Laying Tracks
New Orleans, 2009

 

We meet over breakfast
In the restaurant where I’m recognized as a friend
By the owner
After only one visit

I taste his gentleness immediately
Mix in long hair and he tastes like a friend
He tells me of how he creates Celtic music
“I have 12 CD’s out.  I make enough in royalties to live off.  The live performances are more for enjoyment than promotion. My podcasts...”

He invites me to his performance at a bar that night
I don’t have an address of the bar
Only the street
So I wander the street and stop into a shop
“Have you heard of…?”

They haven’t, but one of the men steps up to help
“They’ll know next door.  Follow me.”
So I follow him into the small bar

He silences the bar
Yes, really
He silences the bar

Everyone looks as he asks, “anyone know where…”
I quickly get directions
Only in New Orleans
Does a man silence a bar
To help find another bar

My friend is performing “Oh my Darlin’”
When I enter he waves at me
I sit at a bar stool with my water in a plastic cup
I recall my father singing this song
Over and over
As we drove around Nigeria
In our tiny blue WV bug

After his performance
We chat as he loads his instruments
Which we leave
In my car to get dinner of gumbo and beans

Several woman comment in the street
“Love your kilt,”
Flirting with him
Which surprises me
As he’s simply my friend

He meets me several nights later
Bringing me a sweater as it’s chilly
Even with our game of catching beads
From the floats

“I spent the day laying tracks,”
Which means that he spent the day in a studio
Recording his new CD
“How does it feel to have fans?” I ask
As I’m not sure I know others who have fans
“It’s sometimes creepy. 
Some women fall in love with me.” 

He shares a story of a woman stalking him.
He’s such a gentle being that I see how his beautiful voice could draw in women
Yet’s he’s still single

A month later, on facebook
he updates his relationship status
To his “friends,” it appears as if 
he “is no longer single.”
More than 30 people comment on it
Celebrating that he’s now in a relationship
I mention it in a quick note to him
“I only deleted the relationship status.  Still single.”
Is his reply

And I wonder how it is
That so many beautiful beings are
alone in this world
Simply because
no one vibrates at their same vibration.
 

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