Having permission to feel good about myself is nice. Maybe one day I won't need permission, I can simply think well of myself because I am not a complete shit-heap of a person. Until then, having permission is nice. Next show is the end of this month with the Detroit Symphony, we're doing Beethoven's 9th again. So much freude in the singing of it all, in the rehearsals. Pretty much immediately after I finish up with the DSO, it's time for NYC and Carnegie Hall for the 3rd year in a row. This time there will actually be someone who knows me in the audience, which is comforting. I like to remark to my friends and Robust Pleasure Source 'We're the adults now! We get to decide what that means!' And lately I've been really able to say that and mean it and take pleasure in self-actualization. If my idea of fun is laying in the sun and reading, nobody gets to gainsay that. I'm increasingly more comfortable in my own skin which is a fairly novel feeling.