Reileen van Kaile

Tonight I went to see the musical goddess Vienna Teng perform at Schuba's Tavern. It was my second time seeing her live, but the magick of watching her at the piano keyboard was no less worse for the passage of time, and in fact seemed ten times better than I remembered seeing her. The "strings ladies" Marika Hughes and Dina Maccabee were there, along with newcomer Alex Wong on percussion. I think the addition of Alex Wong really lent an amazing rock-ish flavor to Vienna's songs that was really, really refreshing and completely made of awesomesauce.

But as I was standing in the back watching the performance, there was a phantom taste stinging at the inside of my mouth. A taste of longing to be where Vienna was, rocking out my original songs on that Yamaha keyboard, sharing funny stories with the audience that's hanging onto your every word, every note like it was a rope thrown to you as you're drowning in the middle of a roiling ocean. I wanted to be where she was so badly that I wanted to cry.

I want to do what Vienna does. No, not just that - I want to do more than that, because I can. Or I think I can.

I want to be that touring musician with a great band to perform with. But I also want to be that artist who exhibits at odd little galleries and Artist Alleys. And I also want to be that best-selling author who signs copies of her novels at Borders and gets asked to do panels at conventions or things like that.

These are such silly little things to whine over, I know. Greater dreamers than I have wasted away into obscurity, their hard work little more than dusty invisible footnotes. But it's been a shitty quarter for me in a million and one ways, and while seeing Vienna* was something that didn't disappoint, it ended up reminding me of my beloved, impossible pies in the sky that seem even more out of reach now.

-Reileen
'cause you're everywhere to me

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*I was also glad that Vienna liked the gift that I brought for her. Originally I was going to get her socks, as per the inside joke on the forums, but I thought she might be sick of them, so I got her this instead. I also got her a bracelet depicting various shots of buildings in Chicago on each segment, which she put on after she dug it out of the plastic bag (and which I assume she probably also took off for the second performance that night...which I couldn't go to because I was under 21, dammit).

I never did go to that Intonation concert from this entry. In my defense, though, I'd really not rather do any performance without at least one rehearsal. I e-mailed the coordinator of the concert asking about a rehearsal time, since I wouldn't know anyone there or where the concert was going to be held, and he never responded, so I didn't want to go and make a total fool of myself. Plus I didn't really know what I wanted to play. Hahahahawhups.

My New Year's schedule has also been shot to shit, although it's been that way for a while. Just another personal case of self-disappointment in the life of Reileen. It's not a surprising development for me.

To top it off, I never sent my conference paper to either of the two possible places that I could have sent it, mainly because I never bothered to finish the "related work" section of my paper. I know I could have, but I just got really lazy and lethargic and depressed. Rrrargh.

In happier news, a friend has introduced me to a slightly more sugary version of Ali Project, called Yousei Teikoku, and I am hopelessly hooked on a couple of their songs (although I think listening to their stuff for too long drains my life energy or something).

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Current grades:

ART106 - A
JPN102 - B
ANI220 - Expecting an A, but we'll see...
ANI105 - Probably a B?

Blargh. I should've done better.

-Reileen
to skip or not to skip, that is the question