Posts Tagged ‘songs’
Some Songs
Yesterday afternoon, a song popped up on my random shuffled library playback and triggered a visceral response that none of the songs ahead of it did. My reaction wasn’t immediate beyond appreciating that I hadn’t listened to it for quite some time. Then I noticed it was building to an ending that has always been one I adore. The last two minutes of the 4-minute and 52-second song grabbed me.
I spontaneously told Cyndie, “Play this at the closing of my funeral.”
Now, I’m not currently in the thought process of planning for my funeral, so I don’t know where that idea came from. I also don’t know what it was in that moment that triggered my brain and body to react to the end of the song in the way I did.
Some songs just do that for us. Last night we coincidentally watched the 2018 version of “A Star Is Born” with Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga in which there is a scene that talks about the 12 notes between octaves…
…music is essentially 12 notes between any octave. Twelve notes and the octave repeats. It’s the same story told over and over forever. All any artist can offer the world is how they see those 12 notes. That’s it.
Sam Elliott’s character, Bobby, talking to Ally (Lady Gaga)
There is an article posted (Dec. 2022) on Psychology Today, “The Amazing Power of Music in Our Lives; Seven great reasons to incorporate music into your daily routine.” Music is good for our health.
I don’t know why some songs stand out more than others for us or why a particular moment I hear a song can have such a distinct impact.
.
Yesterday, “Opposites” on Eric Clapton’s 1975 album, “There’s One in Every Crowd,” resonated deeply for me.
Some songs just do that.
.
.
Caught Up
For a day or two now, we are caught up with mowing all that is growing at the peak rate typical for June. Yesterday was a perfect day for cutting grass with the lawn tractor. It was dry with a nice breeze and the grass wasn’t overgrown. I was able to mow at high speed, there were no piles of clippings, and the finish looks top notch. I will enjoy it for the rarity it was because I regularly find myself facing one or multiple versions of cutting complications.
Cyndie raked the clippings in the labyrinth after giving them a day to dry out and it is looking its best, as well. Did I mention that, after a good night’s sleep, Cyndie was feeling back to her healthy old self?
I tried wearing my earbuds under the earmuff hearing protection I wear while mowing because I am caught up in a Kris Kristofferson song from 1976 that I just heard for the first time. I’m contemplating trying to memorize it so I can create my own version to play and sing.
“There ain’t nothing sweeter than naked emotions
So you show me yours hon and I’ll show you mine”
I heard Shannon McNally’s version first and then searched for the song origins and found both Kristofferson’s and Willie Nelson’s two versions. It amazes me that I haven’t come across this song sooner in the 46-years since it was written.
All credit goes to MPR’s “Radio Heartland” on the HD2 subchannel of KNOW’s 91.1 MHz. I rarely pursue music beyond my personal library collection anymore, so exposure to new music is mostly limited to what I hear on the radio when traveling in my car. My tastes have begun to age out of MPR’s “The Current” at 89.3 MHz FM so more and more I find myself migrating to the primarily acoustic, singer-songwriter, folk, and Americana offerings on “Heartland.”
“And I wish that I was the answer to all of your questions
Lord knows I know you wish you were the answer to mine”
I am enjoying that this song has finally caught up with me after all these years.
.
.
It’s November!
How many times have I written of my astonishment at the arrival of a new month? November is here. This morning there is a beautiful fire in our fireplace and the clocks have been changed back to standard time. The pump has been removed from our little landscape pond and the leaves covering the surface are locked in a layer of ice.
The garden hoses (we had a dozen of them strewn about the place) have all been drained, coiled, and stored. It feels like November. The one family on our country “block” that came trick-or-treating for Halloween last year, showed up again Friday night. Luckily, this year Cyndie had purchased candy, so we treated the one family, and yesterday I tried to eat all the rest.
“Oops, I slipped and another chocolate-almond-coconut concoction flew into my mouth.”
Cyndie recently coerced me to spend some time on a jigsaw puzzle by pitching in to spread out the pieces and flip them all face-up. Puzzling is both soothing and exhilarating for me, and it always evokes pleasant memories of assembling them when I was young. I find that dallying on jigsaw puzzles while listening to well-loved music tends to bring new depth to old songs. The music seems richer and the puzzling becomes doubly so. I finished the puzzle Friday night.
Yesterday, I drove the Grizzly around and collected all the stacks of cut wood that have accumulated from the trees that either fell in the wind, or were cut to clear trails and fence lines. There is no shortage of wood to be split and stacked in the shed. Meanwhile, there are still tree trunks under brush piles that remain to be sawed into fireplace logs, after I chip the branches above them.
Last night I had a dream that involved my needing to plow snow. As shocking as it is to accept that the month has already arrived, it definitely feels like November to me now.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Relative Something 