This weekend I will be avoiding the luggage carousel by traveling light. I will also attempt to avoid any feeling of traveling in circles as just the *thought* of this makes me physically tired. I long to move forward. Perhaps I am feeling an anticipatory exhaustion because it has been so cold lately, and so very dark in the little room where I work by myself. Perhaps I am mourning the loss of the extra days that are cut off at the end of February, (I feel like I have skipped something important. Is it March already?) Or, perhaps I am just tired of the same-ness of each day so far this year. They seem to circle ’round and ’round on themselves like a merry-go-round where I am the only rider, and a calliope tune droning on in the background is never-changing. This is not a complaint, just a fanciful observation of what I am experiencing.

Tonight I am struggling to gather the physical energy to pack the bare essentials, to plan my journey, and to generally “get my ass in gear.” I will do it. I am not worried. I hold out the hope that once Saturday arrives, and I am up in the air, and off of the larger carousel called “New York City”, I will make a grab at the Universe’s sparkling brass ring and the merry-go-round will stop. I hold out the hope that this trip across the ocean will once again ignite some buried creative impulse, nourish some lyrical seeds, and inspire me to write something meaningful.

I will be carrying these lyrics with me, written for a waltz that waits for me there, in EUR. If I’m lucky, I will have a full lead sheet produced for it by Spring.

NOT FOR ME
©2018 Laurie Early
(EUR – music by Nicola Borrelli)

I had a dream
I thought it was real,
something to hold, to love,
to see, and to feel,
but the dream was untrue,
left my heart tired and blue,
and now there’s no hope left in me.

I used to yearn
to travel afar,
but then I learned
that I can’t follow my star.
So, I sit here alone
in the shadow of Rome
and mourn my dream,
a dream that wasn’t supposed to be,
no, not for me.

I had, a dream
it kept me alive,
calmed all my fears, for years.
It helped me survive,
but the dream was untrue,
so there’s nothing to do
but wait for life to start again.

Perhaps, one day
I’ll see a new light,
some kind of way to pierce
the dark of this night.
Still, I sit here alone,
on these gray steps of stone,
and mourn my dream,
a dream that never was meant to be,
no, not for me.