Fog Brain

I have a splitting headache this afternoon. I don't know if it's because of the pilsner I drank at lunch (THAT'S a story in and of itself), the DECAF coffee I drank at breakfast, or the simple fact that there are too many choices and no distinct clarity running around in my brain.

My schedule and plans change several times a day, yet two weeks after arriving in Bubbaville I am still here in the land of no beer and little culture without a really good sense of what to do next. At one moment I am online booking a flight back to California to get things together and raise some funds to use for our "Musicians in Exile" project, then Mayor Nagin comes on the TV and says that he might be willing to let people back into the city in a few days and I think, "Well, maybe I should stick around here." Then my brother in law, who is seeking to be of all the help he can be, asks me to come down to Florida where I can maybe pick up some work. But that mostly feels like a distraction, as practical as it might be.

My friend Tom Morgan calls it Hurricane Brain in his daily email Hurricane Log and that seems like as good a description as I've heard.

The last few days have been particularly difficult as I have tried to do work and as I get reports from people scattered to the winds who are beginning to pull bits and pieces of their lives back together, in some sense, in the places where they have been scattered. Sunday night I even saw a news story about Molly's being open and I so desperately wanted to be there.

The whole experience reminds me of the Catholic concept of Limbo... neither a bad place NOR a good place... just a stuck place. Better than hell... not as nice as heaven.

I've already been to heaven... I know what it's like... and I want to go back.