Monday, May 08, 2006

What Took You So long?

Well, I finally got my Mixed Bag CD’s burned last night. Now all that’s left is to finish the covers and get them in the mail. I may never get asked to this party again. Sigh!

Honestly, I really did have the best intentions of getting this one out on time, but there’s probably only so much one can expect from a guy who can’t even seem to blog regularly.

I’d been keeping a loose running list of songs I might use in my next mix ever since the first of the year. I figured I’d either do one and just send it to some folks or jump in one of Lefty’s next mixing parties. When lefty came along, I signed up, and then everything went downhill.

Parts of the problems were technological and parts of them were personal. When I started gathering CD’s together to rip, I realized that my CD drive was completely shot. I ended up getting around that problem by buying a laptop from one of Keith’s friends. I’ll still need to get a new CD drive for the PC, but I had been wanting a laptop, and this guy’s wife had won one as a door prize at an event. They didn’t need it, and they were willing to take a reasonable offer and let me make payments, so I couldn’t pass that up.

That was actually the easiest part of the whole process. My real problems started about a week before the CD’s needed to go into the mail. I started reading the blogs of folks who were going to APE this year and wishing I could go too. Then I remembered what happened last year when I got back from San Francisco, and all of a sudden it dawned on me that I’m basically in the first anniversary of my father’s last two months of life.

I think that awareness had been lurking around in the back of my mind somewhere, but consciously, I was thinking that I wouldn’t really have to face anything until the actual anniversary of his death. I hadn’t really thought that the weeks before that would bring up anything for me.

It’s not that I’ve fallen totally apart or anything, but it seems like everything reminds me of something that happened last year: APE, Derby, starting the garden, Keith’s birthday—they all fell in that time frame last year. Emotionally and physically, I feel like I’m reliving everything from that time period all over again. I’m tired, listless, and cranky. I’m not eating right or exercising. And I just can’t seem to get my head around starting anything more complicated than watching TV.

Up until this Spring, I thought I had pretty much processed everything, even though I’ve always known that grief is a pretty tricky thing. I guess knowing that and actually experiencing it are two different things.
Anyway, I’ve really had to focus what energy and concentration I have on work lately, so the mix just had to wait for a bit. I hope you’ll think it was worth the wait when you get it.

3 comments:

Gordon D said...

First, don't worry about the mix - to be honest, other than Roger's, Serene's, and a bit of Greg's, I haven't listened to many of the mixes - personal and professional crises abound.

However, grief is tricky - about a year and a half after one of my aunts (whom I was close to) died, I was still reeling, feeling depressed, etc. (Intellectually, I knew I was still grieving, but it was hard to feel). The only way through it, unfortunately, is to just move forward.

You're in my thoughts and prayers.

EM said...

Thanks Gordon. I appreciate it.

Roger Owen Green said...

eddie- My father died 5 years and 9 months ago, and weird things STILL get to me. Tiger Woods' father died recently; I read about it, but when I saw him talk about how Tiger hugged him after winning the Masters, Earl was all choked up. And I got all choked up, not about Earl Woods, but about Les Green. Just the most recent example of how stuff gets to you.