Unexpectedly Needed, or Not Needed At All

[Video: classic moment from The Treasure of the Sierra Madre]

From whiskey river:

We may be only one of millions of advanced civilizations. Unfortunately, space being spacious, the average distance between any two of these civilizations is reckoned to be at least two hundred light-years, which is a great deal more than merely saying it makes it sound. It means for a start that even if these beings know we are here and are somehow able to see us in their telescopes, they’re watching light that left Earth two hundred years ago. So, they’re not seeing you and me. They’re watching the French Revolution and Thomas Jefferson and people in silk stockings and powdered wigs — people who don’t know what an atom is, or a gene, and who make their electricity by rubbing a rod of amber with a piece of fur and think that’s quite a trick. Any message we receive from them is likely to begin “Dear Sire,” and congratulate us on the handsomeness of our horses and our mastery of whale oil. Two hundred light-years is a distance so far beyond us as to be, well, just beyond us.

(Bill Bryson, A Short History of Nearly Everything [source])

…and:

Chang Tzu tells us of a persevering man who after three laborious years mastered the art of dragon slaying. For the rest of his days, he had not a single opportunity to test his skills.

(Jorge Luis Borges [source])

Not from whiskey river:

Into the Ark

An endless rain is just beginning.
Into the ark, for where else can you go:
you poems for a single voice,
private exultations,
unnecessary talents,
surplus curiosity,
short-range sorrows and fears,
eagerness to see things from all sides.

Rivers are swelling and bursting their banks.
Into the ark: all you chiaroscuros and halftones,
you details, ornaments, and whims,
silly exceptions,
forgotten signs,
countless shades of the color gray,
play for play’s sake,
and tears of mirth.

As far as the eye can see, there’s water
and a hazy horizon.
Into the ark: plans for the distant future,
joy in difference,
admiration for the better man,
choice not narrowed down to one of two,
outworn scruples,
time to think it over,
and the belief that all of this
will still come in handy some day.

For the sake of the children
that we still are,
fairy tales have happy endings.
That’s the only finale that will do here, too.
The rain will stop,
the waves will subside,
the clouds will part
in the cleared-up sky,
and they’ll be once more
what clouds overhead ought to be:
lofty and rather lighthearted
in their likeness to things
drying in the sun —
isles of bliss,
lambs,
cauliflowers,
diapers.

(Wislawa Szymborska [source])

…and:

I don’t let myself get carried away by my own ideas — I abandon nineteen out of twenty of them every day.

(Gustav Mahler [attributed])

…and (the “she” in this passage a “reader of palms, of cards, of signs and portents and mysterious coincidences”):

“Things are coming to pass,” she went on. “Destructive things, but also wonderful things — literally wonderful: things full of wonder. Remember that wonders need not all be nice, Wayne. Some can be quite terrible. A dark comet colliding with the Earth is as much a wonder as a brilliant one passing in the night sky, hundreds of thousands of miles distant. But things, yes, wonders long in the making are coming to pass.

“At the heart of these things coming to pass stands a woman — perhaps more than one woman. Each woman a fulcrum, you see? A hinge about which a particular problem can be seen to swing.”

She closed her eyes but continued to speak, as though hypnagogically.

“She — or you, under her influence — must find an unexpected opening and cut into and through the problem. The woman will not be easily pleased, she may not accept at first what you are trying to accomplish, or how. You must not let her decide for you — the fulcrum, you see? she is not the lever itself — but you must attend to her. To get to the wonder, you see?”

(JES, Seems to Fit)

The Vermont band Grace Potter and the Nocturnals seems on the brink of a major breakthrough. No one had heard of them before 2005-06; now suddenly they’re cropping up on TV, at music festivals, on soundtracks… Their bass guitarist, Cat Popper, says her favorite thing about studio recording is:

…when an engineer can capture the air in the room and understands what I mean when I say “make my bass tone sound like Neil Young kicking the mic stand on Heart of Gold.”

That’s a musician who knows what she needs. (They’re all like that.)

The ballad below closes their 2010 (self-titled) album.

Lyrics:

Things I Never Needed
(Grace Potter and the Nocturnals)

Take a long hard look at my face
Take away the things I can’t replace
Take my heart, go on take it away
I’ve got nothing to say

Take away this sense of regret
Take the things I need to forget
Take the mistakes I haven’t made yet
They’re all I have left

I don’t want to be the one who lets you down
All I did was run myself around
I wish I could have seen through your eyes
Maybe then I would have realized
I’m the only one who’s bleeding
For the things I never needed
The things I never needed

Take a good long look at yourself
Take the weight off everyone else
Take the hardest blow that was dealt
It’s all on your shoulders

I don’t want to be the one who lets you down
All I did was run myself around
I wish I could have seen through your eyes
Maybe then I would have realized
I’m the only one who’s bleeding
For the things I never needed
The things I never needed

I don’t want to be the one who lets you down
All I did was run myself around
I wish I could have seen through your eyes
Maybe then I would have realized
I’m the only one who’s bleeding
For the things I never needed
The things I never needed