What did I do this weekend? I’ll tell you what I did. I went to see Gordon Lightfoot in concert, that’s what I did.
Now, if you are like most of my friends (except for Bronwyn Green), you will be asking yourself, “Why?”
Because he’s Gordon Lightfoot, that’s why! Because he writes songs that tell beautiful stories, and so what if some of those stories don’t make a lot of sense and seem to be induced by “hard living,” if you get my drift (and I think you do)? The man is a modern-day bard, a wandering minstrel selling his songs. And he’s still doing it while pushing seventy. That, my friends, is true devotion to one’s craft.
However, pre-Gordon, there was a tragedy. And it happened in my house. It happened to my butt.
Back in the day, when I posted about my office and included pictures, I showed you the nightmare of my office chair. The chair that was the very reason I called my blog, “My Office Chair Is Real Uncomfortable.” I kept that chair, despite the fact that it often popped apart and pinched me, despite the fact that it made my rear cheeks fall asleep, because it had seen me through several manuscripts and was a trusted friend. But now, it has betrayed me.
Here’s how it happened: I’m replying to a fan email (I actually do that, despite all evidence to the contrary. It just takes me a long time and I don’t get all of them) on my BlackBerry, and I lean back in my trusty chair. And as my texting thumbs fly over the tiny keys, I hear this queer sort of groaning sound. Then, a cracking sound. Then, the physical reassurance of the chair at my back is no longer, and I am sliding, too slowly for it to be sudden, to quickly to do anything about it, off the back of the chair and onto the floor, where my tailbone makes a brisk acquaintance with the wood laminate.
Holy God, was that humiliating. Yup. I broke a chair. Sure, it was already broke, but come on. I’m super huge and pregnant here, let’s not add insult to injury. If I was meant to have a bruised posterior this weekend, it would have been just as easily accomplished by some method that did not point out my super lardassness.
Here is photographic evidence of the carnage:
And that’s my dog, looking guilty, though he had nothing to do with it. He just has a guilty conscience. He’s Catholic.
Onto brighter things, though. Here is a picture of me and the lovely Gena Showalter at Meijer in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Gena was there signing books on the Levy book tour, with some other authors. But I was there for the Gena, because she was one of the very first authors I ever met after become a “real” writer, and she has always been ever so nice. Please to be looking at Gena and not me, the person with the swollen face and the hair that is in bad need of recoloring:
