PDX

Portland 9/7
Well, the fist day of the tour went off without a hitch! We all woke up on time, I got a little exercise and then we hit the road. We’re big on books on tape—or audiobooks, I guess is the updated term—and listened to George Orwell’s “Animal Farm” on today’s drive to Portland. We got to the club at about 4 and there was already a line around the block. We loaded our gear into the Aladdin, a venue famous for screening “Deep Throat” for two decades, then jumped into the van again and headed to Wal Mart for some random supplies.
I haven’t been nervous to perform on stage since my first open mic about 4 years ago. I remember it pretty clearly. I had one song to play. It was fairly new, but well practiced, so I wasn’t really afraid of screwing up so much as I was afraid everyone would think I sucked. Twenty minutes before my name was called, I began to feel very jittery—all butterflies and visions of everything that could possibly go wrong going wrong. My body seemed to be bracing itself for an extreme threat, a terrible, inevitable danger. Dread filled me. But I got up, played, and about a half hour after that I was able to calm down. Now, years later, the essence of that uneasiness was poking around inside of me. It was a little puzzling to me as I was pacing around backstage.
Luckily, once I stepped out on stage and heard the enthusiastic screams of the audience, those butterflies in my stomach vanished. It was such a fun show! The crowd was so much fun. Everyone was smiling, dancing and clapping along. To be honest, I thought it would take years of corralling loyal fans before we’d hear an audience clap along through a whole song, but tonight, tons of folks were clapping along all night. It’s so much fun when the audience let’s you know they’re involved.
I’ve always loved going to Portland, and this trip was fantastic! I really look forward to my next visit. Thanks to everyone for all the memories!