[cw: brief discussion of past abuse]
Most everything for the album has been written and recorded by now, outside of a few vocal and guitar tracks. Things have been going fairly smoothly, and the studio itself is miraculously holding up despite looking more and more as though it's held together with duct tape.
Nate had been frustated about not being able to improvise and play his own little pieces for two-minutes-plus in each song-- something that sounded a little silly to me at first, before I realized that it was what he was used to. I was kind to him-- I think. I tried to be. I think it went well. As our sessions went on his playing just got more and more beautiful... so I think, from that perspective, it DID go well. He had to say more with less, and at the same time, also had to be choosy about what he wanted to say. A challenge, but talking about it like that made him more motivated. It’s funny-- that’s also how I motivate myself. Maybe we both have our own kinds of competitive streaks.
Getting to hear him play like this, be so close to it, is something I still can’t take for granted. I had a feeling, from the minute I heard him all those years back, that we would sound good together. I admittedly did hope, in a small way, that I’d be able to test that belief. Sometimes I’d just daydream about it when I was in my car, half-listening to the radio, taking a break from work, wondering what it’d take to get there when I was starting as low as I was. If it was even possible. I held on to that little hope somehow, felt silly doing so, and now here I am. Here I fucking am! And it feels more and more real, more and more stable, tangible. I haven’t been able to sing alongside his playing as much-- the little I’ve done has already been fantastic. The real test’ll be the gigs. --Rehearsals, maybe.
I almost expected to be able to connect to Nate’s playing. I truly didn’t expect to feel so good singing with Greg. His voice has such a dark, velvety smoothness to it and mine just fits inside it, alongside it, above and around it, so wonderfully. And then, during some verses or pre-choruses, I can do a solo vocal and it’s the contrast between us that’s most apparent. I like that we can be what we need each other to be so easily already. I’m also happy that I’m getting to a musical place like that with Nate!
Having to craft a life story for myself has been a strange thing. I should've expected to need to do something like this, especially in an established band w/press already interested in 'em (in US.... wow), but even if I did anticipate it, I don't think it would've made this any less uncomfortable. My life and my past aren't the most palatable things, and that's already putting it very lightly. But people still get curious, and I've learned more and more that avoiding it entirely just makes people MORE curious. Like wanting to pick at scabs. Ugh. Well fine. I'm generally boring as all getout, then. Trust me. I grew up in the boonies, my daddy left me and Mom when I was seven and I was raised by a single working mother and rotating relatives and family friends 'till I was thirteen, that's my sob story. I was a shy little nerd that couldn't figure out what I wanted to do in life besides sing and that's why I was unemployed so often and why I dropped out of college. Pay no mind to the man behind the curtain, etc.
Might not do it yet since I'm so new and don't want to get in the bosses' bad favor so soon after joining, but I think it'd be nice eventually to talk about more surface-level interesting things. Like being half-Persian, both of my parents being half-Persian half-Portuguese, living in a little neighborhood made up the same way (joking about how neither side could tell one from the other), converting to Judaism for my step-father (and for my mother, really, because she was converting for him and it’s the mother that matters most there[8]), getting snuck into Arab and Persian clubs as a teenager despite being underage, getting to stay after getting caught and offering to try and drum for them (like, bongo type drums), that influence on my music and my voice, etc. I've snuck some things into the songs for the album already (certain melodies/phrasings, different styles of vibrato, chords and chord progressions, scales, etc), and I'm happy about that and know Mom and Mamaji would appreciate that as well. --I've told Greg a lot of those surface-level things already. Some to the rest of the guys, too. There was a little bit of joking about whether I'd want us to take Saturdays off, but they've all proven to be relatively decent people at the very least with regards to not treating people different from them like trash. Thankful that’s mostly confined to Phil.
Woke up this morning and immediately reacted as tho I was back in Lorenzo's house; I must've had a dream about it or something even tho I couldn’t remember it, and it took me at least five minutes to calm down and remember where I actually was. It's been four years. He'll never want anything to do with me ever again. Who knows the last time he gave me a single thought? And yet I still have nightmares about him, still wake up in physical terror at the idea of being stuck back with him, still hate sleeping even more than I had before I met him, have such a hard time relaxing enough to fall asleep in less than a fucking hour-- fuck I want to spit in his fucking face (or better, stab it). It's been like this for awhile now, where memories of that time either cut far too close to the bone as if they happened to me yesterday or I'm so detached from them it might as well have all happened to someone else another lifetime ago.
But I was alone for that particular panic thing and SO thankful for it. Even more thankful that Greg made breakfast for us. He told me I looked exhausted (and I hated that he noticed). I said I had a hard time getting to sleep. That I tend to. He got another mug out of his cupboard, filled it up with coffee, and placed it next to my still half-full one. Which made me laugh! I DID drink both of them, tho. I would've hated being inconsiderate and wasting it. I was a little scattered and overly chatty during the day because of it tho, too much caffeine for me (and my stomach was cramping... oh well). Funny that it does that when I had such a high tolerance for speed. It's been almost a YEAR since I've used... I just realized. Wow. This is the longest I've been clean since I started using in the first place. That makes me feel a bit better-- that even if parts of me are stuck in the past there are parts of me still able to move forward. That I can stick to taking care of myself, at least relatively speaking.
On the other hand, what happened this morning is why I used to avoid sleep as much as I could, and speed was what let me avoid it. Learning how to power thru on my own, without speed as a crutch, when things like this happen has been a bit of a struggle. I hope that with time, it'll get easier.
Work's been busy but nice, and no repeats of the panic episode from earlier. I've gradually learned that I'm the one with the most ~formal~ music training out of all of 'em. That still isn't much, honestly, but I can read music. Sightread a little if it's in the right register. Know a few things about scales, chord progressions, etc. I guess I'm more decent at learning languages than I give myself credit for sometimes! It really is a whole mode of thinking (and English and the Latin alphabet are honestly the worst)... the guys all pride themselves on being able to do what they do without knowing how to read music, and it IS a lot more difficult writing or learning songs that way. If you can make it easier for yourself tho, why not do so? I don't want to pressure them or seem snobby, but I have been sharing what I know when it makes sense to/when it'll lead to potential breakthrus/etc.
Thankfully it seems to be taken as good-natured nerd stuff. They're all very used to writing songs their own way and it's been so interesting becoming a part of that whole system, too. I hope they know I don't want to upend that system in any way-- only enhance it, and only when necessary. It's all been going so well, tho... I really do think we're all finding a groove, here, with each other. I'm excited and relieved all at once-- and feel like I might belong in yet another place. I'm still not used to that feeling, and even less used to belonging in such a STRAIGHT place... would Cryssie hate the relief I feel? Would she consider it yet another sort of selling out? Maybe. I don't want to change myself too much, though, and I don't want to compromise more than I have to. She always wants me to keep my "spark" alive, and I'm trying my damn best, even if everything with Ricky nearly put it out.
I feel a little guilty not visiting the rest of my family more often nowadays, now that I can-- I dropped most high holiday things because I feel guilty for not being religiously Jewish at all anymore and also not being physically around the culture for a long time (I don't eat pork, I respect G-d's name, and I use Hebrew text in my writing alongside the Farsi and Latin (alphabet), but that's about it...). I mean-- a lot of it was for Mom and Marv anyway, but still. I know Anna and Esther would probably be a bit disappointed, too. Also haven't been around the Persian and Arab clubs for a long time. I'm known more and more as ~Jules Riley~. Feeling weirdly assimilated. Of course, part of that was less by choice and more because I didn't want anyone I cared about to see me at the worst of my junkie-hood. Half my family would be very much okay with how assimilated I am, anyway-- they think that's part of the American dream. Maybe it is. I dunno...
Beyond all that, though, going back to the Valley feels like what walking into a haunted house must feel like. Short trips don't bother me much, but overnights are a different story. When people are talking about where they grew up or if I get interview questions about it I always say I love it "in my hometown" and miss it there, but I miss an idea of it that truthfully rarely existed for me, if ever. Just one I always craved. I enter the valley, pass the alfalfa fields, the wind thru my car windows gets cooler and it's nice for a second and then reality smacks me in the face again. Says "you moron. were you actually expecting something different this time?". I enter Carlton town limits and I get hyperaware of myself. Every facet. I'm not Jules Riley there. I'm not Julie Rajani, either. I'm Julian, or more often, "Maryam's kid" or "Johnny's kid", or, whispered, when they think I'm out of earshot, "the little queer". If I ever get really famous they'll probably change their tune completely, of course. They'll want to be known as ~my home town~ UGH. I dread that, too, if only because I'll know how phony it is. I already see old high school classmates that loved beating the tar out of me after school or threatening to do things to me in locker rooms or spreading nasty rumors about me and they smile and pretend like they never did or said any of it. Maybe they really did forget. I know things are different when you're the DOER instead of the one things get DONE to[9].
So I avoided most people for this year's set of winter holidays, again. Stuck to Mom and Marv and Roya/Lev/cousins in each instance, tho they were still very happy to see me. Felt bad that I was as detached as I was. Everything I did felt fake to me and I was sure everyone else could tell but they never made mention of it or even gave me a single questioning look, not even Anna, who's usually frustratingly perceptive, and it made it feel all the more unreal. And I still couldn't sleep in my old bed. It made me feel... it's hard to explain. Just "gross". Almost feverish. Nauseous, clammy, tense. An urge to curl into as tight a ball as possible, which I gave into for awhile. Ended up sleeping on the rug on the floor of my room w/ pillows and quilt, door locked, night stand against the door jamb (the couches were all claimed, and if I slept in Miss Rustbucket I wouldn't hear the end of it from Mom...). Whatever. Back and shoulder pain was better than the feeling I felt on that bed. Even more haunted house feelings. I had to leave town before it really started to get to me. I can't afford for it to get to me.
PS: Buy two new sets of pillows/sheets/blankets. Bring one set of new pillows/sheets/blankets.
Greg's family seems nice, or at least he seems very re-energized by his own set of holiday visits. I hope I didn't look TOO obviously wiped from mine. I admit I'm a little envious of what his situation seems to be. He DID kiss me at midnight, though. That was really cute and unexpected and did make me feel better for awhile. Now I'm back to moping ("wallowing", as Cryssie used to call it). I need to just try to sleep, I know. Emphasis on "try", though. Ugh.
I know I'll have to (down a couple shots and...) call Granddad at some point and say happy holidays sorry I missed ya blahblahblah. Neither of us will believe it. I'll feel even more dreadful after hanging up than I already do. G-d sometimes it's so hard not to get disgustingly jealous of people with normal families. I know part of it's my fault, and that a whole other part is because of me but not my fault as much as it's something that's out of my control. --G-d I'm even MORE disgustingly jealous of gays with happy families. What the fuck kind of utopian bullshit is that. What the fuck planet are they from. I'd ask to join but part of why I'm so jealous is I know it's too late for me. The damage was already done and then some. And it's so awful, I know Mom's always tried her best, she had to be so brave and so strong and do so much by herself; it's absolutely not her fault. And Anna’s amazing, she’s always been there for me and she loves me even when she doesn’t fully understand me, and I love everybody, it’s just… I don’t know. It's everything else.
There're times when I'm depressed/anxious where I feel like a child in my helplessness and other times I feel unbearably ancient and jaded, like the weight of far too many years for one person at my age is on my shoulders. It all ends up in the same place, so I suppose it doesn't matter whether I feel helpless or hopeless about it. I'm sitting in bed wishing I had speed all the same. I don't have much to distract me, either, outside of writing n' biting my nails to the quick. If I try and work, I'll just want speed even more. Maybe reading won't be as bad, if I can pay attention enough to it. I should feel good about not using for eight months, and I was up 'til now. I can ignore the cravings for a damn long while, but they sneak in all the same. I wish I knew when I'd ever stop wanting it; I was so proud to avoid using for this long but it won't feel real to me til I stop craving it. That's my wish for the new year.
[8]ESPECIALLY because some people assume I’m Jewish from birth ‘cause of my nose, and it always throws them when I say I’m Jewish on a technicality (and it’s an odd mix of funny and annoying seeing them try to scramble and come up with nice reasons for “always” thinking I was Jewish)
[9]I tried to be a doer before, to see how it felt, to understand it– I’m a hands-on learner, I suppose, for better or worse– and all I could feel was the other kid’s sort of pathetic fear and… I guess some people get off on causing that reaction– I mean, Lorenzo definitely did. I was just disgusted with myself and ashamed of and angry at both of us.