Hail Dropped Like Bullets (Rerun from Last Year)

Cold night air everywhere...

Carrie had a boyfriend. Someone she knew from High School.

We never saw him, but we heard all about him.

Then, one night, she showed up crying. He'd dumped her by letter. Couldn't even wait until they saw each other. Couldn't call her (although it was before cell phones, back when long distance still meant anything).

She waved the letter and we looked at it. It was filled with typos and grammatical mistakes. Someone said "he's an illiterate dope, you're better off without him." This made Carrie cry even more.

I took her for a walk. We went down the hill. To the statehouse with the big fluffy lawn.

I made her roll downhill on the lawn. This momentarily made her feel better.

And we walked back up the hill.

"I never thought we'd be together forever," she said. "But I thought we'd make it to New Year's Eve."

And she started to cry again.

I wanted to hug her, but I didn't. Instead I distracted her with a story about a girl I knew in High School.

It was a funny story. And it made her laugh.

But she would have rather had the hug.

When we got back to the dorms, she thanked me for the walk. Then she hugged me.



"Maybe you and I should hang out later," Carrie said.

And I nodded. I wanted that too.

But I didn't want to swoop in after she'd been dumped.

And it was right before finals.

So I didn't do anything about it.

And then Carrie started dating this guy named Marc. And whenever she saw me, she'd give me a sad smile.

A smile that seemed to say "you should've hugged me."

And I nodded. Because I should have.

Tis the Seasoning

Found on the Interwebz

Because, you know, Christmas.

Boxing Day Go Here, Read This, Listen to That, And Watch This Other Thing

Sometimes you box the day, sometimes the day boxes you.

Steven, from Stevenology 2.0, reports from the Graham Parker & The Rumour show in Santa Cruz.

Holly from The Song in My Head Today hips us to my new favorite Atheist Christmas song.

Hey Dullblog re-re-re-examines Magical Mystery Tour with links to a slate review that includes a link to the following "new" (or at least new-ish)documentary:

Watch Magical Mystery Tour Revisited on PBS. See more from Great Performances.

Two More Christmas Favorites

Because It's Just Not Christmas Without Them

John Lennon's "Happy Xmas (War is Over)" and Darlene Love's "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)" are among my favorite Christmas songs ever.

Also in my top 5 Christmas songs are:



and:



I've never quite been sure what to put in the 5th slot. Maybe that song by the Pogues. Or the Squeeze Christmas song. Or "Christmas Wrapping" by the Waitresses. Or "All I Want for Christmas (Is World Peace)" by Timbuk 3.

Whatever's on your list, here's wishing you a fantastic Christmas (or whatever holiday or non-holiday you celebrate) and an even better 2013.

Merry Christmas

Another year over...

Watching Darlene Love on Letterman, I wonder which late night show would have John Lennon appear every year on the last show before Christmas.



Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.

Darlene Love is a National Treausre

And still sounds as good as she did 49 years ago...

I guess it started sparse back in 1986:



(Bonus for the Spuds Mackenzie ad, I guess...)


But it's gotten a bit more elaborate in the past 26 years:




May we all sound that good in our 70s....

On the Shortest Day of the Year

The Winter Solstice is not a time for mourning, it’s a time for celebrating.

Think of it as Yoga for the Earth.

Breathe in. Hold. Breathe out. Hold.

Align chakras up from the magma at the center of the planet to the highest mountain peaks.

Most of the year we're breathing in. Or we're breathing out.

Twice a year, we hold. In the holding, magic can happen.

In the pause, anything's possible. All over the world.

The Druids knew this. So they celebrated the holding.

After months of losing light, we pause. And in the pause we reflect light outwards. And then we start the long, slow process of gaining light, building back towards a period of growth. It’s slow at first and the progress isn’t always obvious from day to day. We gather, we collect. Later we plant. And grow. Then harvest.

We stop and change course during the pauses. And that's where the rules are thrown out.

In Iceland, there’s a town in the Westfjords that is technically below the Arctic Circle, but they have darkness through January because the sun never gets very high in the sky and a local mountain keeps the town in shadowy darkness. They celebrate the Solstice there – and celebrate “Sunshine Day” in January with a pancake breakfast attended by all townspeople the first day the sun peeks over the mountains. They pause. And then they eat. Pancakes.

While others lament the shortest day of the year and wonder where their sun has gone, the Druids knew this as a special time.

So they’d pause.

Yoga for the Earth. Hold the position. Breathe in. Hold.


This is a time when your stars are aligned. So go into the world.

And make your own magic.

You Lived in Your Imagination, Briggs

Unless You Want Him Crawling Through Your Dream

She stared at me. "I want to travel," she said.

And I did, too.

"I want to drive everywhere. Take months. Take off. Just go."

And we talked about roads. And places. And states.

And other places. Countries we'd visit. Places we'd dreamed about.

You know the ones. The ones that don't even have names.

But we didn't go everywhere.

Except. Sometimes. Late at night.

In my imagination we're there. We're driving. And it's raining. Or snowing.

But we don't care.

It's right there -- it's a place I can almost reach. Can almost hear and see and smell and taste.

And I look over at her.

But she's not there. And, if I'm honest, I'm not there either.

On some days, I don't even know if she ever existed. I have flashes of memory (so many flashes of memory).

I have flashbacks and flashforwards involving her. And the car we were driving. Which, for some reason, was lime-green.

And her hair blew behind us in the breeze, riding up and down the hilly San Francisco neighborhood where neither of us has ever lived.

But in the moonlight, sometimes, I can see it. Clear as day.

Even if we're never going there again.

Even if we never were there at all.

Maybe not even in my imagination, Briggs.

Some Days, It's the Best You Can Do

Some days we're eloquent.

Some days we howl in the darkness, angry there's no moon.

Best Xmas Record of 2012

With bonus points for use of the word "coterie" in the lyric...

Steve Simels over at the Power Pop blog posted about what has to be my favorite Xmas record of 2012.

Go read what he has to say... or just give it a listen:

The Cold

It's Cold This Time Of Year.

But not like this.

This is more than we're supposed to get. Maybe more than we can stand.

This is the cold that starts at your cheeks and spreads downwards through your body.

This is the kind of cold that seeps into your bones.

And stays there.

The kind of cold that seems like it might never end.

No matter how many layers you wear.

No matter how many fires you're near.

No matter how tired you are. Or how much you eat. Or drink.

This is the kind of cold that gets under your skin.

The kind of cold that defies numbers, even when those numbers have a negative sign in front of them.

This is cold.

India

I've Got to Follow My Heart

Do we get changed by going to other places?

Or do we go to other places in order to get changed?

When we seek out the new experiences and hope for change, sometimes we get what we hoped we'd get.

More often, we get what we didn't even know was waiting there.

And then, if we're lucky, we find our way home.

Miles Away

No Don't Shake Me

Why, yes. I'd love to go out drinking with you starting at 1am.

Except.

I'm not 22 anymore.

(And, to be honest, didn't do that even when I was 22.)

In fact...

To be honest...