Whit's Blog / 1000 Recordings

Banish Nostalgia

The other night, at the end of the evening, I started listening to Tea for the Tillerman, in the dark. Joe came in, awake and not so much awake, and got in my bed, and asked when I was going to go to sleep. So, feeling all "Cat's the the Cradle" and the silver spoon, I got in bed too. And I didn't get back to Stevens for a few nights. I've been wandering around in some mighty different stuff at my uncle's suggestion and it's been fun. But tonight I came back to Stevens.

First off: I don't care what he's done since. Stevens is a musician, or at least he was (and is again, the clerk at the local video store tells me), and I am not in the religion or the religion subdivision business. Stevens made music. I used to like it, when I was a teenager and looking for someone to help me feel whole. And it turns out, that all these years gone, I still like the music. A little I felt like I was in the old Ford Escort or, before, the VW Rabbit, but not entirely. (Well, now he's playing "Father and Son" -- I'm not made of stone.)

It's lovely to find the music lasts for me. I remember teachers sneering, or quizzical, asking "Do you REALLY think Pink Floyd or Led Zeppelin will last like Mozart?" I remember arguing, yes, this song, but maybe not that one. I remember doing a paper on Mussorgsky and his work, and reflecting that not all of his songs were immortal. I remember saying: We don't know.

Stevens won't last forever, either. He'll peel off when Croce and James Taylor are still audible. Joe probably won't find Stevens in his copy of 1000 Recordings, umpteenth edition, which I hope to buy for him some day. But it's lovely work, precious to hear, and to apply myself to now. I'm more complicated than this music (and so is Yusuf Islam, I hear), and it's wonderful to have the stone to touch again.

[Adding later: Now I remember, too -- I just listened to the first part of this record. Tape. Probably more tape than record. Still like it -- but mostly the first part.]

Question You Never Want to Have To Ask

Honey, why are you walking through my home carrying a mallet on your shoulder?

Strive

Strive
Originally uploaded by WhitA

This is what it feels like to love what you do, and I love what i do.

Things I say when I supposed to be listening

1. Uh-huh!
2. Really?
3. I'll bet!
4. %lastwordsofjoessentence, and is that often?
5. [laughing sounds]

The Wait is Over

The first segment of the Tites saga is now available for reading. (Pictures not currently available.)

Once upon a time there was a cauldron located in a place called the Cokoroll. The Cokoroll was an ancient jungle. Out of that cauldron, 15,000 years ago, came the greatest warrior of four nations, called Tites.

Soon after, six more people came out of the cauldron to be his brothers. Since he was their oldest brother, and they had no Mom or Dad, he named them. He named them Greentes, Lites, Bites, Fierce One, Zites, and Smites.

 

Immediately, when all seven got out, Fierce One was enemies with his oldest brother. He wanted to take over his oldest brother. He did not approve of his skill. So he struck him with the mace -- that he just happened to have -- right on the cheek.

 

For the first time, they ventured outside the Cokoroll jungle to begin their adventures. So first, they tramped through a mud puddle. And then through a meadow. Until they came to a cave.

 

But when they went into the cave, they got a big surprise. There was a fire-breathing cat in the cave. (Its name was not “fire-breathing cat,” but “Hempsen.”)

 

So, Zites stepped forward to kill the fire-breathing cat. But first, before that, Tites said, “No, wait, I’d like to experiment with its fire, and I will mix it with some water I saved from the cauldron.” So he mixed it, and it smelled very, very good. So he drank a little. And then, once again, Fierce One tried to strike him, and hit him right in the hair. But Tites was not harmed.

 

Tites said, “I think this is some sort of impenetrable potion.” So they let the fire-breathing cat live, and they continued on their journey. (They brought a thousand jugs with them.)

 

They were marching through a stone mound and they came out the other side. Tites walked right through a castle’s open drawbridge. He and his men decided to move in and live there.

 

When they went inside, they saw a statue that looked like a yak with a cape and a sword. Suddenly, it moved and said, “I am the Caped Yak Master! Go away, or I will slay you to bits!” Tites said, “We’ll see about that.” He leapt on the Yak Master, wrenched off a horn and slashed his throat. The Yak Master surrendered.

Bounce

So, Joe and I were playing basketball, and we couldn't sink a shot no matter what we did.

Dad: Know what happened? Here's what happened. An alien landed in the night, and it knocked down the basketball hoop and dragged it away. But the thing is, the alien looks exactly like a basketball hoop, and so now it's getting all mad at us. It's refusing to let us get the ball into its hoop.
Joe: Or maybe it likes it. It's like, thinking, "Cool! DODGEBALL!"

See, now? That is FUNNY.

I Win! My Father's Day Had an Orange Slug

Joe and I went to a local nature park today, a nice little one where there aren't any signs that say you shouldn't go down in the water to tick off the bugs and worms and other creatures that really probably pretty much wish you would just Stay A Higher Life Form And Stop Bothering Them.

So we bothered a bunch of creatures. We looked at the damselfly nymphs and the little worms and the frogs and the whirligig beetles who Failed To Get Away. Also at the water striders. And I think my favorite, the "Small Unidentified Creatures." The word "rotifers" springs to mind, but heaven knows why. Pinnipeds. Homophones. Whatever.

There were also snails. Snails! What is this, a mangrove swamp? Their shells were transparent, or at least translucent, and they slooged down grassblades for all the world like alien creatures of Great Wisdom. Which they weren't.

Joe told me what a wonderful time he had. We saw a blue-winged warbler. That's three for me, ever. They are so beautiful, as beautiful as a pickle jar with a frog in it, and as cherries pitted while you sit on a board walk where an iris is blooming.

No flipping!

Joe built a clubhouse and put in a TV. This is what he refers to as a flip TV show. I regret not getting his version of "LOST," in which the dialogue went, roughly, "We're lost," and "We're home," which, all in all, pretty much covered the first three seasons of the ABC drama.

The Thinker

Joe: Why don't trophies ever have any clothes on? It's kinda gross.

All Greek to Me

So, Joe says, "You speak a lot of French, but I speak foreign languages, too. I could pretty much walk up to any Ancient Greek or Roman and have a good talk."
I say, "Really? Let's try that. Pretend I'm an ancient Roman or Greek. Walk up to me and ask what's for dinner."
Joe says, "Uhm...you're not Greek. You wouldn't understand."