Parade 5/25/06

The dates on this thing are a little screwy. Stay with me. Laney Packed her house up. And I needed to get out. After a long morning walking the city on my own, i spot Mostafa putting chairs outside his restaurant. I sit down with Kim and Stephane (my new housemate) and we watch two of myu friends play guitar on the sidwalk. Ran into some poeople who had already disappeared grom granada in my mind: Gavino, the gypsy jazz guitarrist from Belliville Trio, and Greg, the american Flamenco Guitarrist and Alvalro, Laney's portugese neighbor. Said goodbye to all of them otravez, knowing the chabnce of seeing them on the street was slim. Said goodbye to Matt surely for what will be the last time (goes back to US and then back up to northern spain to do the Camino). It was more sad than I expected it to be. Went up to Laney's and helped her finish packing. The house seems so empty without Sara, and I know Laney was really feeling it. Stayed with her until 8pm and then went down to Paprika to eat dinner and hang out with some friends. Stephane was working and proceeded to give food and drink for little charge. Ava and Ana had a show on the same street, but when I went there I was greeted by the bar owner who claimed the show was cancelled, even though there was a large crowd and Ana and Ava were all ready to play. Proceeded to walk the entire city with a train of hippies/beatnik/street musicians. Somehow I was designated cherry girl and ended up holding/distributing a bunch of cherries to the insane group. Within the group there were bums from the UK, musicians from Denmark and a very loud but charming group of israeli teenagers. There was also a couple from the US, in their mid fifties, who, despite my constant reassurances, kept complaining about how old they were. At one point I turned o them and said "Aw, it doesn't really matter, age is only a number" and they stared at me as if it had never occured to them before. they were the coolest parents I think I could've ever met. The woman told me about how she studied abroad in madrid some 30 years ago, and how she never wanted to leave but did anyway, married at 25 had children and woke up one day in a routine she deosn't want or enjoy (one of the israeli teens asked her what do you do for fun" and all she could say was "I don't know, I get up I go running, take care of the kids, make dinner and go to bed") She said she felt there was a reason she had met all of us (all of us being the 40 some hippies) and there was no coincidence that she was there talking to me at that point in her life. And as much as I don't believe in destiy and all that, I'm thinking that maybe there was really a reason for su meeting but not for her. More for me. I know now I can't end up like her, regretting never returning, sucked into the void of suburban comfortable lifestyle. Looking at her was like looking into my futre, what it could be if I don't follow what my spirit needs but rather follow my security.