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...

All My Life

I've been walking in the rain just to get wet on purpose

She wanted to spend time with him.

I don't know what he wanted. If he didn't want to spend time with her then he was an idiot. But I don't know.

She didn't go out drinking. She thought that was stupid.

She didn't smoke pot with the others. She'd tried it and didn't like it.

She wanted to spend time with him.

And he was not there. This was before cell phones. Before texting. Before email took off.

So there were long pauses. And long unpauses.

But mostly long pauses.

I know this. She told me.

She wanted to be with him. And he wasn't there.

And she smiled wistfully as she told me. And I answered. Truthfully. Before I could stop myself.

"Then he's an idiot."

And she nodded. Not because he was an idiot. But because she was sure.

She'd wanted to be with him. And he wasn't there.