Harvey

Knowing you lied
Straightfaced
While I cried.

Last Friday, I went to a reading. My writing class teacher invited us all to hear him read two pieces, one long and one short essay. One had never been read aloud. So I decided to go. ManLosch came with me as well. He drove us to Jamaica Plain, because if you've been in the car with me, you've seen me freak out behind the wheel if I don't know where I'm going. We arrived at Java Jo's just in time, and realized that it was actually an Open Mic night.

I was a little hesitant at that point, but realized how great Open Mic nights can be. It gives anyone the chance to showcase their work, whether or not it's good and I think it's important that we as a community of writers, of musicians, of artistic expression, support one another. So we heard a few musicians, heard my writing teacher read (very good btw), and then we were thinking about leaving until Harvey came on. Harvey was an old man with a guitar. I groaned silently, but he started singing and I was immediately pulled in. He played his guitar like it was a bongo; almost banging it with his fingers instead of plucking the strings. He only knew a few chords, but somehow it worked for him. He carried a weight of sadness through him and I felt it everytime he huskily sang "...knowing you lied, straightfaced, while I cried." He sang more song that he wrote after that, and I was SO intrigued by him, that I started thinking about him and what his life might have been like.

Did he ever have a wife? Was she pretty? Did she die? Did he ever go to war? Did he have children? How did he learn guitar (or the few chords he knew)? Where did he get those brown loafers from? Why is he taking the bus alone at 9:30pm? He's so tan; I wonder if he likes to sit on benches alot. Does he have a big family? Is he Jewish? He looks Jewish. Wait, how does someone LOOK Jewish? Hmm.....

All through the questions running through my head, I still envisioned him heading home, to a tuna sandwich and a cup of coffee. He would sit in his recliner with his basic cable television and watch the news, muttering to himself how things used to be different.

We left right after Harvey sang and I said a silent prayer for him; that he wasn't really lonely and sad. That my imagination was just active and on overdrive that night, fueled by too much creativity around me. Or maybe it was the coffee.....