friday march 16 2001    |    9:54 a.m.

all right, corporate america. i'm ready to give you up.

ed (record label guy) picked me up last night and we went to churchill's to have a "job interview" of sorts. except we were hanging out like old friends. he bought me drinks and we swapped music stories and talked about his plans for the label and got all starry-eyed over the archers of loaf and low-fi, and misty-eyed over mikey, whom we both knew, and i smoked a lot of cigarettes, and he gave me a bag full of cds and 7"s and his old band's demo tape.

i've never been to churchill's on a low-key bar night, only for shows, and it was superchill. aside from ed and i, there were six or seven other men, most well over 40, drinking pints and playing pool, playing marvin gaye and al green on the jukebox, singing along with enough enthusiasm that the bartender turned off the volume on the soccer match on tv. ed and i talked about shows and looked at the skeleton of the stage behind the bar, constructing our plans with our eyes.

on the way back at 8:30 (my mom was taking me out to dinner) i listened to him tell me stories about his friends and this and that, and looked out at the city -- nothing too miami-glam, only the ghetto extending from downtown to the outskirts of miami beach -- and felt good. happy. and calm. like i rarely feel. without the urge to run away screaming. with no sense of entrapment. just driving around miami with ed listening to wvum.

i love miami. i love it like belonging. i think all it was missing before was a soundtrack.

things, of course, are not falling into place. they are much clearer, yes, but no easier. it's never that easy, revelation-easy; not for me, anyway.

ed and i are already talking like this is a done deal, working together. although he knows i'm waiting on the job interview, and he understands. but i'm still worried. i haven't been sleeping. maybe four hours a night the past two nights, one hour the night before that. i don't have time to sleep. need to think and plan, write and worry. and no, it's never too early to start worrying.

also talked to erick last night. and i just don't know.

tomorrow i fly back to school. i'm ready, i suppose, although less than thrilled. but this trip home has put things in perspective as usual, and i think it'll make the next six-ish weeks easier. i'm most excited about being back with the girls. and have the urge to sit in daniel's room for hours drinking and listening to music and talking like we used to last year. i hope everyone's not too busy. . . i've already started having dreams about senior week debauchery!

sigh. so many things.

if you've tried to e-mail me in the past day or so, i probably haven't gotten it. something's wrong with my e-mail provider: no idea what's going on, but with no prior notice the website has ceased to exist. so you can write me here if you need to. or leave me messages. they make me happy.

off to sleep before haircut & necessary shopping this afternoon. rick b_, if you're reading this, i'm hopelessly jealous & excited for the next installment & i e-mailed you yesterday.