When: Monday nite 5/11 730pm ET

Where: On Vance's YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@vancegilbert1958/streams

10% goes to: http://horizonschildren.org Horizons for Homeless Children improves the lives of young homeless children in Massachusetts and helps their families succeed by providing high-quality early education, opportunities for play, and comprehensive family support services.

http://paypal.me/vancevancevance or https://venmo.com/vancevancevance or VanceFunder P.O. Box 17, Arlington, MA 02476

*PRIVATE COACHING AVAILABLE - Songwriting, performance, and voice.

***CUSTOM SONGS - Expensive, sure, you want one about you, your family, something.

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ANNIVERSARIES

They’ll sneak up on you. They operate in the background. There’s that sense that something is up, something’s over your shoulder, something is left undone, that something, maybe, has left you undone. You can’t quite put your finger on it.

Then sometimes it nudges you, whispers in your ear, nods over at your calendar. Sometimes, yes, it hits you. Illuminating a death. A break-up. A trauma. Non-birthday stuff.

For me it’s the one year anniversary of that kind-faced doctor looking me in he eyes and saying, “You have cancer”.

Cancer survivor Kenneth Pattengale of The Milk Carton Kids warned me when he reached out, “Please take extra good care of yourself, and don’t underestimate what the whole ordeal does inside the mind”.

I’ve been “clean” thru 2 sets of scans now, and you’re getting this from a long road trip, the Arizona part of which I crushed. My voice was top notch. I read and moved the audiences. The songs landed solidly. It’s all I could ask for. I was so very in my shoes, more than usual, and I couldn’t tell you why.

I recently went out to get plastic organizational bins and came home with a new mattress. I went to have the oil changed on my 180K minivan and when JiffyLube wouldn’t because of a compromised, rusty oil pan, yep, I came home with a new car.

I also bucked my phone’s plea to upgrade to more iCloud room for more money, so during the long flight home from Arizona I started removing messages which apparently take up tons of space. To the people whom I tried to befriend with “hello, what’s up?, etc”, that remained curt or unresponsive, you’re gone. I’m not really mad. I just hear the clock ticking, and maybe it’s you that are missing out.

I also wrote an open letter of truth to the president of the university that fired me unceremoniously and without hearing. It was the type of letter that you write but never send. I sent mine.

The university erased my presence in everything - no email, nothing - but for the mass promo mailings from the president. I replied to one of those, so I doubt anyone sees it. It wasn’t vulgar and I won’t be boiling a bunny in anyone’s kitchen pot, but it felt great, I have to say.

I’m not impulsive, really. I’ve been calling it “older and getting it done now”. But as I was clearing the text messages, I saw the old doctor visit text reminders, the calendar hit me, and now I get it.

Anniversaries tap you on the shoulder. It’s up to the tapee to act. To quote my musical genius friend David Buskin;

"So I guess this is just another way to shake my fist at the sky. I want to tell the powers that be, 'I know you’ll get me in the end. The house always wins. But for now, I’m still here, motherfucker. Goddamn you, I’m still here.’ "