention how much I suck at the sport of golf?). So I hope you’ll all forgive my tardiness when it comes to this journal entree. Frankly, I’M EXHAUSTED! June 30th 2001, Trilogy Wine Bar, Boulder CO "I’ve never seen so many capers in my life," said Soucy staring at the upper shelf, stained in halogen light and bending from the weight of the condiments in bulk. Trilogy has no "backstage" as it were so for the past two years we’ve been making the storage area our green room hang out. It’s not bad really. We sit on cartons of fruit and wine and snack on garbanzos and pickled beets. There, at 10:00pm, we make a set list for the night etched in purple pen. "Nisa, SOS, Sign-o-Rain, When We’re Tog, Wait…" I call out in code and the boys scribble their own lists. "Show time." Says Delucchi, popping his head in the door to hand me my in ear monitors and a bottle of water. The show was fun. The sound in that back room is always really nice and the ambience, filled with curtains and candles and crystal seems to weep, with wine drenched emotions, for jazz and passion, for romance and her counterpart, heartache. Our set lists had all of that to offer. Dean Oldencott is our new drummer. Kyle, our old drummer, is having a baby and wants off the road. We don’t blame him but we’ll miss him. However, last night Dean ROCKED (it was his first gig too). I love playing at home! July 1st 2001, Mishawaka, CO "I'll have the veggie burger." I said squinting against the sun which beat a red pattern into the back of my eyelids despite the huge overhanging tree that protruded through the porch floor under which we sat. The guys ordered buffalo burgers. "We're just changing the kitchen from breakfast to lunch so it'll be a while." "How long's a while?" asked Dean. "About 45 minutes. 45 minutes to an hour or so." She said smiling cheerfully. I was starving, I said. I said we were with the band. I said we'd eat anything they had prepared already. She said she'd bring us out some chips. A basket full of red, blue and yellow corn chips arrived. No salsa, no dip, no guac. Yellow Grey Pupon in a squeeze bottle instead was passed around the table in place of chip condiment. Not bad really. That's when we discovered the birds. Two huge, white tropical cockatoos one of which hanging dangerously close to my chip. I wouldn't have noticed it there but it pooped on my shoulder and everyone laughed and pointed gleefully. "Oh, really cool." I said sarcastically. From there on out 'Wanona' and I were not friends. Our relationship didn't improve any when my food came she dive bombed me falling directly into my lap with a branch full of leaves still clutched in her tinny talons. I, of course like a girl, screamed and jumped to my feet as the uninjured and still determined, Wanona, waddled aggressively toward me. Again, the restaurant lit up with hysterical laughter. "The sound equipment's stuck in Breckenridge," said Delucchi, taking a seat beside Kenny "the house guy's settin' up what he's got here but that ain't saying much." He laughed. It was too hot to complain. That's when Soucy's tummy started to rumble and later, when Delucchi came to call us on stage: "Five minutes folks. Five minutes," we found a not so fresh Soucy. His face white, framed by the loud pink of the green room toilet bowl. His little knees had raspberries on them from where they rested against the unwashed linoleum floor and his eyes were all blood shot from dry heaving after the buffalo burger was gone. It was a fun show. The venue is out side atop of a raging river on which kayakers and rafters stopped temporarily to catch a verse or two before flowing the rest of the way down the cold, white frothing water to the mountain basin and it couldn't have been a nicer day for it. Robin, one of our favorite and most insane promoters, hooked us up with mudslide cakes and icy beer and photo albums and stories of Joan Baez and Dylan and this guy and that gal and things I didn't (and probably shouldn't) even know about my dad. Soucy was sick! But he played. And at set break he headed back to the bathroom but after that he played again and even played well despite the sour and pinched expression on his face. And at the end of the show, he was rewarded with the back seat all to himself on the hour-long drive back to Boulder. July 10th, 2001 Eagleview Concert Series, Exton PA The boys gallantly drove the 1,725 miles between Boulder and Exton without me. They did it in 32 hours and when I found them they looked haggared around the edges like old love letters, like September's spent leaves. Not that I looked any better for the week of vacation I'd just spent with my boyfriend on Martha's Vineyard. The guys were hovering under an awning hiding from the rain with opened arms to greet me. With them stood Marji, Larry and Katie Romanski waiting to shower us with sugar filled gifts and next to them our beloved "Rellogg" (Steven Kellogg) who'd be opening up for us. Rellogg's slender, tree-like frame embraced me and his brand new (to me) moustashe roofed an endless smile full of pearly whites pointing directly at me. Suddenly I felt less tired, less soggy, less sad and closer to all right after being dragged away from Dean, my love, in Boston. We did a quick sound check and ordered some food. I got the crunchie crab cakes (mmmm mmm!) Then went back to the van to change and clean up. There was no backstage at the venue, so we had to take turns changing in the cargo cage of the van. Moby's rear lights have long since burnt out and from the dark and tinted windows of the van you'd hear the "oooffff" of a bumped head or the "Thud" of someone tripping over your suitcase or the "Sh__!" of someone just realizing they'd put their pants on backwards. Mist clinging to tree tops made them look like Q-tips. Blue and green coated all other colors and the town of Exton looked as though it were under water. Leaves, pushed by warm heavy air, resembled sea urchins and the field we were to play in, before we were told the gig was cancelled, looked like a lake or a pool. Then suddenly the clouds opened up and it became the most beautiful night and people with red and blue lawn chairs and children and sweaters and smiles and clapping hands appeared in droves and stayed and watched until the rains came again. I was warned during the show that if I saw any lightning or thunder I should get everyone off stage ASAP which made me very nervous every time someone's flash went off. But somehow the storm waited for us to finish and only started when we were loading the last things into the back of Moby's belly. We sat in the resturant as the rain came down, laughing, eating Jelly Bellies and the remainder of the crab cakes still out on the table. Fun night!! P.S. it was great to see Jonathan and The Shanks (good to meet Grandma Shank), the artists: Riley & Connor (get that green cast off your leg boy!), and Denny Dyroff. Thanks for coming. July 11th 2001, Haddon Heights, NJ The Doubling Rule (short version): Double a final consonant when adding a suffix to keep the previous vowel short: Cap > Capped"Understand Sal?" asks Soucy as I stare blankly at the chicken scratch on the crumpled white sheet of paper he's just handed to me from the back seat. "Um…Yua…Yeah, I think I got that." "A teacher might tell their fourth graders 'if there's only one consonant, the E in CAPED makes the A say it's name,'" continues Soucy. "Oh, that makes much more sense to me," I say taking a confident swig off my soda. That makes the guys laugh and the slightly dangerous drive through downtown Philly a little lighter. I guess ol' Souce is fed up with editing my writing. We arrived at 4:30 to some great food and another beautiful outdoor venue in a rural New Jersey setting, with wooden bleachers set up in front of a stage lit with kite-like structures as a backdrop. The crew guys were great, donned with some serious accents ana cupula* tough love smiles. After sound check we all grabbed some whole food veggie wraps, salad and soy cookies (felt just like home) and huddled around the back of a white flat-back truck to eat and laugh and exchange our "road tales" while the late sun strained effortlessly through forest green tea leaves and our opener, John Flynn, played some tunes. The sun was just finishing its descent when we got on stage and by mid set the bugs were just starting to become a nuisance. They were attracted to the high voltage lights, which were pointed mainly at me. Nearing the last couple of songs I was covered in everything from beetles to mosquitoes. During "Split Decisions" a moth flew right in my mouth. Because I was now ingesting the majority of New Jersey's swamp residence (and because I LOVE children) I invited the kids that wanted, to come up and dance on stage to "Happy Now." Turned out that ALL the kids wanted to be on stage and before we knew it Kenny was hosting Romp-a-room over on his side of the stage. Seriously there must have been 20 kids on stage! Some kids were behind me. Some over by Soucy. Some on the monitors and there was Kenny, literally covered in children, relinquishing his mic to the tykes, trying to teach them to sing the chorus but all that came out of their mouths was indistinguishable screaming except for one kid you could hear above all the rest, who was yelling with a much too gigantic voice for his body: "I AM SO COOL!" "I AM SO COOL!!"  Photo: Rich Perrotti Between the bugs and the kids I was laughing so hard I could barely finish the song. There was a player-piano back in the lobby of the Hilton playing jazz standards badly. We gathered in the lobby lounge, had some spicy peanut mix and drink before Soucy and I got way into "Golden Tee," the video golfing game, which ate all our money and gave us hours and hours of hysterical laughter. *VOCABULARY - ana cupula: Jersey for "and a couple of" July 14th 2001, Club Helsinki, Great Barrington MA Today was one of the best days ever. How do I go about trying to relay all the wondrous things that happened so as not to insult the glorious memory of it all? My memory, which gracefully collects pieces of emotions, shards of images and the faintest wisps of smells, will undoubtedly put to shame my futile attempt to describe, in limited words, my time and space spent this July 14th. I'll start at the beginning. MORNING: When I wake up Soucy's gone, the room seems blacker than usual, colder. I take my vitamins with what's left of a jumbo size tub of root beer I'd purchased last night with my dinner from Blimpie's at the strip mall across the street. The lady behind the reception counter tells me there's a gym not 10 minutes walk east that she can comp me a pass to. I don't feel much like working out but walk down that way anyhow. I've got time and besides, it's a perfect day. One of those days that hints at fall but is still full of summer. Inside, the gym is pale blue, from the pool, from the cinderblock walls painted white, from the scent of disinfectant. The ceilings are high and the place is pretty big. As I'm climbing onto the treadmill I spot Soucy in his Hawaiian blue and white swimming trunks near the Nautilus machine. Dean-o's there too, lifting like a champ. Suddenly, in addition to my running work out, I'm flailing my arms trying to get their attention across the gym, course they don't see me and I look like a complete fool. More Blimpie for lunch. This time I skip the soda. THE CLUB: Club Helsinki is one of my favorite places to play. I think it must be a great place to see a show too. It's small and intimate, but has good sound. It's adorned with splintered pieces of colored mirror, which is mosaic-ed together along walls, on furniture and ceilings. The food is amazing, colorful, and exotic. The staff is AWESOME, friendly, beautiful and generous. Playing there, what with all the couches and tables, is like playing in your living room. In short, I love Club Helsinki. Stephen Kellogg shows up right around dinner time out of breath. "I didn't know I was playing with you guys tonight, " he says "no one told me." I was in Connecticut on a friend's computer trying to look up where you guys were playing thinking I might catch a show if you were near by and suddenly I see my name as your opener. I'm not late am I?" We chill in the bowels of the Club under the stage where the ceiling hangs low and the pipes protrude and the roots leak in like milk and where the pickles are stored next to last Christmas's candy canes. Stephen's wearing a brown corduroy outfit that I teasingly refer to as a leisure suit. We start writing a song about it: "I am so brown…" sings Stephen and we respond: "he's wearing brown…I am so brown….he's wearing brown….and on the ground….still wearing brown….I can't be found" His plan is to introduce himself, then his outfit, then start singing "the brown song." The guys and I cunningly stash ourselves behind the stage door left, preparing to stick our heads in for the response part of the song but just as we're all getting geared to pop our heads out, in through the door walks my mom. "NO WAY. NO WAY. NO WAY," is all I can manage to say. I'm in shock! I had no idea she was even near Great Barrington let alone planning on coming to my show. Both my Mom and my stepfather, Jim, had come up to surprise me. What a HUGE treat. And to make things even sweeter of a treat she let me call her up on stage to sing on "Convince Me." I don't even think people understand how much I love my mama. Just seeing her smile sends me into childish laughter. It means so much to me that she came! During break we sell CD's from the stage. Kenny's helping me with the transactions. A very sweet young woman approaches us and with nervous yet outgoing laughter. She tells us how much she loves us and that her parents drove 4 hours from Rochester NY just to see us tonight. She's very sweet and her smile is contagious. So contagious that she initiated the thing I am about to convey. THE THING: Let me first explain that I am prone to laughing fits. I almost failed a class in college due to a laughter tantrum, I caught one day during a lesson, that ended up lasting a month. Every time I'd get near that classroom the laughter would return with such vigor that I'd have to leave again. I missed an entire month of that class which eventually showed up in my grades. Some of you may also be familiar with the "Bubble story" of '99 where, due to laughter, during a show in Mobile Tennessee I was unable to complete a song due to a bubble machine incident where I unintentionally covered a Harley dude in ivory, un-popable, liquid soap bubbles from the stage. He was too drunk to know that he looked, to me, like he was wearing an irridescent bubble robe. That said, it should come as no surprise, the event I am about to express. We were almost done with the second set and a bit giddy all of us. The girl from break who was so sweet, kept yelling up to us "You're beautiful," "we love you," and "You go girl," when without warning she jumped up to dance to "Happy Now." I was taken off guard. It wasn't that she was dancing funny or anything. It was just that she was the only one dancing and it was sort of cute and, well, the adjective that keeps' coming to my lips is, sweet. For whatever reason I couldn't contain myself and I burst out in an inappropriate, Uncle Albert style laugh right in the middle of the first verse. The boys, seeing me bent over in hysterics, lost it too. They were laughing at me so hard that it perpetuated and fueled my own laughter. The more I thought about how inappropriate I was being, the more I laughed. I kept having to turn around so as not to be too obvious about laughing. But how can you hide when you're on stage with the lights on you and everyone's looking? Every time I'd turn around I'd see Dean who was trying so hard to hold it together by closing his eyes or staring at the ceiling and I'd say to him: "Dean. We have to end this song. (Tee hee he). This is terrible. (He he) Get me out'a this man. Lets end it right here." Then Soucy would initiate another chorus and it was this non-stop laughter fest which I had no control over. I just hung on and took the ride. The audience, by the end of the song, had all caught the laughter bug and every time I'd bust up and fall over, they'd roar in hysterics with me. Even when I left the stage and came back for the encore, the fit continued and I barely made it through Tomboy Bride. I'd like to thank that woman, whoever she is, for the wonderful laughter she bestowed on all of us, by being so damn sweet!! THE RIDE HOME: 1:00am. We pile back in the van and head towards Cromwell Connecticut, home for the night, about 80 miles away, when my dad calls. "Hey Pop, where you at?" "I just got done with a gig at Jones Beach. Got a couple'a days off so I'm headed up to the Berkshires. Where you at my girl?" "I am on highway 91," I say looking at the map "headed toward Connecticut." "That's south right?" "Sure is" "I'm on 91 headed north. Lets meet up at one of these exits so's I can smack eyes on ya. What exit you at now?" "We're still in Mass." "I'm at exit 24. Call me when you get to the CT state line." We spent the next 20 minutes calling back and forth strategically figuring out how not to miss each other. 2:13am. Exit 46 off highway 91. We pull into a Mobil station. Dad's still a couple exits away. We each buy our own jumbo bags of chips and the fake cheese that escorts all good late night snacks (some Tums too) and wait in the food store for my pop to show. He pulls up in a shiny town car so black it reflects the night sky. It's great to see him. He looks great despite all the dates I know he's been playing. We stand there in the parking lot under the street lamp outside the Mobil station, crunchin on chips and rappin' with my ol' man. It's a great thing to be able to meet up at a gas station in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night with another band who's got the same screwed up sleeping schedule as you do, just to chill, admire the moon, chew on some pastels or hostess snacky cakes, and maybe even have a cup'a joe. Especially when that other band is your dad. Great Day! July 21 2001, The Sou'Wester, W. Chatham It's morning in Foxwood, Mass at the Executive Suite Marriott off I-95. Sun pokes through a slit in the brown, in-flammable, floral curtains like a blade but doesn't cut into the icy green halogen light by which Soucy and I are fumbling groggily. Chris is brushing his teeth and I'm towel drying my hair in front of the bathroom mirror. Our reflection not so much on ourselves as it is on the night we just had. The one that got us into the hotel at 3 am. The one that seemed so surreal that we delinquently compared notes to ensure we hadn't just dreamt it up. I missed the boat off Martha's Vineyard that day. We'd played The Vineyard the night before for a wonderful benefit: "Time For Life," proceeds of which go to children with cancer. Dean (my Dean, not to be confused with Dino, our drummer) was rushing to get me to the ferry on time. He's been on tour with us for the past week which has cut severely into my journal writing for which I apologize but this boat ride marked the end of our time together, at least for a while. At the ferry we were informed there was a limited supply of life preservers and therefore a limited passenger capacity on the boat. No amount of pleading would get them to let me on. Dean went scouring the island for a boat he could drive me over to the mainland on but had no luck. So at 3:45 I had to take a Hyline ferry to Hyannis to meet the guys. It was sad to watch Dean float away on the landlocked dock, out of sight. It's so hard to be in love when you're on the road. The Sou'Wester is a restaurant/bar with canary yellow Denny's-esque booths, begonia pink lights and a tiny stage which, with surprising ease, we managed to fit on. We sat at a sticky, large oak island table while waiting for a sound check which never came. We ordered some food from our cute as pie Bulgarian waitress, Lily who had such a beautiful and seductive accent that Soucy literally fell off his chair batting his eye lashes at her. The food was phenomenal. I drank 2 Red Bulls, which I'm now addicted to. Thanks Steve (sound guy from the Saint in NJ who introduced me to the stuff). We changed in the parking lot, timing our nudity to occur in the dark between oncoming headlights. The first set was pretty uneventful. The place was packed full of friendly faces, cashmere cardigans, baseball caps on vacation, khakis, Laura Ashley summer prints and ears pressed up against my lyrics, rare for a restaurant/bar. But that was all before the second set. The second set was full of laughter mostly due to this dueling pair of middle age oddballs who showed up around the second song of the second set, stood off to stage right, and harassed us 'til long after the 3rd encore. One of them had a harmonica, red brillo hair, and one eye. He insisted on playing harmonica from the audience during the songs. The other one, the one in the Kiss T-shirt, with tall curly, soul glow, Kiss hair, stood directly in front of Soucy, dancing, as though at a Kiss concert, by himself, yelling out random guitar players names: "Lee Rittenour!" "Larry Carlton!" "Steve Vai!" "Skunk Baxter!" and "Play guitar man!! Teach me! Teach me!" Needless to say they managed to clear their section of the audience which unfortunately gave me a direct view of their uncanny behavior. How could I NOT laugh hysterically? How could Soucy manage to keep his game face? Their behavior reminded me of wild hyenas, it was hilarious, it was horrendous, but it was also so unnerving that at times it felt dangerous to me. I somehow managed to finish Tomboy Bride even though Greg, The Kiss Man was dancing like a bat on speed. But that's not where the harassment ended. While I was signing cd's, The Kiss Man approached me and while I was talking to a couple of guys he started: "You're mom is Carly Simon and James Taylor? That makes you SO lame! I rock you guys! I rock you guys so hard!" he said. "I'd rock you guys over so hard you wouldn't even know what hit ya." He went on and on even though we all ignored him. He and his buddy with the harmonica and the one eye just drunkenly followed us around harassing us. Then in between harassments he'd tell Chris what a great F-in' guitar player he was. It was so funny and so odd that it couldn't'uv really happened. "Could it have?" Soucy and I questioned each other in the mirror. In the halogen light. In the morning. In the glaze between gigs. In the middle of the hollow of the road. We played Golden Tee (the golfing video game), loaded out then drove 100 miles. Well Delucchi drove. We all slept, waking only long enough to transfer sleep from van to bed. I dreamt of peanut butter. Now we're on our way to NY. July 22 2001, Bodles Opera House, Chester NY There was blood on Soucy’s sheets at the Hotel. Not a lot of blood, just about as much as a hang nail or some cracked skin will produce, but none the less, there was blood, and leaves too and a couple of twigs when he threw back the beige felt-like cover. "Eww" we both shrieked and jumped away. "This bed hasn’t been cleaned!" said a severely distraught Soucy. Then we both started laughing. When we’d checked in at 11:30, the gatekeeper had been in a fowl mood and scared Delucchi worse than I’ve ever seen him scared. He looked like he’d run into a ghost when he returned bearing green plastic marked keys for the rest of us.
Soucy sucked it up and after putting a towel over the small bloodstain, and wiping the sticks and stems off the mattress, he fell into bed. The TV remote was on a chain leash that was attached to the wall and the room wreaked of floral scent Glade. We watched VH1 Behind the Music: Tina Turner, and I woke up to the sound of someone splish splashing in the tub. That someone was Soucy. How he’d gotten brave enough to soak in a hotel where there’d been blood on his sheets is beyond me. We were starving by 11:00 and went into downtown Chester to catch a bite. The only eatery open was this little ol’ place called 19 Main Street that looked like a cross between your fifth grade cafeteria and your grandmother’s house. It was right down the way from Bodles Opera House where we’d been just hours before, loading up our gear from a great gig and telling Dirty Johnny jokes with the staff. "Can we still get breakfast?" asked Dino. "Oh, not today," exclaimed the sweet little old lady at the counter "it’s pot roast day!" She said. So we all got pot roast for breakfast and then pie to top it off, vowing to return again as soon as possible. Needless to say, we napped pretty much the entire ride to VA. July 25th 2001, Ram’s Head, Annapolis MD Stretch me out, I’m your rubber band, state to state, don’t know where I am."-Split Decisions "Who put these states so close together?" I ask "USA? Yeah, they’re all close together Sal." Retorts Soucy in a well deserved condescending tone. "How am I suppose to know where we are when every 1/2 hour we pass through another state?" I am, of course, trying to justify having (for the second year in a row, I might add) miss-refered to the location I was playing in: "Man, sure is hot here in Virginia!" I’d exclaimed in the first 20 minutes of the show. "Maryland!" corrected the audience, wondering, perhaps, how I could have possibly managed to make the same mistake 2 years running. I tried to play it off like I’d made the mistake on purpose but my blushing gave me away no doubt and I ended up fumbling more, in a sea of apology and confused righteousness. The show, in general, was pretty funny all together, full of casualties. Casualty #1: Need I mention again that Virginia is not in Maryland. Casualty #2: I’m adjusting my monitor pack, located on the neckline of my dress when I realize I haven’t shaved my arm pits in over a week and for the rest of the show I continue to feel self conscious every time I lift my arms…. Just another girl from Boulder right? Casualty #3: Dino asks if we’re all ready for him to count off the next song. We all say "yeah" but I’m thinking that the next song is Use Me Up when in fact it’s For Kim and now I’m playing an A funk progression in 4/4 while the rest of the band is playing D in 6/8. Train wreck! Not so good ST. We had a great opener, guy named Frank Morey. He had this cool raspy Tom Waits-ish kinda voice and this crazy drummer, Scott, backing him up with this vaudevillian drum kit. We met the two of them before the show. They were from Lowell MA. We asked where they were staying out here in ‘Virginia’ (ha ha). They explained that they don’t get hotel rooms on the road, they just stay out at the bars until they find someone who’ll take them home. "Maybe we should do that." I suggested "Uh, no sweetheart." Said Kenny "Why not just get a van you can sleep in?" We asked. But they looked at us crooked and said "that would take all the fun out of it." When signing cd’s, an attractive crew from Baltimore told me they’d recently adopted a stray cat and named it after me. It made me feel really happy. I’ve always wanted a cat and I think having one named in my honor is second to owning one myself. Besides, I was a bit jealous after hearing that Chris Soucy had a cat named after him, ("Soucy" thanks to Marji Romanski) long before I got my name on a pet’s leash tag. Long live Sally the cat!!! It was hot after the show. Muggy and filthy dark. Loading out equipment, I felt I might as well be moving into a new house. Things felt heavier: Guitars, amps, tambourines. Even my thoughts felt heavier. Our laughter rung out in slow motion spirals in the ally way between last call and good night. July 27th 2001, The Oakland Main Street Festival, Oakland MD Perfect little children drift by like colorful balloons. They’re eating and wearing strawberry ice cream. They’re dancing and darting and some are sitting on dad’s laps and pointing at puppies and pretty flowers. It reminds me of my childhood. I can remember how watermelon tasted, for the first time, like metal and how the first swim of the summer felt like 100 pounds of winter air in your chest. I remember wondering why, when you got your fe elings hurt, you bled water from your eyes and why the moon followed me and only me. The floor is cement, the ceiling is tin and the sound is hollow as where whispers begin. We’re playing in the Oakland town produce stand. On the roof reads words like: "Fresh," and "Delicious." Coincidentally, that’s the way we feel in this cool and beautiful July evening, my thoughts pouring off me in mellow and hushed tones. [The boys and I went to see my dad in concert in Pittsburgh last night (which as usual was FANTASTIC. He’s just so good!)] "It’s like two cups and a string." Says Kenny out of the blue. "What is?" I ask "Our stage production compared to your pops." "But, may I point out, we too are playing a shed: The produce shed" says Soucy in jest as we pull up to the produce stand. I do my nails back stage in red, shooing gnats that threaten to land in the shiny magenta lacquer of my new polished toes. Boats slip by noiselessly on a glassy pond ahead and a coal train goes by every 30 minutes or so. I feel like an extra on "Little House on the Prairie." Everything is so quaint and beautiful and untouched here…well except for that new Wal-Mart that’s gone up on the hill and is sucking, like a weed, the life right out of this little town. Downtown lies the historic integrity of this little village. Every place sells antiques. It’s "Elizabeth’s hair salon & antiques," "The Book & antique store." Even the soda fountain/diner we were in for breakfast is first and for most a venue for the purchase sale of antiques. I sip on an energy boosting drink (which, unfortunately, is NOT Red Bull) and wait for our set to start up. There’s a little storage shack we’ve been offered as a green room which has been recently donated to the towns people for their production of Anne Get Ye’r Gun. We don’t really need it for any r eason. However during set break, while I’m selling cd’s, Delucchi and Dino did manage to get themselves locked in there. I guess Delucchi had turned some little latch upon entering realizing later that the key and latch were on the outside. There they were, two 30 year olds locked in this little home depot green shack too embarrassed to call for help. Finally some little 5-year-old wandered and with great difficulty managed to get them out. The little kid was going to get his dad to help but they begged him not to. They were humiliated as it was. It’s so nice to play in front of children! Amber and Sarah, two local girls, helped me sell cd’s and a bunch of kids came up and danced on stage for "Happy Now." Later there were pictures, meeting the mayor, hot tubs, kitties and a party for us where I ate too much rum cake. Mmm mmm good. I love Oakland. July 28th 2001, Grico’s River Street Café, Plains PA "Buttermilk 5," "Two egg combo," "Chicken Supreme," Reads Kenny from the Perkin’s menu. We laugh because these are things he’s suggesting we name the band: "Sally Taylor & The Cornbeef Hash" he suggests. "Over the years we’ve come up with some pretty good band names," says Soucy "But they never seem to stick." I shoot a spitball at him, which lodges in his ear. He looks annoyed as everyone laughs, then he sticks a napkin in a plate of syrup and slaps it on my back. "How ‘bout, ‘Sally Taylor & the Grilled Pork Chops?’" shrugs Kenny "that’s good, right?" A baby cries. The walls are mauve. The trim is strawberry. A fly buzzes heavily on wings that sound as though they’re made of cellophane. We’re exhausted. Our eyes are rimmed in crimson and little crustys sit like dandruff on our lashes. This is not good. We’d planned to stay in Plains for our day off between here and Boston, however we’d had enough of Plains by the time we’d found the club: "We’re lost." Said Delucchi matter of factly. We were already late for sound check and the streets were void of life so we couldn’t even ask directions. Every turn we’d take there was just more dusk-lit suburbia stretching out into a garden of picket fences, parched lawn and gray shingles. We passed the ‘Ram’ hotel. We passed ‘Jack’s Watering Hole.’ We were getting farther and farther away from anywhere that resembled any place we might play. Dino was trying to convince Soucy to introduce him to his cute, redheaded, cousin who was allegedly coming out to see the show. "Come on Hombre, hook me up." Said Dino from the back. "No way dude, she’s 18." Said Soucy looking at the map. "Perfect!" Dino said rubbing his hands together. "Uhh-o no man. I’m not introducing you to my cousin." By the time we found the club our teeth were floating and our sides ached from laughing so hard. The room was already pretty full by the time we got on stage for sound check at 8:00. Usually our sound checks consist of a couple "Check 1,2,3, Check"’s and a tune and 1/2 or so. But last night there was some ghosts in the machine and for seemingly no reason there was radical feedback and major bass leaks in the mains. The sound was wretched! Not only in the audience but on stage too. Even after 4 tunes I felt reluctant to leave, knowing full well that it would be no better when I returned to play for real. We ate bread and salad in the back of the kitchen with the hot and the greasy and the bustle of wait staff rushing in and out of the green swinging doors with pink industrial tough napkins and trays and white shirts wearing the sound of concern and late and silver ware dropping on cement floors. I felt not so good about going on stage for a number of reasons that I would rather not go in to. But after talking to Dean I felt better and as though I’d be able to suck it up and get through the night. The show ended up being fun actually. The room was packed and though I’m sure it didn’t sound very good out there in the audience, we were able to laugh about it and joke around on stage. We winded up having drinks after hours with some folks we met, and didn’t get back to the Ramada Inn until some time after 3am. "The Nascar races are in town, sir. We have no rooms left." Said the desk clerk to Delucchi who responded with venom as he’d made the reservation months ago. Nothing is so impressive as a justified and righteous Chris Delucchi. He got right up in the night manager’s face and by 3:30 we were being escorted down the 5th floor hall to the owner’s suite while the manager himself cleaned two rooms by hand on the 2nd floor. The owner’s suite was dark, bare, and plastic. A tucked up Murphy bed plugged the western wall and a long window looked out on an empty 5-way intersection. The brown paisley, often times disguiseable, bed cover was coated with obvious stains and food and krevel and the furniture was bolted to the floor. We named the room "The Nutra-Suite" and that’s where the guys stayed. I stayed downstairs in my own stinky miniature nutra-suite where the faucet ran brown and the lights rang and the king sized bed skated toward the center of the room on it’s rollers. No chance we’d be spending our only day off in that place. Aug. 6th 2001, Rte. 95 South, Mass The Road, More or Less, Traveled Chris and I... Alone... 5 more days ‘til the end of this East Coast tour... let the countdown begin. Morning, 6:10 am on Martha’s Vineyard after a couple gigs and a couple days off. It’s foggy out and my eyes barely focus on the alarm clock, which must have been ringing for at least 10 minutes. Dean, Soucy and I rush about the MV apartment picking up stray socks instruments and papers. It’s too early for me. I feel nauseous and sticky. I feel as though I were stuck in a giant cobweb. This is the last leg of the road and my body can feel it. It can feel every bar, every late night, every early morning, every lumpy motel bed, every Denny’s meal, every halogen light’s flicker, every mile, every mile, every single mile. "The world’s only Rhinestone Rockstar Doll Baby Mama." Says Soucy and we’re out of there. Dean’s got to go to Boston for a photo shoot so he’s giving us a ride as far as Brookline where we’ll pick up our shiny, gray, over-sanitized, Hyundai at Budget, in which I’ll immediately put a huge dent with my guitar case. In order to get Dean to his shoot and us to Budget for an on time departure to NYC we have to catch the 7am ferry. But when we get there the man at the ticket counter says the earliest he can put us on a boat is 10:45. We freak out and come up with plans B, C and D before they let us on the 7:00 anyway.
The drive to Boston is relatively painless. We stop for gas and a breakfast burrito. I can’t find anything in the gift shop that’ll hold my hair off my face so eventually I settle for a package of beige knee-highs, which I braid together into a make shift/MacGyver-ed scrunchi. 9:45 we drop Dean off at his shoot. He looks so cute dressed up in pajamas talking to the 4 year old who’s made to look like his son for the photo shoot. I wish I could stay and watch him work. But Soucy and I have got to get to Budget and out-o'-town ASAP. Now we’re on 93 headed South. There's a mid-70’s black Chrysler in flames on the side of the road. The AC is weak, no match for the liquid heat swirling in from the cracks in the windows and by the time we hit NY the AC will be spitting actual warm, polluted and intoxicated air in from outside. We listen to every station on the radio and know the words to every song from the 70’s, 80’s, 90’s, Hot AC, rap, classic and alternative stations. The sleepiness sneaks in and I sip on my second Red Bull before falling fast asleep and dreaming about a giant crocodile who’s trying to bite my leg off. When I wake up, we’re on Avenue A. We’re outside the club. Aug. 28th 2001, Travel day to Norwich CT, The Ramada Inn I hadn’t planned to be in love when I booked this gig in January. I hadn’t planned to be tired or run down or mid-vacation but I am and waking up Monday morning and leaving my love and vacation for The Denver International Airport seemed like a cruel joke. I’d dreamt, the night before, that I’d been in the green room at The Wolf Den (tonight’s gig) about to go on stage. The guys were already on when I realized I’d forgotten to make a set list. I sat, paralyzed in the dimly lit backstage, on a stool all dressed up trying to remember the names of my songs and struggling to recall some of the lyrics… "Red….Red what? Oh yeah Red Room." I was saying in this dream. I do that. I have nightmares the days before a tour, or a show when there’s been any more than an 8-day hiatus between gigs. I dream I’ve forgotten how to sing, that I don’t know the words, that I’ve lost my guitar, my pics, my tuner. That someone’s stolen my capo and of course, every once and a while I have the traditional horrifying naked on stage dream. When we boarded the first flight to Chicago I got a little faint and had to walk around the stale-aired aisles sipping from a jug of water till take off. After that I was fine. We had individual TV’s on the seatbacks in front of us, from which we could chose from 3 movies. Kenny, and I chose ‘Shrek’ which was great and we sat there in the center aisle of row 41 getting teary eyed. Delucchi watched ‘Shark Week’ and Soucy and Dino chose poorly in selecting ‘Benny & Joon,’ who’s viewing was cut short by an on-time arrival… Go figure. We had an hour-and-a-half layover at O’Hare and sat outside gate C31 just right of the Starbucks on the uncomfortable blue cushioned seats which were just a little to uncomfortable to sleep on. Surrounding us was a student body of Chinese highschoolers who later, on the plane, would sit behind us and make the ride just a little too uncomfortable to sleep. We sat in the terminal surrounded by cymbals, guitars, drums, stray bags and Chinese students ‘til 8:30. Kenny read. Delucchi smacked his jaws against some Swedish fish. Dino spaced and Soucy worked on his ‘Hemispheres’ in-flight magazine ‘Solid Gold’ crossword puzzle, calling out every once-in-a-while "Beach Boys hit, 10 words?" or "Another word for ‘Crag’?" I worked on a song I’d started that morning, humming, holding my gray, half busted, recording device to my left ear, scribbling some lyrical ideas with a chewed up Marriott pen onto a crumpled yellow supermarket receipt. 5-1/2 hours later we’d make it to Hartford. There was a 2-hour delay on the tarmac due to thunderstorms in the area. 30 planes not moving in front of us and monsoon-like rain out the left hand side of row 22. I sat next to Soucy who was still doing the crossword and thought I’d help him out (ha ha) by opening up my own addition of the ‘Hemispheres’ in-flight magazine and reading to him the answers. "CUTE," I’d yell out, obnoxiously, "88 Down." The guys thought it was hysterical and whipped out their own copies of the ‘Solid Gold’ crossword to join me in harassing a perfectly irritated Soucy. Once we were airborne we got a pretty cool show of the storm clouds on their way out towards Canada, showing off their lightning and gray black darkness even bigger and deeper than the night itself. I looked down past the storm onto the glistening city. From in the air it seemed hard to wrap my brain around all those lives being lived, each as complex and stressful and complicated and interwoven as my own. From there it was just a grid of lights the way Liz Phair described them on her album "Exile In Guyville" (A great album by the way if you don’t already have it) "I was flying into Chicago at night…..The planet looked like it was lit from within like a poorly assembled electrical ball spinning out of the farm land and into the grid the plans of the city were all that you saw." * From Hartford it’s about an hour drive to Norwich and we made it to the Ramada and into our beige/pink king-sized rooms by 3:00am (long day of travel). There was a sign up in the elevator apologizing for the fire alarm testing that would start the next morning at 11am. I searched for ear plugs in my bag and in my purse, but came up with nothing and stayed up watching "I Love Lucy" on Nick at Night ‘til 4:00. The next thing I knew it was this morning and red flashing lights were bleeding in a spiral from beneath my door. Then outside in the hall, this bleeping noise was happening and a mechanically dry calm voice was repeating: "May I have your attention please. May I have your attention please. There has been an alarm reported in the building. Please proceed to the stairways and evacuate the building. Do Not use the elevators." But I was too tired so I just made some bad coffee and started to write this here journal entree. *From memory, these lyrics may be off a little. |
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