Every night here is like a dream. Living at home I never would have imagined life could be like this. I thought I was doomed to driving to bars a mile from my house, watching other people eat 15 cent chicken wings, waking up and feeling like a stranger to my own family. Now I ride my bike 10 miles to see a different person each night, wake up to an empty apartment and roam about.

A 'well-off' friend visited tonight with her father. Back in school he had made it tradition to take us all out for expensive meals whenever he was in town. Tonight wasn't any different, we had a nice communal dinner in Williamsburg (shudder).

We talked and we drank. Funny that when there's food in my belly I can handle more than a pint.

Her father is the sensitive type, a generous and successful man with 'clients' all over. He toasted to staying friends, talking about his daughter and how sad she was that she didn't graduate with us. It might be the first time in a long time that I took something that sentimental seriously. He said that he did these dinners because he knew it made her happy, it made him happy to be able to do this for us.

We went to a yuppie bar (okay, I kind of liked it) and he sat in a booth with six of us, twenty-somethings. We took a shot of whiskey and pickle juice, a stranger thought we were all gay. I laughed because in high school that might have been an insult, but in Brooklyn, in a yuppie bar, it felt like such a compliment.

At 2 AM we left the bar, people walked me to my bike. I said thank you and the father said goodbye, and he repeated something he'd said earlier to me, that he was so happy I was pursuing my dream. That I was trying to support myself on music.

Everyone was a little bit tipsy, but as I started to pedal back and everyone yelled 'goodbye!' I heard him call out 'You're an inspiration!' and everyone in the group laughed at him. It was the kind of thing a mom might yell at her kid as he gets on the bus for his first day of school.

It felt undeserved, it was a drunken exclamation, but still good. I want to be that. I know I'm not there yet. Tomorrow is a start, February will be the execution. And if I can keep the wheels spinning from there, then maybe I could be what he called me.