The entertainer

I woke up this morning and realised I’d forgotten to blog yesterday. I have a reminder set up on my computer, and yet somehow it passed unnoticed that yesterday was Wednesday, and Wednesday is blogging day.

I think it’s because I’m having so much fun at the moment, and that’s good, right? Because I’m organising a casual soirée at my home on Sunday night – an evening of poetry and music and community – and it has consumed me.
Why? Well, partly because I love hosting gatherings of people and deciding what to feed them, how to make them feel at home, anticipating their needs as much as possible. I’ve hosted birthday parties and baby showers and book clubs and bridal showers for other people just because I love entertaining so much.

But mostly it’s because there’s another sort of entertainment I love too – put me on a stage and I’m in a very happy place. And this weekend, for the first time in many, many years I’ll be on a stage, singing a handful of my own songs, for a paying audience. Not just that, I’m singing with someone so talented and experienced and accomplished I can scarcely believe he’d agree to sing with me. It literally takes my breath away.

I cannot wait.

And I’m simultaneously neurotic, terrified, panic-stricken, anxious and filled with self-doubt – but in a good way. It’s messing with my sleep, and with my focus on my day job a little, but it’s the best feeling in the world.
Now all I have to do is pull the damn thing off.