We ordered very light food--he said he had had a very late lunch, and I had too. he got a soup, and I got a tofu salad. When we got our food, he offered me some of his soup (which I thought was nice) but I forgot to return the favor!!! We talked about my salad... it looked like fried mozzarella sticks, but they were actually fried tofu sticks, and then a skyscraper-like pile of lettuce that was actually balanced atop a base of seaweed (?), avocado, and cucumber, and some small brown rectangles that I *think* were tofu but I joked could possibly be beef tenderloin... B said he liked how they presented the salad and I quoted David Sedaris's essay about how in Manhattan, the food looks like the real estate... tall and skinny and piled high...
The whole time I felt really stressed and overwhelmed still. I felt like I was having a hard time staying cool, and sort of distracted. B seemed much more relaxed to me, maybe he was a little stoned (?) or maybe he was trying to show me that it would be OK, or maybe he was just calmer, I don't know.
He told me that a friend of his, and his friend's wife, had just moved to Sarasota, and B was able to visit them while he was down there with his quartet. B's friend had been struggling to make a career as a baritone opera singer, and recently someone suggested he start trying to work as a tenor. B's friend had a total identity crisis about this, but decided to try it, and now he's got work lined up back-to-back as an opera singer, which is really exciting.
B had asked me a few times how long I would be in town and I was sort of vague about it. He asked me again and I explained how it depended whether or not I got some cello lessons, and I explained how the earliest one of the teachers could see me was Sunday afternoon, but I hadn't been practicing and had basically decided not to do it, especially because one of the teacher's lesson fee is REALLY expensive, but this morning when I discussed it with the friend I'm staying with, she said I should think about doing it or paying for it even if I DON'T to show them that I was serious about working for them in the future. B said he was confused about my motivation for wanting to meet them. I explained that they were people I'd like to work with long-term, either in school or possibly out of school. He asked, "seriously? that guy is really expensive" and I said, "well, it's WAY less expensive to study with him privately than to pay full price to go to Juilliard". I asked if my explanation was unconvincing because my behavior (contacting them but then not preparing to meet them) was so conflicted. He made some really good observations: if I was setting up meetings with them to create a goal to motivate myself to work harder, I shouldn't meet them, because obviously it wasn't working; if I wanted to study with them in school, I should meet them ASAP because sooner is always better in that situation; if I just wanted to meet them to get to know them, to wait until I felt more ready; if they met me, they might like me or dislike me for any number of reasons: for example, every teacher sees something different, so if they see that I have potential that they could help me with, even if I was having a bad day or week, they would still be able to see that. on the flip side, if I was really advanced but my technique was really different than theirs, they probably wouldn't be that interested in working with me because they would basically have to strip me down to the foundation and start over. All of this was really helpful, but I still don't know what I should do about meeting with them......
At this point I myself was feeling somewhat overwhelmed by the topic, so i thought I should change the subject instead of persist in my confusion.
At some point he told me that he needed to be either home or off the subway by 9 pm, when he had a conference call with his quartet. I felt disappointed, because I had picked the "dinner" option so things might be more open-ended, and though we met at 6, that was still only maybe 2 hours before he had to hop on the train, but I didn't say anything. I know enough not to make a disappointed face, but he knows me so well, I'm afraid that the disappointment just leaks out uncontrollably.
