It’s a JibJab, a Christmas letter from a very different year, and a couple of songs that I love. Many of you already know why this was a very “different†year.
Either way…Read On.
Not all that much live music in 2023 compared to previous years, but I did see lots of my favorites:
Springsteen in KC and Tulsa; Dawes in STL and Lawrence; Tedeschi Trucks in Little Rock and STL;
The Mavericks twice at Knuckleheads in KC; Jackson Browne here in Spfd; John Fullbright in Joplin and Okeimah, OK.; National Park Radio in town and at the Rock House. I’m grateful that I got to see so many of my favorites.
{Noticeably missing is my current favorite: Jason Isbell…we’ll see him here in Jan}
There were another dozen shows, and some good times at The Rock House in Reeds Spring, but my concert going got cut short…Read On.
There were no road trips, other than the ones to the shows listed above and a few 200 mile trips over to visit Dad. At 97, he’s still hanging in there. For that I’m grateful.
Well, technically there was the 733 mile road trip home from the beach, after 18 nights, on January 3. {We drove straight thru. Never again. What were we thinking?!?!}
After 7 years of heading to Gulf Shores at the end of December, that road trip won’t happen in 2023…Read On.
I’m grateful every year for my garden.
My spring garden exceeded expectations, thanks to the first cabbages I’d planted since Corvallis in 1981! Spring broccoli was excellent too. Lots of salads of mesclun.
Summer garden produced lots of tomatoes. Bumper crop of cherokee purple and brandywine. Still lots in the freezer for winter soups…
I hear that my fall garden did pretty well. Shelly gave away lots of lettuce, mesclun, kale, and broccoli…and that’s where “Read On†comes into play.
Four days after my 75th birthday my world changed. Many of you know already know all the details included in the 750 word post at my blog: http://slw913.com/transverse-myletis/it-still-doesnt-seem-real/
On 9/18/23 I woke up in the hospital, paralyzed from the shoulders down. Several days later I was diagnosed with Transverse Myelitis… a pair of words I’d never heard b4, and had trouble remembering for awhile. {But 2 words I’ll never forget…} Check out the wikipedia page.
Three months later I’m making slow progress. I get around with a walker for now. Below the waist I have issues and constant nerve pain. It’s gonna take awhile.
I can’t thank my friends enough for all the support and encouraging words. Keep ‘em coming…Shelly & I need ‘em!!
For my friends and support network I’m very grateful.
I’m proof that good things happen on dating sites (and that I am a lucky old coot).
Shelly and I met on OkCupid in 2012. We “celebrated†our 11th “Meetaversary†at the Meyer Orthopedic and Rehab Hospital here in Springfield, MO.
We’ve been saying that we make a Good Team since early in our relationship. I can’t imagine where I would be without her. For Shelly Drymon I can’t find the words to express my gratitude. Together we are gonna whip T.M. however long it takes.
Now for the tunes:
1. My favorite Christmas song: I’ve got all the gifts I need…friends, music, and Shelly. Never cared about “stuff†b4 and care even less about it now. Friends, music, a partner who I love and who loves me, and experiences are all that matters. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTL0odryDN0
2. I’m not planning on going away anytime soon, but one of my favorite artists was when he wrote this. It’s the last song on Warren Zevon’s last album.
Hold your friends close. Don’t wait until tomorrow to make the call, send the text, or write the e-mail. Tomorrow never comes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHrtZbMx8GA
I hope our paths cross or that I hear your voice in 2024.
Merry Christmas. Happy Holidays. Take care. Keep in touch. Enjoy every sandwich.
Be. Just Be.
Steve
417-379-6817…call or text me sometime!! {we’d both enjoy it…}
This piece, and any that follow, will be getting help with excerpts from “my gizmo.” The “gizmo” is a Sony Dictaphone. {I bought one for my Dad several years ago in the hopes that he would tell lots of his stories into it, so that I would have them for posterity. He dubbed it a “gizmo” and it was only used when I was at his place. I got one for me and use it to clandestinely record our phone calls. Shhh…he doesn’t know.}
Since I wasn’t able to use a laptop between 9/18 and 10/26, I started keeping “notes” using the gizmo while I was at the hospital and inpatient rehab. {I have been keeping a journal on my laptop since 10/26/12. Wish I’d started loooong b4 that!}
On the morning of 9/18, as soon as a room was ready, they transported me to Room 849 of the Jared Neuroscience wing of Cox South. I wasn’t able to use the gizmo until the 23rd.
“They seem to know what they’re doing. But they’re having trouble diagnosing exactly what’s wrong with me? They put me on something called an IVIG* thing on Monday and on Tuesday I was getting a little use of my left hand, still nothing with my right on Tuesday and I’m probably getting some of this messed up because I’ve been on so many drugs, but not the kind of drugs I like.”
At first they thought it might be GBS. “There’s the Guillan-barre syndrome. And this other one. I have a total mind block on what it probably is…I can’t remember the name!” {I’m pretty sure I’ll never ever forget those two words now: Transverse Myelitis!}
My extreme claustrophobia didn’t help with the diagnostic process. “On Tuesday they sent me down to do an MRI and as soon as I got into the tube I pressed the button. I was freaking out. An hour later, they sent me back down. I stayed in there for like 40 minutes. I don’t think I squeezed the button, but maybe I did and it turns out that they would have liked two passes, one without contrast and one with. I didn’t do the with contrast, and came back upstairs.”
My neurological NP and hospitalist were great. They told me how important the MRI with contrast was. “They loaded me up with Benadryl and a shot of Ativan and I did it for the duration. They discovered I have a lesion on my spine, which is complicating the diagnosis. Because it might be an indication of Ms. Isn’t that lovely?” {No MS…but it was also an indicator for Transverse Myelitis!}
“The next procedure that was done was the Spinal Tap, which wasn’t painful at all in my drugged up state. They roll me up in a ball as tight as they can. Which is really hard based on the lack of mobility, especially on my right side. They sent some some of the spinal fluid to the Mayo Clinic to have it diagnosed. No MS”
I didn’t mention it on the gizmo, but about that time they started me on IV steroids for several days.
“The next treatment that began was plasma transfer or PLEX, and that started on Friday. That involved putting what they call a catheter down the carotid artery in the right side of my neck. It’s got 2 little ports and what happens is on one side they’re flushing plasma out of my body. On the other side, they’re putting new plasma into my body, and so they get about 20% of the plasma each of the 5 treatments. When they’re done you’ve had ‘an oil change’ of your plasma. Each procedure takes three hours. It addresses both the Guillan-berre and this other one, which I guess I’ll keep calling ‘the other one’ until I get can remember it.”
So those are the treatments: IVIG, spinal tap, IV steroids, IV antibiotics, Plasma transfer.
But how was I doing? The gizmo was no help for that first week. Fortunately Shelly set up a Caring Bridge site on Friday the 22nd and wrote about it there: “He can move his left hand now and has a very strong grip! He is feeding himself, taking a drink of water, and brushing his teeth with his left hand. He can pick up his left leg and wiggle his left toes. He can move his right hand, but not his right leg. With help, he was able to sit up on the side of the bed twice.”
For the first few days either Shelly or my sister Paula fed me and brushed my teeth. Four days in I was able to pick up a fork and a tooth brush in my left hand. Shelly or Paula slept every night on a couch while I was in room 849.
She also wrote: “He gives the nurses, the aids, and the docs his personal recommendations for music and tells all kinds of stories.”
All the rooms on the 8th floor were large and private. Mine had a great view. I saw lots of sunrises (I wasn’t sleeping well) and moon rises.
I had Shelly bring my laptop (with it’s thousands of songs) and Bose speaker. She had to operate the laptop to launch the playlists. (I didn’t touch a keyboard for almost 6 weeks.)
There were “concerts from” playlists from several years of bands I had seen that particular year. Several were 6 or 8 hours long from years when I saw 50+ shows and went to a few festivals. The staff started calling 849 “the party room.”
They did that even when they were responding to me pressing the call light when we thought I might have had “an accident.” Losing feeling from the mid-torso down also meant that I had no control over my bowels. (Smell was the deciding factor re pressing the call button. I had a catheter, so urinary incontinence wasn’t an issue.)
As if that isn’t TMI there is this: I’ve often told people that if I had 1000 bucks for every individual who wiped my ass in Room 849 I’d be able to buy a new Lexus.
I had some visitors. (I’m sure tahe some of them were freaked out!) I made and received a few calls toward the end of the week. Shelly read me the comments on Caring Bridge or comments to her FB posts.
I had lots of Jimmy V moments: I laughed; I thought; I cried.
I really am a lucky old coot with old friends and many that I’ve made since moving to MO in 2011.
And so ends week 1 of “the other one.” In week 2 the words “Transverse Myelitis” became indelibly etched into my memory.
*IVIG= “Intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) is a pooled antibody, and a biological agent used to manage various immunodeficiency states and a plethora of other conditions, including autoimmune, infectious, and inflammatory states. The ultimate goal of this therapy is to normalize a compromised immune system.”
Eight weeks ago, on September 18, I woke up in the Critical Decision Unit at Cox South Hospital in Springfield, MO. Five days earlier I had my 75th birthday.
I was paralyzed from the shoulders down.
I could move NOTHING.
As I tell the story, as I see my body that morning in my mind’s eye, and as I type this, it seems like a dream. A very, very Bad One.
But it was/is Very Real.
The day before had been a normal Sunday. We’d been up late the night before. Six bands kicking off Drury University’s 150 year Anniversary. Our first time seeing the Ozark Mountain Daredevils. Late night eats at IHOP. (No place in town to get midnight pie, so I had to settle for pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream.)
The 17th started with a quick stop for Shelly at the library while I washed the car with a wand across the street. Then grocery shopping.
At 2pm or so I grabbed a snack and settled in to watch the KC Chiefs with the announcers muted and Jason Isbell playing on the stereo.
As I was about to sit down it seemed like I had stepped on something. I rubbed the carpet. Nothing. I had vacuumed the day b4.
The ball of my right foot felt funny.
Half an hour later it was the same thing with my left foot.
I took a short nap after the game and didn’t stand up again until 5 when I put my shoes on to go for a short walk and to check on my garden.
My ankles and feet felt tingly. Pins and needles.
I cut my walk short.
As usual I called my 97 year old Dad at 5:30.
After the call I headed for the shower…and admired Shelly’s strawberry rhubarb pie.
(I never got a bite of it. It was 38 days until I was back in the apartment.)
In the shower the soap in my hand felt weird against my body. (I still can’t find the word for this sensation…which continues in my lower arms and from the waist down. “Weird” sums up this nerve pain…)
I knew something wasn’t right.
I cut my shower short and told Shelly that we needed to head for the ER.
My walking was getting shaky as we headed for the elevator.
{We almost always took the stairs in our 3 story building.}
Shelly got the car as I sat on a bench out front and waited for her to drive us the 1.4 miles to the hospital.
She walked me inside Cox South and quickly got me into a wheelchair.
Surprisingly the ER was almost empty.
The computer system was down.
It took 15 minutes to get a bracelet.
{You don’t got anywhere in a hospital without a bracelet.}
The delay didn’t matter in the long run..but it was frustrating.
Not too many minutes later I was being evaluated by a Nurse Practitioner.
She checked to see how far the “pins-and-needles sensation” (aka Weird) had advanced up my legs.
I squeezed her fingers. My hands were strong.
When she asked me to push her hands, I almost knocked her off her feet.
We both laughed.
That was the last thing I found funny for awhile.
They moved me to the Critical Decision Unit.
You feel like you’re in the hospital (you’re in a gown and you have an IV), but you’re not admitted yet.
They whisked me away for a CT scan…and after that things get murky until I woke up, so I’ll rely on what Shelly tells me.
But I sorta remember the 3am MRI. It should be no surprise that I had been in that godforsaken tube for only a minute b4 I pressed the panic button…and not just because of my intense claustrophobia. I knew that something was very wrong and I was scared.
After being told that I was being admitted Shelly made a quick trip to the apartment to grab a few things. She notified my sister and let her know what was going on.
When Shelly got back 30 minutes later I was thrashing about with muscle spasms in my arms and legs. (That was the last time they’d move for several hours.)
She went looking for someone for help.
I was hollering repeatedly I’m gonna lay here and die!!
They gave me some medication to put me to sleep.
I’ve already told you what happened when I woke up…this is the start of this adventure.
Part 2 in several days: My time at Jared Neuroscience.
It’s an interesting phenomenon: the older I get, the shorter the letter.
There was quite a bit of live music in ‘22…but not as much as I would’ve liked.
Saw some of my favorite artists multiple times. Saw some folks I’ve listened to for years, but had never seen before. Sweet.
There were road trips…but not as many as I would’ve liked. Most of them were music related, and the favorites were meeting up with friends who had also road-tripped to KC and Nashville.
Friends came from FL and GA once again in June for music at The Rock House. Awesome.
The other road trip favorites of ‘22 were the 200 miles over to visit Dad. I threw him a surprise birthday party at the DQ. It was special…as was everyone who attended.
At 96, he’s still hanging in there. He’s now the only one remaining from the Elvins class of ‘44.
I know how very lucky I am to still have him, as several friends lost their parents in 2022.
I lost several friends and acquaintances this year. Probably every one reading this did too. As Dad says: “the troops are thinning.”
Like most everyone I know, Shelly and came down with Covid. Fortunately our cases were mild.
I didn’t badger friends to donate to The Victim Center’s Wine Women & Shoes fundraiser in 2022.
I’m sure that made some people on the receiving end of this e-mail happy.
But I did try to make up for it by taking advantage of a QCD (Qualified Charitable Distribution) to that and several other worthy organizations.
If you’re an old person like me and required to take distributions from your IRA, you really should utilize QCDs. Reduce your taxes while doing good.
Lord willin’ and the creek don’t rise, on12/16 we head for Gulf Shores, AL. It’s our 7th annual late December trip to the beach, and once again friends will be meeting us there. This year they’ll be coming from: Cumming, GA; Mulvane and Pittsburg, KS; and Reeds Spring, MO. Looking forward to 17 days of hugs, sunrises, sunsets, walks on the beach, naps, and more.
Now for the tunes: two songs from the album that I listened to more than any other in ‘22…“Liars” by John Fullbright. These two help me do a couple of the Jimmy Valvano Three: one makes me think and the other makes me laugh. John Fullbright – Stars (Live @ 2018 Fayetteville Roots Festival)
I hope our paths cross or that I hear your voice in 2023.
Merry Christmas. Happy Holidays. Take care. Keep in touch. Enjoy every sandwich.
Be.
Steve (aka a Lucky Old Coot)
417-379-6817…call or text me sometime!!
In 3 days we head for Gulf Shores, AL. It’s our 6h late December trip to the beach, and once again friends will be meeting us there. Looking forward to 16 days of sunrises, sunsets, naps, and more.
2021 has been similar in many ways to last year: Masked up; Hunkered down.
Add in: vaccinated; boostered; some road trips and live music.
Once again the first weekend of June was a highlight of the year: Shady Acres Motel; Tom and Gloria; Steve and Claudia; 2 nights of music in the back yard at The Rock House…The Creek Rocks…The Lacewings. Plus The Shandies at Bear Creek.
That weekend would have been on the short list of highlights for ANY year.
For the second year in a row I was named King of Soul at the Wine Women & Shoes fundraiser. Thanks again to the 50 folks from 16 different states who helped me raise $6,238.08 for The Victim Center. It’ll be my last year hounding friends for $$…it was Shelly’s swan song at the V.C.
It was my first time taking advantage of QCDs (Qualified Charitable Distributions). There will lots of checks from my Fidelity account to 501(c)(3) organizations in the future.
Shelly has been taking some time off since then…but she is NOT retired. In 2022 she will be moving on to another venture.
We celebrated with our first long road trip of 2021. It began with seeing Dawes at the Ryman and visiting some dear friends in Nashville, then we were off to Hotlanta, Tampa, Siesta Key, and Panama City Beach. Great visits with a few friends and with both my kids and their partners.
There have been other music related road trips: to Pittsburg, KS twice; KC once; STL 3 times; and another weekend in Nashville for 2 shows by The Mavericks at The Ryman.
And then there was a weekend in CoMo for the Roots&Blues Festival.
In many ways 2021 bore a semblance of normalcy.
But we still mask up when we go out, and I shake my head at the anti-vaxxers and the apologists for what happened on January 6. Lunacy, willful ignorance and apathy are deadly pandemics.
Here’s a repeat from last year:
I hope to do a better job of living “The Jimmy Valvano Three” each and every day of 2022.
“To me there are three things everyone should do every day. Number one is laugh. Number two is think — spend some time time in thought. Number three, you should have your emotions move you to tears. If you laugh, think and cry, that’s a heck of a day.”
Indeed.
Oh, yeah….here’s the song. I certainly have all the gifts I need: friends, music, a partner who loves me, health, and more money than time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opktLUqP2Ek
I hope our paths cross or that I hear your voice in 2022.
Merry Christmas. Happy Holidays. Take care. Keep in touch. Enjoy every sandwich.
This is my first blog post of 2020!! I drafted a number of items, but never finished them…it has been that kind of year.
-=-=-=
December 16, 2020
I’m writing this from Gulf Shores, AL. It’s our 5th late December trip…and only the second time I have been out of the state of Missouri during this shitshow of a year.
If I wanted to keep it really short, this annual letter would only require six words to describe 2020:
Masked up; Hunkered down; Stayed home.
I had high hopes for 2020 (and not just because of the symmetry): roadtrips planned and some booked, concert & festival tickets purchased, a 30th Year Tax Director Reunion in Sarasota…for starters.
Your hopes and plans were wiped out too.
2020 sucks for everyone, but at least we’re still breathing.
Add those last 2 words to the 6 above.
The first weekend of June was the highlight of the year. Shady Acres Motel. Joseph and his friend Karla. Tom and Gloria. Steve and Claudia.
2 nights of music in the canyon….Jeff Porter…The Nace Brothers.
That weekend would have been on the short list of highlights for ANY year.
Last year’s letter ended with a link to a song that matters and these words:
“Don’t let this happen to you: ‘All the words I never said falling from my eyes…’
Don’t miss your last chance.”
Soon after sending that, and being the spreadsheet guy that I have been since Visicalc, I created a file named “I wanta hear your voice in 2020.” I talked with 88% of the people on my list once, and most of them a couple of times or more. Others only heard my voice in a message.
Many of those conversations make the 2020 list of highlights too.
I missed the “last chance” once. That is one too many.
So now we all look forward to 2021, getting vaccinated, and getting back to some semblance of normalcy.
I hope to do a better job of living “The Jimmy Valvano Three” each and every day of 2021.
“To me there are three things everyone should do every day. Number one is laugh. Number two is think — spend some time time in thought. Number three, you should have your emotions move you to tears. If you laugh, think and cry, that’s a heck of a day.”
I hope you do too.
And I hope to hear your voice in 2021…and to give you a real hug. In 2020, this is the best I can do:
Not sure how many people read their e-mails… Fewer still re Christmas letters… Whatever. But everyone loves JibJab. Sent the following to my e-mail list earlier today
-=-=-=-=-=
It’s a JibJab, an abbreviated “Christmas Letter” and a song that matters.
RE the letter: I reread last year’s. Too long…what a windbag!!!
This year it’s short & sweet.
Saw lots of live music in a variety of venues. Hope to see lots of shows in 2020.
Had some success raising vegetables. Hope for better crops in 2020.
Took several road trips. We’re on a roadtrip right now….our 4th end-of-December trip to Gulf Shores, AL. Hoping for more road trips in 2020.
On our CO/NM road trip we visited with one of the first friends I made in Orygun in 1976, who I hadn’t seen since my solo cross country drive in 2000. On our last night of the trip, I visited with friends from Sarasota who live in Denver. I hadn’t seen one of them since that 2000 roadtrip. Awesome.
A couple of contemplated trips never materialized. Enjoyed the contemplating.
Didn’t do any fishing. Maybe in 2020. Need to find a good farm pond/lake.
Didn’t get a haircut in 2019. Maybe in 2020. Maybe not.
Helped raise money for The Victim Center in my role as a “Sole Man” for their Wine Women & Shoes event. Thanks to all who donated. Hope to raise even more money for them in 2020. Expect to be asked…
Talked to my 93 year old Dad almost every day. He might outlive me.
Made more calls and sent more texts than I received. What’s up with that?
Read too many obituaries of friends and acquaintances. Two friends died suddenly. It’s a good way to go…we’re all gonna die…but it’s hell on the survivors.
If you want details, i.e. the windbag version, give me a call.
Here’s the “song that matters.” Give it a listen. Travis (the banjo player) had only written the first verse when his 91 year old grandpa passed.
Don’t let this happen to you: “All the words I never said falling from my eyes…”
I got started early on 9/23/19 and picked up speed later in the day. I posted comments on and links on Facebook to 14 songs by Bruce Springsteen on his 70th birthday.
They were done in chronological order based on release date, except for the last one. From 13 of his 19 studio albums.
#1 FB at 8:24
Bruce Springsteen is 70 today. Happy Birthday to The Boss.
His audition tape is pretty sweet.
“when they said ‘Sit down’ I stood up…”
-=-=-==
#2 FB at 9:00
I’ve been cranking this one UP for 46 years. That ain’t gonna stop anytime soon.
He said: “I wrote ‘Rosalita’ as a kiss-off to everybody who counted you out, put you down or decided you weren’t good enough.”
My favorite line:
“Someday we’ll look back on this and it will all seem funny…”
Crank. It. UP!!
-=-=-=-
#3 FB at 11:22
I was a fan in my 20’s…back in the 1970’s.
I’ll be a fan in my 70’s in the 2020’s.
“So you’re scared and you’re thinking that maybe we ain’t that young anymore
Show a little faith, there’s magic in the night…”
Crank. This. UP!!
-=-=-=
#4 FB at 1:14
The record company and lawyers mucked everything up for awhile.
It was almost three years before The Boss released his fourth album. This song is the first cut on the long-awaited “Darkness on the Edge of Town.”
“You spend your life waiting
For a moment that just don’t come
Well don’t waste your time waiting…”
And this: “it ain’t no sin to be glad you’re alive…”
-=-=-=
#5 FB at 2:08
“The River” was his 5th album, his only double album and the first of the 80’s. This was his first album to go #1 on the Billboard 200. (He’s never had a #1 single…)
It was never my favorite album, but I’m a sucker for a rocker.
The link has the lyrics…but all you really need to know is this: “I’m a rocker, baby, I’m a rocker, every day…”
-=-=-=
#6 FB at 2:44
This is the second cut of Springsteen’s sixth album, released 37 years ago on 9/30/82.
This song is NOT about Philip Testa. But Philly’s “chicken man” did get blown up in early ‘81 by a nail bomb as he was entering his south philly home. It started a gang war, with a couple of dozen made guys getting killed over the next few years.
Whatever…
Nebraska is a great album,,,but damned is it bleak or what?
Everybody knows this song. Damned near everybody covers it.
Nobody does it any better than my friend David and The Nace Brothers. Seriously.
I’ve always loved this line: “Everything dies baby that’s a fact, But maybe everything that dies someday comes back…”
But I love it even more now that i’m looking forward to being reincarnated and in 40 years or so reading about “the times in which we live.” (Dad uses that one often. 😉 )
-=-=-=
#7 FB at 3:22
“Born in the U.S.A.”
Released 6/4/84.
Seven top 10 singles.
The Boss & the E Street Band achieve commercial success.
My favorite lyrics from any of the 12 songs aren’t from one of those seven songs.
“Well, we busted out of class
Had to get away from those fools
We learned more from a three-minute record, baby
Than we ever learned in school…”
(BTW…I loved school…most of the time…
I’ve learned a thing or two from 3 minute songs too.)
And: “We made a promise we swore we’d always remember
No retreat, baby, no surrender…”
Resist.
And have fun like these folks.
-=-==
#8 FB at 4:24
“Tunnel of Love” is the 8th studio album. Springsteen married Julianne Philips in Lake Oswego, Orygun on May 13, 1985 in Lake Oswego. A bad relationship spawned a pretty decent album.
I lived in Portland at the time. There was a rare sighting of The Boss in the PDX area. None by me.
At the time, I had made several more trips around the sun than I deserved based on a bit of risky behavior. And I was still making some bad choices, especially for my liver.
But my perspective on life had changed a bit.
“Now some may wanna die young man
Young and gloriously
Get it straight now mister
Hey buddy that ain’t me
‘Cause I got something on my mind
That sets me straight and walkin’ proud
And I want all the time
All that heaven will allow”
The Mavericks often have this one on their setlist. 🙂
-=-=-=
#9 FB at: 5:08
I don’t own the next 3 albums.
On 9/11 I posted links to a couple of songs from his twelfth: “The Rising.” This was his first album with The E Street Band in almost 20 years.
Fifteen tracks. Damned near perfect.
For a 70th birthday party…or a wake, this one is also perfect.
“Seven days, seven candles
In my window lighting your way
Your favorite record’s on the turntable
I drop the needle and pray (turn it up)
Band’s countin’ out midnight (turn it up)
Floor’s rumblin’ loud (turn it up)…”
Turn. It. UP!
-=-=-=
#10 FB at 5:58
The E Street Band was back for album #15. “Magic.” 9/25/2007.
Rolling Stone put it at #2 for the year.
Once again, the first track is my favorite…at least for today. 🙂
“This is radio nowhere, is there anybody alive out there…”
“I want a thousand guitars
I want pounding drums
I want a million different voices speaking in tongues…”
“I just want to hear some rhythm,
I just want to hear some rhythm…”
-=-=-=
#11 FB at 6:56
Springsteen’s seventeenth album was released on March 6, 2012.
I’d been back in Missouri for 9 months. I was living alone. There was lots of music in A-306 at The Abbey.
“Wrecking Ball” was in rotation for awhile.
He wrote “Easy Money” right after the 2008 financial fiasco and said this about Wall Street walking away unscathed: “That hustle has been legitimized over the past four years, when you have the level of risk and greed at the top of the financial industry, and people basically walking away, relatively scot-free, completely unaccountable.” [Do NOT get me started!]
“There’s nothing to it mister, you won’t hear a sound
When your whole world comes tumbling down
And all them fat cats they just think it’s funny
I’m going on the town now looking for easy money…”
-=-=-==
#12 FB at 8:24
Jan 14, 2014. “High Hopes” is released.
I like the album. It’s different. Covers. Outtakes that didn’t make earlier albums. Songs that had been on live albums or promo CDs.
There is good stuff here.
But picking just one cut is too easy.
It’s a song that was written in 2000 re Amadou Diallo. He started singing it again in 2012 after Trayvon Martin was gunned down.
This is an Important Song.
So is “What it Means” by Drive-by Truckers.
Black Lives Matter.
“Is it a gun, is it a knife
Is it a wallet, this is your life
It ain’t no secret
No secret my friend
You can get killed just for living in your American skin
41 shots
41 shots
41 shots
41 shots…”
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#13 FB at 9:16
This makes it a Baker’s Dozen on The Boss’ birthday.
Just over 3 months ago, on June 14, 2019, Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen released his nineteenth studio album.
“Western Stars” is a solo studio album….and it is a dandy. I heard something about a documentary.
I loved this song at the first note…at the first sound of his voice…and the first time I heard this:
“Some find peace here on the sweet streets
The sweet streets of home…”
And this:
“When everyone’s asleep and the midnight bells sound
My wheels are hissin’ up the highway
Spinning ’round and ’round…”
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#14 FB at 10:18
Why stop at thirteen? This wraps up Birthday songs for The Boss on his 70th, 9/23/19.
I have cranked this song up more than any other by Springsteen. It has rattled walls and made cars shake.
It was released Aug 25, 1975.
We were living in Cape Girardeau and had gotten married 237 days earlier on 12/31/74.
We wanted the hell out of Missouri. (I never expected to move back. Thirty-five years later I did…)
Not much more than a year after I first heard this song, our 2 VW bug caravan arrived in Corvallis.
No doubt this song gave us a push…not that we needed one.
“I’ll love you with all the madness in my soul
Oh, someday, girl, I don’t know when
We’re gonna get to that place
Where we really wanna go and we’ll walk in the sun
But ’til then, tramps like us
Baby, we were born to run…”
I have a ticket for “An evening with Jackson Browne” tonight at the Britt Festival in Jacksonville, OR. But on August 7, 2019 I’m gonna be 1984 miles away in Springtown, Misery.
On most days of our summer roadtrip I posted thirteen pictures on Facebook. This time I’m stealing lyrics from a baker’s dozen from the singer-songwriter who has been my favorite the longest.
If I was making up the setlist for “An evening with Jackson Browne” this 8/7/19 I’d have trouble limiting it to his standard setlist for 2019 of 22 songs. And I’d walk away from the show wanting more.
Picking only 13 is not gonna be easy. The first twelve are listed in the order released, and then my number one.
Some editorial comments; perhaps some background; and always the lyrics. Other than #12, these have been the songs of my life for the last 40-plus years.
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1. Jackson Browne’s first album was released in January, 1972. I was a short-timer at Ft. Bragg. I wanted out of the army. They wanted me gone. This is one of the albums that pulled me thru the last few months of my 1 year, 6 months and 6 days in uniform. Angst running rampant. Hoping not to be court-martialed out.
“It’s a hotel at best, you’re here as a guest
You oughta make yourself at home…”
I’ve been lucky enough to bounce from room to room, and from pillar to post, for longer than anyone who knew me back then expected. I was a loose cannon. “Wanta do it? Wanta do it now.”
Last summer I drove by the four places I lived in Corvallis between 76&82.
2. From that same, self-titled album a song that seems like it should be played at the baptizing hole…or on a water bed perhaps. I read once that he said the song came from the desire for love and peace and release and reconciliation with the spiritual.
I can support those four.
BTW, the album is NOT titled “Saturate before using.” Just sayin’.
“Your walls are burning and your towers are turning
I’m going to leave you here and try to get down to the sea somehow…
…When my life is over, I’m going to stand before the Father
But the sisters of the sun are going to rock me on the water now”
This song meant more to me after we moved to Oregon and we could be at the beach in under an hour. Someday I hope to be closer to the Pacific again.
3. “For Everyman” was released in October of 73. I was getting ready to start my second year at SEMO. I was the sports editor for the Capaha Arrow, worked football and basketball games and did some tasks for the Sports Information department, and picked up a few bucks as a stringer for a couple of city papers and the AP.
I had been subjected to living for one term with my authoritarian asshole of a brother as a roommate. I spent a lot of time in the library and in my own head. I cannot hear this lyric without thinking of he who shall remain nameless.
I don’t expect to die while living in MO. But I’m not going anywhere that will keep me more than a few hours from Dad. And even though at 93 he talks about going somewhere, I’m expecting to be spending several days/weeks at some point wrapping things up at the house he had built a little over 30 years ago.
After his place in Doe Run is gone, who knows? Stay in Springfield? Orygun? Colorado? Virginia? Belize?
5. The album “Late for the sky” was released on my birthday in 1974. I’m pretty sure I didn’t get my copy on 9/13, but I’m sure the first vinyl had been played a hundred times before xmas of 74.
When I met Shelly she wasn’t all that familiar with Jackson Browne, so I bought her 2 CDs: a greatest hits….and this one.
Stick me on a desert island and tell me only one Jackson Browne album, “Late for the sky” is it.
Come to one of the ash scatterings that I wrote about, and this one will be playing. My sister says she wants this one played at her funeral too. When I heard this, I asked what she thought our fundamentalist, biblical inerrancy father and brother would think of the lyric, she said it is open to interpretation. Malarkey. Typical baptist bullshit.
As an evangelical agnostic, I love it:
“I don’t know what happens when people die
Can’t seem to grasp it as hard as I try…”
And others too:
“Keep a fire for the human race
And let your prayers go drifting into space
You never know will be coming down”
“Don’t let the uncertainty turn you around
Go on and make a joyful sound”
I saw Warren Zevon open for J.B. a couple of times.
7. Paula Rudloff and I moved everything we owned in a 2 car VW bug caravan from Washington, MO to Corvallis, OR at the end of August of 1976. The road trip was interesting. Saw POTUS in Russell, KS. Got yelled at for pumping my own gas in Ontario, OR.
“The Pretender” was released in November ’76. We were impoverished…with priorities. I scrounged up a few bucks for an album that stayed on the turntable for a long time.
This is another one that he seldom plays, but it has always been one of my favorites.
“Forget what life used to be, you are what you choose to be,
It’s whatever it is you see that life will become.
Whatever it is you might think you have you have nothing to lose,
Through every dead and living thing time runs like a fuse.
9. It was several years between the time I first heard the title track of “The Pretender” in 76 and when I started at AA&Co. in late May of 82. During those 6 years, I was a substitute teacher for a few and then at OSU on the GI Bill. There were also more than a few prolonged periods of stoned stupors and homemade blackberry wine benders.
At Andersen these lyrics applied. I worked my ass off there. There was tad bit of quality to go along with the quantity:
“I’m going to pack my lunch in the morning
And go to work each day
And when the evening rolls around
I’ll go on home and lay my body down…”
I became a full-fledged Pretender in 2011. I got lucky too….I found her!!
We house sat for her brother in Vancouver, BC for the summer. In the fall we moved into grad assistant housing. Made 4 batches of blackberry wine…20 gallons. Had grow lights in the extra closet.
As soon as the needle drops, the math works:
“In sixty five I was seventeen and running up 101
I don’t know where I’m running now, I’m just running on…”
“In sixty-nine I was twenty-one and I called the road my own
I don’t know when that road turned, into the road I’m on”
I dropped out of college at the end of 68. It’s a miracle I made it thru 69. Landed a union job at PPG Industries in Crystal City . Shift work. Carpooled…sometimes with a couple of wild guys from Bonne Terre. Booze was a big problem. Blackouts. Stories for another day…
No doubt about it. I had no idea what I was looking for in 1969. I was indeed running on empty.
13. After Shelly had listened to the album “Late for the sky” several times, including a few when I caterwauled along, I asked her for her favorite.
I don’t think I guessed right.
I Know that she didn’t guess mine.
So I played my favorite from the album and told her why.
The album had always been my favorite album. This start of “The late show” took on more meaning during the 14 years at Arthur Andersen. The politics there were cut throat at times. On the flip side, many of the friendships are irreplaceable.
These six lines start it off:
“Everyone I’ve ever known has wished me well
Anyway that’s how it seems, it’s hard to tell
Maybe people only ask you how you’re doing
‘Cause that’s easier than letting on how little they could care
But when you know that you’ve got a real friend somewhere
Suddenly all the others are so much easier to bear”
The other lyrics that we talked about that day were these:
“And now I’m sitting here wondering what to say,
Afraid that all these words might scare you away…”
I don’t 100% buy into the first half of “say it, forget it; write it, regret it.”
I told Shelly that I have mellowed, but my mouth has gotten me into, and out of, lots of trouble. I am a wise ass.
Every once in awhile I flash back to a morning in mid-October of last year and a “deja vu moment.” Shelly had been out of the apartment less than an hour. I was on the couch with a cup of coffee and the latest issue of Time magazine.
I was about to wrap up a quick pass thru the magazine. The last page of each issue is usually “X number” of questions for a celebrity. Might be a politician, an actor, an activist, or an athlete. That day it was 8 questions for an author: Paulo Cohelo.
I’ll admit it: before I started reading I had no idea who “the Brazilian novelist, one of the world’s best-selling authors” was. As I read the piece I did recognize the name of his biggest seller “The Alchemist.”
What grabbed me were the last dozen words of the intro: “…on nostalgia for his hippie days and the forms that love takes.”
As I read the Q&A I found myself nodding in agreement with some of his answers.
Q. 3. “What did your generation fail to understand about society?”
A. 3. “My generation understood that once a hippie, always a hippie. Of course, I could not be a hippie today, sitting comfortably here in Geneva. But my values are still the same: simplify your life, eat healthy, respect women.”
As I read the remainder of that answer some lyrics from my favorite songwriter popped into my head.
Paulo Cohelo’s answer: “My generation understood the mind and our desire to journey–but then it came time to support ourselves. And it became difficult to broker a peace between the two.”
When Jackson Browne sings “The Pretender” I often say: “That was me. I was a pretender.”
His lyric: “I’m gonna be a happy idiot and struggle for the legal tender, Where the ads take aim and lay their claim to the heart and the soul of the spender, And believe in whatever may lie in those things that money can buy…”
Been there. Done that.
-=-=-=-=
The deja vu moment happened as I read his answer to question #6 of 8: “The two have a complicated love for each other in the novel. Have you ever been in love?”
Cohelo said: “I don’t remember not being in love.”
That ain’t me.
I remember the first time I fell in love. I’m in love again now for just the second time. But I do remember when I wasn’t in love with anyone, including myself.
I got a refresher with part of his answer to Q6. “There are very different types of love. There’s Eros, love for another person. There’s Philia, love for wisdom. And there is Pragma, which is love that goes beyond everything.”
-=-=-=-
The last part of the answer had me going “Holy shit…that was me last night!!!”
His answer: “Every time I go to sleep, I look at her and she is already sleeping. And I say to myself, ‘Oh my God, this is the greatest blessing in my life, to have found the person who understands me.’ ”
Shelly is always asleep when I shut down for the night. When we first started sleeping together even the slightest touch would get a flinch. It took awhile, but now I can lightly stroke her butt cheeks or a shoulder w/o startling her.
That night before reading the magazine I had given her a couple of love touches as I settled into our bed.
Then I just watched her sleep for what seemed like a long time. It was probably only two or three minutes. I broke out into a smile. I remember chuckling for a second or 2…she tossed a bit and re-positioned.
I gazed at her some more and thought about how lucky I am.
I thought it again the next morning, Time magazine in hand.
I am a lucky old coot.
But this time I didn’t just chuckle.
I laughed out loud.
Literally.
