Where Were You Hiding When the Storm Broke?
I wrote not so long ago, or spoke not so long ago, about one of the trivial benefits of living with LOML after he moves up here from Tucson. That particular benefit, one among the myriad, would be a house filled with music.
After a minor kerfuffle the other night at the Lonestar, and a blog-preserved mutual button-pushing session, I decided to jump the gun and make a point of having some music playing. So I did, while I did some random stuff around the house and in the back yard, continuing to put my house back in its resting state after the big birthday party here a week ago. "Where Were You Hiding When the Storm Broke?" is an interesting song—part anthem, part homage, part call-to-arms. And like most of the 5000+ songs currently residing in my iTunes Library, it's an esoteric pointer into certain memory locations. Having the vast storehouse playing on Shuffle makes for an interesting ride, to say the least. I've been all over the map, all over history, all over the spectrum of human emotions.
It's going to take some time, this time. Only the heart may know. It's 10:15 on a Saturday night. And the tap drips under the striplight. If I loved you, words wouldn't come in an easy way. Merry Christmas, Darling. Make mistake #3. Shiver and say the words of every lie you've heard. If you will dare, I will dare. October, and the trees are all bare of what they wear. Do I care? What would we do without all these jerks, anyway? Besides all our friends are here. Sing us a song, you're the piano man. Aphrodisiac Jacket, Napoleon machine gun. Point me in the direction of Albequerque. The mutants, creeps and musclemen are shaking like a leaf. I no there is a heaven, no there is a hell. When are you going to come down? When are you going to land? As long as there's stars over Texas, darlin' I'll hang the moon for you.
See what I mean? And not only sequence comes into play. Where is the sound coming from? Am I listening with intent? What kind of stereo? Tonight Joseph stood out in the yard, as Debussy played from the kitchen. Listening to an abjectly random song-by-song stream has its particular qualities, as does hearing your favorite single from way back when on a tinny little clock radio coming from the next room. The effect of listening to an entire album without stopping has its merits. So does having to flip over the tape or wait for the mechanical clunking of the program-change, or having to flip the album over and clean the surface before beginning Side 2. It's more than nostalgia, it's color. Situation. Mood. Feeling. Ambiance. You can't generalize any of it, except to group these moments into a lump of things you can't generalize.
Sing along. Hum in silence. Grab an old instrument or sit down at the familiar keyboard. Tap the kitchen countertop or your own thigh. Try a new thing. Scratch at a turntable. Derive a circle of fifths. Quantize that drumtrack you just laid down. Program a new sound. It's all the same. You're making music.
Sometimes I think we do an injustice to certain qualities of reality by assigning an external label. "Music". "Humor". "Love". These are things in our lives, these are things of living, things we respire.
Things we forget we need.
............................................................
For the language of longing never had words,
so how did you speak from your heart?
Yet here is a box that swears it has heard that
ideas are like stars.