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boston, 9/29-10/2
My journal method for the trip was this: I bought a little blank book with pages in various bright colors. Along the way, stopping for meals or sleep, I would jot little notes to myself about what I'd done and seen, notes like "looking for Belgian waffles" or "trying not to step on the cat" or "Jews in Denmark in WWII". The idea--which worked out for a while--was that I would get to a computer soon enough that these fragments would jog my recent memory and I would know what to say about them in full sentences.
I have no notes from Boston. But I remember I had a great time.
Boston (and Cambridge and Somerville) was the most aggressively nostalgic stop on my trip. I figured I had a lot of old favorites to visit, and only a few days to do it, so I'd better not waste any time. With a few exceptions, I went only to restaurants and stores and cinemas and places where I'd hung out when I used to live there. People would say "I know this really great Greek restaurant" and I'd veto it solely on the grounds that I'd never been there. So I went to the falafel place across from my old school, and the Thai restaurant down Mass Ave., and the CD shops in Harvard Square, and generally was all about rekindling old affections.
The major exceptions to the nostalgia campaign were the open mikes. I played at the Cantab and had a good time, and played at the BCCA and had a good time, and in between I played at Club Passim, which felt like an achievement even though I only got to play one song and I had to pay to get in.
The one song ("Snowblinded") went over well, though--after a long, depressing drought across the south, I made my first CD sales to people who didn't already know me. I also traded CDs with Sam Bayer (who traded me his mammoth 3-CD compilation for my 22-minute EP) and Myq Kaplan (who I hadn't seen but who turned out to be really funny) and I think some other people but it was a while ago and to be honest I haven't unpacked the CDs yet. And also The Animators were there and it was great to see them again, and I stayed an extra night partly so I could see them at the BCCA.
And in the process of eating at old haunts and playing at new venues, I met some online friends for the first time and saw some other friends for the first time in years and saw some other friends I'd seen earlier that week and saw a whole lot of![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
dougo, who I was staying with. I'm doing this from memory, so I'm sure I'll forget someone, but let's see: There was bnewmark and perci and evandra and shoebox_bird and rawrin. And dougo. Seems like there were more. Anyway, all of whom were fun to hang out with. Except one. YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE. Just kidding, it was all fun.
The one sad thing about visiting Boston was this: If visiting New Jersey was emotional but fraught, and visiting New York was thrilling but exhausting, visiting Boston was... well, nice. It was nice because it was a nice place where I used to live, and I knew where some cool stuff was. (Somewhat proudly, I didn't pull out a map the whole time I was there.) There was nothing about it that I didn't like. But it didn't pull me back the way it used to, the way I expected it to.
So maybe next time I visit I'll try to cut the strings of nostalgia and see Boston like a new place. But on the other hand, I miss Bangkok Cuisine and Boston Shawarma again already, and I'd hate to miss whatever's showing at the Brattle, and I didn't even make it on this trip to the Someday Cafe or the Museum of Fine Arts. So maybe I won't.
I have no notes from Boston. But I remember I had a great time.
Boston (and Cambridge and Somerville) was the most aggressively nostalgic stop on my trip. I figured I had a lot of old favorites to visit, and only a few days to do it, so I'd better not waste any time. With a few exceptions, I went only to restaurants and stores and cinemas and places where I'd hung out when I used to live there. People would say "I know this really great Greek restaurant" and I'd veto it solely on the grounds that I'd never been there. So I went to the falafel place across from my old school, and the Thai restaurant down Mass Ave., and the CD shops in Harvard Square, and generally was all about rekindling old affections.
The major exceptions to the nostalgia campaign were the open mikes. I played at the Cantab and had a good time, and played at the BCCA and had a good time, and in between I played at Club Passim, which felt like an achievement even though I only got to play one song and I had to pay to get in.
The one song ("Snowblinded") went over well, though--after a long, depressing drought across the south, I made my first CD sales to people who didn't already know me. I also traded CDs with Sam Bayer (who traded me his mammoth 3-CD compilation for my 22-minute EP) and Myq Kaplan (who I hadn't seen but who turned out to be really funny) and I think some other people but it was a while ago and to be honest I haven't unpacked the CDs yet. And also The Animators were there and it was great to see them again, and I stayed an extra night partly so I could see them at the BCCA.
And in the process of eating at old haunts and playing at new venues, I met some online friends for the first time and saw some other friends for the first time in years and saw some other friends I'd seen earlier that week and saw a whole lot of
dougo, who I was staying with. I'm doing this from memory, so I'm sure I'll forget someone, but let's see: There was bnewmark and perci and evandra and shoebox_bird and rawrin. And dougo. Seems like there were more. Anyway, all of whom were fun to hang out with. Except one. YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE. Just kidding, it was all fun.The one sad thing about visiting Boston was this: If visiting New Jersey was emotional but fraught, and visiting New York was thrilling but exhausting, visiting Boston was... well, nice. It was nice because it was a nice place where I used to live, and I knew where some cool stuff was. (Somewhat proudly, I didn't pull out a map the whole time I was there.) There was nothing about it that I didn't like. But it didn't pull me back the way it used to, the way I expected it to.
So maybe next time I visit I'll try to cut the strings of nostalgia and see Boston like a new place. But on the other hand, I miss Bangkok Cuisine and Boston Shawarma again already, and I'd hate to miss whatever's showing at the Brattle, and I didn't even make it on this trip to the Someday Cafe or the Museum of Fine Arts. So maybe I won't.
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Take care!
misty
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