music

I realized this evening, as I sat at one of those tiny black CBGB tables that will soon be a dimly-lit memory, that the only music shows I see in the city are those of my friends who need bodies in their audience. There are worse things than seeing your friends do what they love, brazenly; I'm not complaining. Tonight it was my friend Erin and her sci-fi harp band, the Telepathic Space Rats. Despite the line around the block of mini-punks to see 30 Degrees to Mars next door -- I think that the name the skinny white boy with the mohawk and the "no fur" button told me -- she had a good crowd. Unfortunately, it included all these people I used to work with at the Very Important Talent Agency: actors I last saw a year ago when I left that wretched place, actors I never expected to see again.

One of these actors once, when displeased with me in the voiceover booth because I wouldn't let her audition for something she wasn't scheduled for, grabbed my hair. That's not something I forgive, unless maybe the perpetrator is a six year old. MAYBE. Still, I was polite and friendly. When she asked me what I was doing now, and I told her publishing, her face blanked over, like the page had turned.

Well, she might not be impressed that I'm no longer in entertainment, but I'm in employee heaven. I don't have to ask anyone's permission to go to the bathroom! People occasionally say "thank you" when I do something for them! Nobody even THINKS of touching my hair. I have no regrets.

Still, when the next actor who asked what I was doing now, I replied, "I wrote a novel, got engaged, and now I'm working in publishing." Cuz it couldn't hurt to be precise, could it?