Monday, October 26
The large white bird of paradise in my living room is one of several houseplants in decline. I bought it on my birthday three or four years ago and have given it the bare minimum of maintenance. I keep it watered and prune its paddle-like leaves when they turn brown. It sees the sun, though rarely enjoys its full effect. "Surviving, not thriving," as my friend Jess would say.
Before it becomes terminal, I carry it outside and give it a gentle trim, then replace the old soil. I know I'm supposed to repot it into a larger vessel, but I'm on a budget, so it's back into the 12-inch terracotta planter for now. The same goes for the wild, overgrown cactus, which falls apart as I try to save it. I rearrange its surviving pups in fresh soil and hope for the best.
Although the dracaena in my kitchen nook is in good health, it clearly needs a new home and is taking over the space. Meanwhile, the majesty palm in the bathroom seems depressed, with only one new shoot poking out of its fibrous trunk. Everybody is in trouble all at once.
Tuesday, October 27
Like a calving glacier, the bar of soap in my bathroom soap dish has shed a third of its mass and now resembles a small white Moog synthesizer. I would classify its scent as vaguely "grandma," which is to say comforting and a little old-fashioned. Not my normal style, but I find myself washing my hands with it before I leave the house, using its scent as a defense against the day.
In video class, I’m thrown into a team leader role, which I don’t mind, but it leaves me too exhausted to do my job when I get home. As a result, I don’t get started until early afternoon and end up working much later than I’d anticipated. This snowballs into the abandonment of evening recording plans—I just don’t have it in me.
Wednesday, October 28
Atop a pile of cardboard boxes outside a garage on Rue Deauville is a gold kick drum, glinting in the autumn twilight. As I run past it, I wonder whether the rest of the kit is in the boxes below, and why it’s outside. A couple miles later on Geddes, I listen to a mix of the song I'm working on and spend the rest of my run rethinking its arrangement. So much of my self-editing now happens away from an instrument or screen.
After dinner, I remove my pumpkin’s innards while listening to Helloween’s 1988 album, Keeper of the Seven Keys: Part II. Along with its predecessor, this album was a favorite of mine when I was young and partly informed what I thought metal was supposed to sound like. I can hang with most metal subgenres, but über-melodic European power metal is still my sweet spot.
I carve out my pumpkin’s eyes and eyebrows, then add a boomerang nose and a drooping mouth. Its expression is slightly bewildered but resolute. I roast its seeds in olive oil and Tuscan seasoning salt, then set my jack-o’-lantern on the front porch to begin its brief life.
Thursday, October 29
After work, I take myself for a walk through Frog Island into Depot Town, where the shops are all set up for trick-or-treating. A little girl, half-blinded by her oversized witch mask, stumbles around the corner, pillowcase bag at the ready.
At A2 Vintage, I flip through some vinyl and a stack of old Leni Sinclair prints, mostly of the MC5, then carry on walking to the end of the block. I head north and stop to admire 516 River, one of several dream homes I’ve bookmarked during my walks around town. Shading its detached garage—which would of course be my recording studio—is a hulking maple, bright leaves volcanic in their autumn splendor. Across the street on the corner of River and Oak is Hutchinson House, a Richardsonian mansion built by S&H Green Stamp baron Shelley Hutchinson in 1904 and now the home of the HighScope Foundation.
As I loop back west toward home, a feisty little rainstorm overtakes me. I’m wearing my raincoat and could just hustle home, but since I’m walking by the brewery and it's happy hour…