tonight’s death homework...plus atlanta... & set piece needs for rest o tour (Patreon)

(public post)

hallo loves 

greetings from a plane from NY to san francisco...i’m about to embark on the west coast leg of tour, part 1. i’m playing san francisco on friday at the warfield - with a pitstop in oakland tomorrow night to play the bandcamp record store at around 6:30 pm (info HERE) - and then i’m heading to LA for saturday’s show at the theatre at the ace hotel. i look forward to seeing a ton of you. 

meanwhile - i’m packing it in tight as usual and spending tomorrow before the bandcamp event doing a podcast interview i’ve been chasing for months, and i’d love you to join me in the prep work. 

BJ miller is one of my heroes. his TED talk, which i was lucky enough to watch live a few years ago, touched me deeply. especially after my getting-closer-to-death experiences with jeremy and anthony a few years ago (long story, but ill probably discuss those with BJ in the podcast, so don’t worry), i’ve become more and more curious about our relationship(s) with death and dying and why they are often so fearful and fraught. 

enter BJ. 

BJ was in an accident in college - he was horsing around with some friends late one night and climbed atop an electrified trolly car that sent 11,000 volts coursing through his body. he lost the bottom half of both his legs and one arm at the elbow. 

then he went on to study art, get his medical degree and now he runs a hospice in SF called The Zen Hospice and is publishing a book he just co-authored called “A Beginner’s Guide to the End: Practical Advice for Living Life and Facing Death”. 

BJ sent me a PDF of the book and it’s completely absorbing. there are so many parallels i see between how we do birth AND death so wrong. we have lost touch so completely in these areas and are so goddamn clumsy when it comes to taking care of one another. i think back to me experiences with death in 1996: my grandparents dying, my step-brother dying, my ex dying...how it was all so shrouded and inaccessible. how i didn’t get to process so much of it, and how that denied me a lot of the soil that i needed to keep being able to growing. 

BJ also lost his sister, to suicide, when she was 33. he seems to me to have headed far-long down a path i’ve hurtled myself towards lately - though i feel like an amateur; connecting the dots from grief to growth, finding true that old buddhist saying that pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional. discovering that the greatest losses, griefs and traumas of our lives actually hand us the keys to unlock the dark, if we are willing to fit them into the right hidden doors. 

that through the dark, we find light, it’s just a matter of perspective and shedding our fear of the darkness itself. and all that. are you with me here? 

anyway 

there’s a great interview with BJ here (its a little outdated): 

https://www.ucsfhealth.org/doctors_and_clinics/features/miller_bj/

and i highly recommend watching his TED talk:

https://www.ted.com/talks/bj_miller_what_really_matters_at_the_end_of_life?language=en

and now....we talk. 

i’ve got about 2 hours with BJ tomorrow to grill him for my podcast. 

anything you‘d like me to ask him?

i’ll scan these comments before we meet. 

and reminder: all these delicious podcast interviews are getting slowly edited into glorious Thing-releases ... at some point. i told you the podcast name, right?

the art of asking everything. 

get it?

ok, ask away. 

.......

MEANWHILE....

a few pieces of tour housekeeping !!

WE STILL NEED A HANDFUL OF SET PIECES !! 

(photo by lindsay duncan taken in toronto)

below is a full list of what we're looking for, where! we are happy to arm you with a handful of tickets & some merch in exchange for your loan!! 

may 17th - Atlanta - rug, lamp, table, disco ball

may 18th - Nashville - rug, lamp, table

may 30th - St Louis - rug, lamp, disco ball

may 31st - Kansas - rug, table

june 1st - Denver - rug, lamp, table, disco ball

june 6th - Vancouver - rug, lamp, disco ball

june 7th - Seattle - rug, lamp, table, disco ball

june 8th & 9th - Portland - table, disco ball

.....if you have any of these things, reach out to lauren through the link below, which has more details and pictures of the kind of items we’re looking for:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfRa9xMwhXLOQitqcSVcykloGNrVKuRJhV2jBzqPB6cWqKpxQ/viewform

if your item matches what we need, she'll be the one hook you up with tickets and passes to the show.

.........

ALSO: don’t forget I’am doing two special patron flash photos at record stores for atlanta and nashville !!!

full details will be announced next week right before the shows.

and a HEADS UP TO ATLANTA - AFTER THE INSTORE IT LOOKS LIKE I WILL BE OFFICIATING A WEDDING OUTSIDE THE VENUE AT AROUND 5:30p. GET READY. info on that coming soon. i’m also going to do a ticket giveaway to atlanta & nashville at some point in the coming days... BE READY!!!

love from a plane 

afp