Gold Dust Woman ~ 1,864 times...

By Mamie Pound

The fire craved the low-hanging elm, licked at its lacy bark. Silver ribbons unfurled toward Orion. Every face warmed with yellow light —part voodoo spell, part lullaby. Each time the wind shifted, we rearranged ourselves away from the smoke.

It follows beauty, you know…

Night after night, a handful of us drank and laughed and cried, placed bets on pandemic numbers, argued about Trump and stimulus checks and lovers.

A few weeks earlier, I’d moved back here, a place I hadn’t lived since 2008. A move made possible by divorce, something as equally surreal to me as the global pandemic. The end of an era, a beautiful adventure, jarring and sad and bizarre. And so it was for everyone— this collective sense of vertigo, everybody just trying to understand a world they no longer recognized.

People I didn’t know so well before the pandemic were soon fixtures around the fire in the courtyard. Here in the District, houses sit so close they almost touch. It’s only natural that an outdoor space, much like our porches, became our gathering spot, the center of our suddenly fragile existence. Outside was arguably the only safe place to be in the company of others. Most of us had little tribes of friends we limited ourselves to, people we deemed safe with which to share our close company. As comforting as it was to have our dependable group, it was maddening to know it was unsafe to venture past them. We were still caged.

By summer’s end, things seem to be better, safer. We were locusts emerging from the underground. Enough of the separation, the distance, the fear of the unknown. We were starved of touch, of company, of love. There was surely going to be a reckoning.

Bit by bit, we all ventured out, past the grocery store and the drive throughs. Restaurants and theaters remained closed. There were no concerts, no music festivals. Only the single Alexa Echo sitting on the side kitchen steps. She played every single song we could imagine. I asked for Gold Dust Woman approximately 1,864 times.

Then one night, maybe mid-summer, somebody said, hey, we ought to get some live music out here. Right here in the courtyard. Just imagine the stage here and chairs and tables all around it. It’d be perfect. We argued about that too. About the safety and the particular performers and the number of people and so on. A bar was built, lights were strung. I posted a request for servers on Facebook. Carla Jo emerged from the ether and became our sole waitstaff. Famous for her pink and black tequila shooter uniform at the Chickasaw Club, (a bottle on each hip, shot glasses strapped across her chest), she talked ninety to nothing about her sniper skills and her boob job, which she did not hesitate to flash, to quiet a political argument. We got Skyler and Heath for our firstever show. Planned it to start at 8, because there was still plenty of daylight in September and it was still hot as all get out. That first night, we had a crowd, all clumped together in little groups of friends, safely distanced. Gaby, ever present to any Blues event, was masked and in a chair way off by the wrought iron fence.

The sun slipped down and away behind the houses on Second Avenue. The string lights glowed up. Heath strummed that big bass. And Skyler was like,

Bye, bye baby, bye bye

Bye, bye baby, bye bye

The people’s hearts grew little wings as a particular kind of magic unfolded in our courtyard on the corner. The ever-present fire perfumed all with burning oak and pine. Every so often people dragged their chairs a few inches to avoid the smoke, just like always.

And so it was, every Friday night, for a few hours, we knit ourselves in the joy of song and spirit and just plain comfort of being near one another. At one point we had the amazing Shelby Brothers, who I’d never even heard of until then. Another time we had April Norris and Mark Sasser and friends. Each time was like uncovering a treasure. The courtyard and its fire drew us in and quenched our desperation for music and for togetherness.

Just last night someone said, “Think of everything that had to happen for all of us to be sitting here right now.”

The handful of us listening to this pontification became friends because of the pandemic. We all had lives that most likely would’ve taken us in entirely different directions otherwise.

All those months, while we were busy lamenting all the things we missed, a beautiful new reality kudzued our old lives and expectations.

Uncertainty had been an empty, dark room.

But we hung in there.

We struck a note and gathered around the fire and created-- all of us, each time we came together-- a landing place of song and instrument and human spirit. And that same spirit lifts each time we come around.

Rock on, ancient queen

Follow those who pale in your shadow

Rulers make bad lovers

You better put your kingdom up for sale

Up for sale

The Rothschild-Pound House Inn, in the Original City Historic District offers house concerts and live entertainment throughout the year. For more information: thepoundhouseinn.com

1,864 times

By Mamie Pound