With the Rhythm of Rhyming Guitars

I turn to the sounds in my car

More than 15 years ago, she said this to me: "If there's anyone who can capture the slow, steady ache of nostalgia and loss better than Bryan Ferry and Roxy Music, I don't know who it is."

And I remember the conversation.

I'm nostalgic for it.

And, once removed, for the nostalgia that prompted it.

A Moebius Strip of yearning.

With this as the perfect soundtrack:

And So Begins the Task

Cut My Hair and Shine My Shoes

She wanted the experience. The full artistic assault.

She got the experience. The full assault.

It was late. Later than it should have been.

The guys were drunk. Drunker than they knew.

And the road was steep. And winding.



The aesthetics brought her here.

Others came for the drugs and the surf. She wanted the aesthetics.

And the winding road was the price she paid for the view.

Which might ordinarily have been enough. But not that night. The night with the crash. And the cops.

And the ambulance. Which got there too late.




"What the hell are you on about?" she asked me.

I shrugged.

"Is this about a particular person?"

I nodded.

"But you're not going to tell me who it is?"

I shook my head. I wasn't going to talk.

Wasn't going to make it any more or less than it already was in the end.

Epistles. Just epistles.

From the hippie era.



(Thanks to Whiteray, for the nudge.)

How Does Your Light Shine

Wash Away My Troubles, Wash Away My Pain

I had a dream last night.

A strange dream.

I was on the top of an enormous vehicle, hundreds of feet tall. The base was just a few feet wide.

And the driver wasn't looking. Wasn't paying attention.

So we stopped short.

And the momentum at the bottom stopped the tires. But the momentum at the top kept me going. And I bounced off tall buildings trying to slow down, knowing the entire structure was about to tip over.

Then I was at a meeting. Or a performance. I'm not sure which.

Trying to get the attention of someone I needed to talk to. Someone I wasn't sure saw me.

And the feeling was just as intense as the momentum tipping over the vehicle hundreds of feet tall.

Certain risk. Uncertain reward.

Thus is the way of dreams.

Missive from the Edge of the Water

Here in Status Symbol Land...

There's something about self-important, self-absorbed people with an inflated sense of entitlement that makes you want to belch Shakespearean sonnets in their faces.

Or is it just me?

The Clouds and the Light

Clouds Are Here

Mostly, in the dark
The light shines from above
Dissipates
Without us realizing it.

But sometimes there are clouds
Big puffy clouds
Small whispy clouds
And they reflect the light
Photons bursting around us.

Is it an illusion
When the light reflects back
Reflects bright and red
Looking holy
And otherworldly?

Babe

That's Enough, Pig

Welcome to June.

Please enjoy this alternate-universe smash hit single from the early 80s -- Joey Ramone with Holly Beth Vincent (from Holly & the Italians):

Happy Birthday

Funny, you don't look 45

Happy Birthday, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, released 45 years ago today after almost 5 months of recording.

And even if there are parts of it that haven't aged well (and there certainly are), the amazing accomplishment of this record is hard to calculate.

And it was recorded on four-track.

And mixed lovingly down to mono.