Wednesday, October 19, 2005
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In which the Dunce finds true love

My final tale of the Folks is the tale of the Dunces. It begins shortly before my Tale of Adam Ant; the exact beginning of this tale can be identified as 3 November 2001. The occasion was the "Beyond Nashville" festival at the Barbican, featuring not only a series of evening concerts but also loads of free musical performances starting about noon and continuing after the evening's main event. On this particular day the event was an eagerly-awaited gathering of assorted luminaries of the (so-called) alt-country world, led by Howe Gelb (including Giant Sand, Vic Chesnutt, PJ Harvey, Kurt Wagner, Mark Linkous, Evan Dando, perhaps others but this tale is not about the show [reviewed here if you are especially interested] so I'll stop there [if these names are not familiar to you, you'll have to trust me].). During one of the free music events I was a-wandering and ran into L____, one of the central (and most lovable) characters of the Folks family, who took a moment to introduce me to another of his friends who had not spent much time at the Folks of late. Although I didn't know it at the time, this was indeed the future Mrs. Dunce, and L____ was the Cupid who brought us together.

One look at each other and we both got dizzy and weak in the knees, flushed of forehead and perhaps a little shaky of hand. I would like to say this was because of love at first sight but a more realistic explanation was that we were both already suffering from assorted ills (I should also note that it couldn't be love at first sight because (the future) Mrs. Dunce had already noticed me at previous music events [I should note that she has a steel-trap mind when it comes to recognizing people's faces, while I am severely deficient in this area]). So we made our introductions and a moment of light conversation before staggering off in our respective directions. Fortunately I had extracted a key piece of information from her: that in the very near future she would be attending a Hawksley Workman gig with her sister (who was in town at the time). Seeing that as an invitation of sorts, I arrived at the Spitz only to find the show sold out (and very sold out, as no one was selling an extra ticket, and my various attempts to blag my way in, or even blagging my way into buying a ticket, were rudely rebuffed). Denied entry, I sought other entertainment: a terrible evening with London's top Grateful Dead tribute act the Cosmic Charlies (I have enjoyed them on many occasions, but this was not one of them: a lackluster performance by a subset of the band, played to a very small, mostly unappreciative [and in one case, outrageously offensive in behavior] audience). Fortunately (the future) Mrs. Dunce resumed attendance at the Folks, so we met again soon after that evening, and quickly became inseparable (not literally).

Time passed and things went well. An image of a calendar shedding pages would be appropriate (if clichéd) here (or feel free to insert your own narrative device to express the passing of time [if the overt "Time passed" is not sufficient]). OK, that'll do.

It's "now" about two years later, or to be exact 14 December 2003. As usual we had made our way to the Fiddlers Elbow for the Folks. Performers that evening were NYC's own primitive-style dobro flatpicker Breadfoot, and Neil Cleary (I ended up with a N.C. bumper sticker which says "If you're in a folk song, don't go to the river" which is sensible advice indeed) among others. But this isn't about the music; unbeknownst to (the future) Mrs. Dunce some plans were afoot. The Autocrat played a couple of songs then (by prior arrangement) made an announcement: something like "A friend of mine has a bit of a performance now, please welcome Mr. Dunce to the stage". And then it was my moment as I came to the stage and took the microphone. I started with a bit of rambling about how I'd been coming down to the Folks for a while now and had made a lot of friends and gotten to know a lot of good people very well, that it was a really great community &c &c. I made the mistake of using the phrase "I'd like to come out ... " which was met (of course) with a heckle concerning my sexuality. But then I continued, mentioning that it was thanks to the Folks (and L____ in particular) that I had met (the future) Mrs. Dunce. And then I asked her to marry me (not from bended knee, at least as I recall. Sorry about that). Needless to say the crowd erupted and called on her to come up and give an answer. Which will be no surprise (given all my signaling what with "the future Mrs. Dunce", &c) was a loud and enthusiastic "YES!" into the microphone. And with that, we were engaged. With the expected consequences: cheering, a few tears here and there, hugs, pats on the back and so on. The rest of the evening was a major celebration, unfortunately slightly marred by some degree of excess (I blame the pub locale, and a surfeit of enthusiasm [and I would fully support any Governmental move to make absinthe illegal again]) but definitely my personal highlight of my Come Down and Meet the Folks experience.
music
Wednesday, October 19, 2005 1:09:18 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)  #    Disclaimer  |  Comments [1]  |  Related posts:
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Saturday, October 22, 2005 7:25:24 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)
Catching up on my blog reading (while sitting with my boy watching Norte Dame vs. BYU), I'm surprised to see no comments on this post! As this is such a great story, it deserves a comment. Touching story. Well done, Mr. Dunce.
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