5 Past 13
The first six months in Virginia weren’t so bad but, when August came around and I missed my first Nationals since 1998, things began to shift. I came up to visit in the beginning of September, hosted the show that Monday and realized how much I missed it all. I’d not only walked away from my baby, which was hard enough, but I’d walked away from my friends. Mondays were my second home, my living room that welcomed all sorts of random people in every week, mixing with the people I held most dear.
When we decided to come back, I knew a big part of getting myself back to normal was getting myself back to Monday nights. When we left, I was extremely burnt out and desperately needed a break. I realized later that it was predominantly my increased involvement on the national scene, and the resulting frustration, that had finally pushed me over the edge. The whole PSI experience left me even more cynical and jaded than usual, but with the proper distance, I realized what a small part of my world it really was. It was the poetry that had gotten me in the beginning – seeing how it could change someone’s life, giving them a voice they never knew they had, or just never knew how to use. That’s what was important. The rest of it was either icing on the cake, or the crusty burnt shit stuck to the pan.