strike that

front row

Doing things against my better judgment almost always comes out right.

I went to the opera. I wanted to wish for it to suck, but I couldn’t help wishing it would be beautiful. And then it was. It was beautiful. It was a beautiful story beautifully told, and it left me with that feeling of having been very close to magic. And all night I felt blessed and also, of course, sad.

And then this morning I went to an interview for my dream job, the job that to the last detail is exactly how I would design it. And I probably didn’t get it because it’s Portland and that’s how things seem to be going, but I did what I could. I was all there.

This is my world for the moment: crazy cool people I don’t get to know and crazy cool jobs I don’t get to do, but I feel giddy with proximity. All of these things I want in my life are close and real, and they are not my life yet but they brush up against me and this, for now, is enough.

As I was walking down the street after the interview a guy waiting for a bus called after me, Your aura today is beautiful, and you know? I’ll take it. I did the crossword at the Powell’s coffeeshop and spent my lunch money on poetry, Wislawa Szymborska and Robert Hass, so Jamey took me to a restaurant thirty stories over Portland, looking down at the barges and the quiet little lines of cars. It is a difficult thing, sometimes, to be so close to what you want. But one could do worse than longing.

posted by tortaluga @ 2:49 PM