The Test Of Love

I love my wife.

Let me say that again - I love my wife. Joy is the center of my universe. But traveling with her is a pain in the ass. How much so? Let me explain. My most recent gig in Nevada was at the Carson Valley Inn in Minden, a place that's rapidly becoming a place I don't want to play for reasons that I'll explain later. But even though it was late February and she doesn't handle winter well at all any more, Joy wanted to come with. Under normal circumstances I'd leave for a Thursday-through-Saturday gig late Tuesday night or very early Wednesday morning, within a few hours on either side of midnight. Joy wanted to leave on Monday, and stay in Bend to visit with her sister and her family. We stayed there that night and the next, and I'm pretty sure that I did all the cooking - not to mention buying most of the food I cooked. And then there was stopping for meals along the way. And did I mention that it was snowing in Central Oregon, and that we slept in an unheated trailer those nights?

But we made it into Minden, albeit freezing our asses off. I can't wait to ditch the truck and get a car that has a working heater. Among other things. I schlepped everything into our room, then took a moment to recover before taking the truck over to the casino's main entrance to load in my gear. But that didn't happen, as the Wednesday-night solo act decided to leave his stuff onstage at the end of the night and come pick it up in the morning. Which left us to wait until the next morning to finally set up and soundcheck.

Now I know you're asking yourself, why is Joe suddenly not so thrilled to play at CVI? Well, it's basically because I'm playing dead drums there. A chain of events that happened at a previous engagement there put me in the position of having to turn my drum module completely off in order to get someone off my back who shouldn't have been on my back in the first place. And Mike keeps telling me "oh, your drums are really cutting through the PA" - oh, horseshit. You can hear my cymbals just fine. But my drums are dead for a reason - to reduce stage volume. That's why I have them triggered and run the module into the PA, so they can be heard. But since the module is off - this time around I didn't even bother unpacking it - nobody's hearing anything other than my cymbals. And this is what's putting me in such a good mood. Having Joy to come back to at the end of the night is a million times better than coming back to an empty hotel room, but sometimes even that isn't comfort enough.

And then there's all the stuff she wants and needs to bring with her. And with those wants and needs, she winds up carrying nearly twice as much stuff as I do. That takes up space and weight in the back of my truck - and the front. She winds up spending the trip pretty much locked into one position because of all the things she just has to have with her in the cab of the truck. But true love is being able to put up with your beloved's issues.

After finishing up at CVI, we headed north to spend a day or two with Michelle and the grandbabies - can't really call them babies any more, now that Cody is ten and Ellie close to her ninth birthday. One problem, though - we kinda forgot to let them know we were coming. And with staying for two nights, it meant having to set up the trailer. At least Joy didn't go bonkers that the damn thing is falling apart. And we made sure to stop on the way home to get some Voodoo Doughnut goodness in Portland.

And I found out that I'll be turning around here in a little while for another weekend. Turns out that the Nugget is still having bands in the cabaret for a little while longer - originally we'd been told that our contract had been cancelled - but the original contract was for this weekend just past, and we were informed that we'll be playing this upcoming weekend instead. I wound up leaving my drums in my storage unit in Reno for just this reason. And Joy wanted to come with me at first, but then she changed her mind. Or more accurately, getting sick right after we came home changed her mind for her.

True love is being able to put up with your beloved's issues. But it's also her being able to put up with mine. And that's why I love her.