I pause this week to remember two somber anniversaries. Twenty-five years ago today, my brother Jim passed away from complications of AIDS. And one year ago this coming Sunday, my mom died after a long fight with Alzheimer’s. As Dave Matthews sang, “I don’t mean to dwell on this dying thing…” Really, I much...
Advice From My Father
The best advice I can ever remember receiving came from my father. I think I was probably about 14 or 15 years old, on the cusp of high school and all the changes that come with that transition. I have a mental image that he’s telling me this while he’s driving me someplace—we’re on...
List: Top Five Story Songs — No. 1
This week, it’s been all about Story Songs, those songs that adopt their own meanings, sometimes far from what the original artists meant. Previous editions are here and here and here and here. And finally, we come to: 1. Stay Free, by The Clash. Way back then, in the early early 1980s, we wrote...
List: Top Five Story Songs — No. 2
2. Christmas In Cape Town—by Randy Newman. This is possibly the darkest, ugliest song that Randy Newman has ever written, and he’s written some ugly ones. Consider yourself warned: Listen. The thing you have to understand about Randy Newman, though, is that he often writes songs from the viewpoint of despicable characters—polar opposites from...
List: Top Five Story Songs — No. 3
3. Sunday, Bloody Sunday, by U2. October 27, 1985: Denkinger screwed up, and the Cardinals were ticked. After the nightmare finish to Game 6 of the 1985 World Series, it was easy to see that Game 7 was going to be a powder keg. The only question was, who was going to set it...
List: Top Five Story Songs — No. 4
4. King Horse, by Elvis Costello. King Horse on Spotify. This is, without a doubt, the best juggling song ever. It’s from Elvis’ best album, Get Happy!, which I was listening to quite a bit in the winter of 1981-82, when I learned how to juggle. Besides being a great song, it has lots...
List: Top Five Story Songs—No. 5
“You see, I knew that song so long before we met, that it means so much more than it might” —Elvis Costello, King Horse Elvis is onto something here, I think. There are certain songs that take on meanings that are far beyond whatever the songs are “about.” Surely everybody has their own songs...
The Submission, by Amy Waldman
I’ve just finished reading The Submission, a novel by Amy Waldman. It was one of the most powerful books I’ve read lately. It begins as a jury is picking the winner of an anonymous competition to design the memorial at Ground Zero in New York City. Primarily at the urging of one member—who had...
The Yellow Cap
Note: When written, this was one of a series of posts describing the pictures that appear in the blog header. However, I’ve since changed the design of the blog, and hence, the pictures are different. Nothin’ stoppin’ you from reading the posts, though; previous posts are here and here and here;. Admit it. You...
Reading List, May 2012: My Last—And Next—Five Books
Here we go with the latest “reading list” post, representing the last five books I’ve read. This one took a little longer than the last installment, only because I’ve been kinda busy with work, and I got bogged down a little in the science of No. 3. Still, five books in less than four...