Freeport, Maine - Sat Aug 23

what a great, fun gig! it was a free concert in freeport maine which is the home of L.L.Bean... We performed outdoors in front of the L.L.Bean outlet store. There must have been 2500 people. One of the quietest most polite audiences I have ever had of that size. they were unbelievably focused.

I am kind of a catalog maniac, I will confess. I am easily hypnotized by them and the idealized world they create. That and magazines. My first catalog that I began ordering from was L.L.Bean in the mid-eighties. So it had a certain funny nostalgic quality to it, actually being in that world you see on the pages. We ran around shopping. “It’s like the catalog! But real!” And of course there are the other outlets, so it was like being at home on my sofa where I usually lose myself in catalogs for hours. My idea of wealth back then was being able to buy whatever I wanted from the catalogs and not have to worry about the cost. Also vintage. It hasn’t really changed much.

Before the show Mike made some obligatory jokes about L.L.Cool Bean which made us laugh. The audience was an interesting mixture of old and young. Glynn saw some very old people grooving to “Blood Makes Noise” which was cool. I hate it when people shout “more vocal!” Many people brought their children. I met teenage boys, lots of little girls and some adorable babies. One came from Israel, at 8 months old with a huge head of stunning hair.

My favorite was Corinna, a beautiful little six-week old. Working backwards, I guess that means she was born on or near my birthday on July 11! Her parents kept coming back and handing her over to me, which was SO nice, holding a baby again! It made me feel content to the bottom of my stomach, holding this beautiful little warm snuggly bundle. I commented on how pretty her little mouth was, her lips formed a perfect heart shaped bow. “Yes, she has little porn star lips!” said her mother, laughing, which startled me, I have to say. When Ruby was born I used to hold her all day sometimes as she seemed to want to feed constantly. I was feeding her 17 times a day according to my little diary of the time. I remember asking the doctor, “Is it normal to feed your child 17 times a day?” “Absolutely not!” he shouted. I miss that time.

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