The Enthusiast Meets Restraint

When I was putting together the God and Jesus CD for N and the Snake for Easter Sunday, I put Western Wall on the playlist, which is an Emmylou Harris and Linda Rodstadt song. I remember Emmylou talking about this kind of music – how it is all about restraint. And you can hear it in both of their voices, the holding back, the waiting a beat, then issuing the lyrics steadily. I was thinking about this because S told me to say hello to the stone fox on the bayou and yesterday morning I said “Good Morning” to him but thought to myself how enthusiastic I sound – like Good Morning, there’s a song in my heart, and isn’t the world great! – the poor guy was mid run in the already humid air. L just looked at me and I said, cute, huh? And L said “nerd”, then when L saw him lap the second time and smile with those lovely dimples, he said okay, I’ll give him cute. Then I came home to quickly change for a run and was running across Canal Street and the light changed and so I hopped on a concrete barrier and tried to balance and was dancing around to get my balance and this guy drove by and smiled and made me smile and I realized I am not going to be anything but an enthusiast, nor do I want to be.

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