I'm kicking myself because I didn't go to last weekend's Fisherman's Feast in the North End, especially the "Flight of the Angel" ceremony last night.
Last year it was insanely fabulous, and if you've never seen a 9-year-old girl dressed in a decades-old angel costume shoved out a third-story window on a zipline by an elderly man who's one canoli away from a heart-attack, well, you should. The street was so full of people that the blaring, tooting, trilling marching bands could scarcely make their way through, and once they started throwing confetti from the buildings, after the quaking little girl had done her speech in carefully emphasized Italian to the statue of the Virgin and been hauled backwards up into the window from whence she came, we were ankle-deep and tangled in shredded office carbon paper which didn't fully wash out of the neighborhood for over a week.
Evening rolled around yesterday, and it was hot and muggy out, and I was lying around the air-conditioning at my house-sitting gig, and I was tired, and I just couldn't (or didn't) haul my ass onto the T, which I hate with a growing passion. The same thing happened on the Sunday when Italy won the world cup, only in that case I had no idea what an incredible photo op it would turn out to be. Last night, however, I knew perfectly well what amazing pictures I could come away with.
So it goes. How much should I let myself get away with these things? Don't the best, most successful artists jump on every opportunity that comes along? Will I ever make it if the best I can offer for an excuse is that I was too lazy? I constantly oscillate between being forgiving of myself, and believing that the biggest favor I can do is push myself to the max. So when yesterday rolls by and the little angel floats over the heads of hundreds of hundreds of photogenic, expressive faces, and my camera shutter sits unblinkly silent in its bag... it's all I can do to pretend it never happened at all. Doo-de-doo... if I don't see them, they don't exist.
So there.
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3 comments:
Not to make you feel bad or anything, 'cuz I have exactly the same problem (I live about a 20 min walk from an Italian neighborhood and didn't bother for the world cup), but I've been trying to live life with as few regrets as possible. If you'd gone, would you be posting about what a pain it was to get your ass on the T, or just posting the awesome pictures for us to see? Now, despite your relaxing evening, you have nothing but regrets to post. I know that, at least for me, it's never worth it.
Oh, how many times have I chastised myself for being too lazy to make it as an artist? I often envision Successful Artist, Age Mid-Twenties, as someone who is constantly creating something whenever they're not anchored to their day job, until one day they make money off of art to take an hour or two off per day, just to be lazy.
I never liked the idea of sitting around until Inspiration strikes, but I do find that if I'm drained from work and try to write or practice, I only get frustrated with my own exhaustion -- god damn me for not being invincible!
Point is, that's why the funniest people on Saturday Night Live were all addicted to cocaine.
So THAT'S why SNL isn't funny anymore! Someone call the Colombians, we need better comedy!
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