Thicker Than Water signed on to travel with singer-songwriter Ben Gatlin on a month-long, fourteen-stop, cross-country tour. Hannah, an indie filmmaker, is the brain behind the project. She’s also Ben’s girlfriend. Her goal is to recreate his first tour for his first album ten years ago and chronicle the reality of life on the road—low-budget, stripped-down, and no-frills. Intimate acoustic shows in small bars that are, in her words, ‘atmospherically gritty and unabashedly genuine.’ That assessment relates to the character of the building and the patrons. She’s a professional, so I think it’s her fancy way of saying dive bars and their drunk, rowdy regulars. It all cametogether quickly, with venues and campgrounds booked in the span of a few weeks. Yes, campgrounds. We’re traveling in RVs.
So, basically the textbook plot of a horror movie: naïve woman, strangers, sketchy bars, remote campgrounds. What could possibly go wrong?
Shit, I need another Tums. Maybe it is an ulcer.
My role is to capture still, candid shots of not only the performers and crowds, but the filmmaker as well, to include with the video footage in the documentary and for Thicker Than Water’s social media. A fly on the wall, to the fly on the wall.
The frequent communication with Hannah since Monday, the contract and NDA I signed yesterday, and the first half of my payment transferred into my checking account are beginning to make it all feel real. Since my good human vs. crap human radar glitches sometimes, Lola stealthily listened in on the calls to get a read on Hannah. Turns out she’s the Australian woman I talked to briefly in the bathroom at the show in Denver. I remember her, but it’s obvious she doesn’t remember me, which is fine. The assumption that she was with Ever was also incorrect. I think she’s overly friendly with everyone. Lola and I both like her. She’s a dreamer, which I can’t relate to, but she also seems organized, which my Type-A personality loves.
I’ve been keeping Good Guy updated because he’s the calming voice in the sea of chaos and the distraction I need when this all threatens to overwhelm me. Yesterday, he was road-tripping with his mom, driving her from Pennsylvania to Kentucky, where she’ll have an extended stay with her brother while he recovers from surgery. I think he’s been using this message thread as a means of escape too. We’re keeping each other sane at this point.
He messaged me early this morning.
Good Guy
First coffee of the day with a few old friends.
The photo that follows is of a dozen cows in a pasture with the sunrise peeking through the trees in the far distance. The grass is dewy, the sky peachy-pink, and the cows are the kind that look like they’re wearing shaggy wigs. Miguel comments on my photos frequently that he can smell, or hear, or taste something in them, like all five senses come alive. That’s how I feel when I look at Good Guy’s photos. I smell the earthiness of the meadow. I feel the heat from the emerging sun. And I hear the snuffling and mooing of the cattle.
I raise my coffee mug with the disaster that is currently my bedroom in the background, take a photo, and send it to him with,
Second coffee of the day, but the ambiance is eerily similar.
He responds immediately.
Good Guy
Both steeped in tranquility.
Textbook serenity. It looks like you made it. How was the drive?
Good Guy
Long, about ten hours. But the weather was perfect. We got here around eleven last night.
Did you get any sleep?
Good Guy
Slept like a baby until that asshole Steve decided to show us what roosters are made of at 5:00 AM.
I laugh and because we’re comfortable with each other now, I add,
There’s a joke in there somewhere about cock wanting attention first thing in the morning, but it’s too early for me to find it.
Good Guy
My mom already hates Steve. She told him her favorite fried chicken recipe step-by-step in a deceptively sweet, singsong voice while she fed him this morning.
Savage. I think I love her.
Good Guy
Never a dull moment with Mom. How’s your packing going?
I survey the clothes on my bed.
As evidenced in the photo, packing hasn’t progressed past taking everything out of my closet and dresser and piling it on my bed like it will sort and pack itself.
