Joe Bunting

I Have Multiple Personality Disorder

Because my categories are not just different hats, they’re diverging selves. You didn’t know this about me, but the man performing these songs on stage is not the same person who wrote them, and I (the guy writing this blog) am neither of them. Sometimes we let the clown out of his cage and things get silly. He’s the one with a penchant for strawberry jam.

Mostly, these different people get along. They are encouraging and enjoy one another’s company. They laugh at José’s (the clown) jokes, pick up after one another, do the dishes in a timely manner, and approve of each other’s taste in friends.

Sometimes it’s not as easy. For example, last year, José stuttered out a dirty joke which was not just in poor taste, but a good ten seconds too late. The rest of us didn’t let him out of his cage for a week. It embarrassed Joe Bunting (the one who writes songs) so much that he couldn’t write anything for a month. He sat in front of his computer for days, huddled over his guitar like he was constipated (literally and figuratively), playing the joke in his head over and over… it was devastating to watch.

There are many selves whom I don’t even know because they come and go so infrequently. I saw Joseph Harold (he’s very organized, a good planner) last weekend, but he came and went so quickly I hardly had time to wave.

Shakespeare was right when he said life is a stage. It takes different actors to play different roles. The best times are when the actors know their lines and are playing their parts well, but when one person messes up, the whole company suffers. Then you don’t want to be in the audience, much less in the performance.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 21st, 2008 at 1:16 am and is filed under Joe Bunting the Strange. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.