Running After My Hat

Ridiculous pursuits, matters solemn and less so

Pocketing the Key to Your Own Cage (or Not)

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(Yes, I know: a day late…)

From whiskey river (italicized portion):

[Skeptics, on why they dislike dogma] mean that the universe is itself a universal prison; that existence itself is a limitation and a control; and it is not for nothing that they call causation a chain. In a word, they mean quite simply that they cannot believe these things; not in the least that they are unworthy of belief. We say, not lightly but very literally, that the truth has made us free. They say that it makes us so free that it cannot be the truth. It is like believing in fairyland to believe in such freedom as we enjoy. It is like believing in men with wings to entertain the fancy of men with wills. It is like accepting a fable about a squirrel in conversation with a mountain to believe in a man who is free to ask or a God who is free to answer. This is a manly and a rational negation, for which I for one shall always show respect. But I decline to show any respect for those who first of all clip the bird and cage the squirrel, rivet the chains and refuse the freedom, close all the doors of the cosmic prison on us with a clang of eternal iron, tell us that our emancipation is a dream and our dungeon a necessity; and then calmly turn round and tell us they have a freer thought and a more liberal theology.

(G.K. Chesterton, from The Everlasting Man [source])

…and:

Three-fourths of philosophy and literature is the talk of people trying to convince themselves that they really like the cage they were tricked into entering.

(Gary Snyder [source])

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In Absentia

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It has been one hell of a week. Not a bad one, but an extremely busy one.

And it’s not over yet. As it happens, I’ve been summoned to jury duty tomorrow. As these things go, most likely I will spend a good part of the day in an uncomfortable chair, actually waiting to be called upon — or not — as a real live jury member. But it threatens to jeopardize my regular Friday whiskey river-inspired post. I’ve worked on it some, but it’s not ready; I might but probably can’t wrap it up tonight or tomorrow morning. We’ll see.

In the meantime, please enjoy the music haunting me from the playlist of the moment: Patty Larkin, “Anyway the Main Thing Is” (lyrics below).

(It’s a shame that this is a static video: if you’ve never witnessed Larkin actually play the guitar, you’re missing the great pleasure of witnessing someone do effortlessly, yet perfectly, something she doesn’t even have to stop and think about.)

Lyrics:

Anyway the Main Thing Is
(by Patty Larkin)

I took the train
Just for the view
I took my boyfriend’s last name
For something to do
I took advice
Now I regret it
I took my time
Cause I could get it

I shook my head
And it woke me up
I shook a strange hand in my bed
And that was enough
I shook the truth
Out of the tree
It shook my faith up good
But it satisfied me

Anyway the main thing is
Regrooving the dream
Regrooving the…

Love doesn’t think
Love doesn’t look
Love takes a flying leap off the brink
Love swallows the hook
Love doesn’t sleep
Love is out of control
Love is only human it can swallow you whole

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For Lack of Better Words

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[Image: “Zip Your Lips,” from A New Me’s photostream at Flickr]

From whiskey river (italicized portion):

The Peninsula

When you have nothing more to say, just drive
For a day all around the peninsula,
The sky is tall as over a runway,
The land without marks, so you will not arrive

But pass through, though always skirting landfall.
At dusk, horizons drink down sea and hill,
The ploughed field swallows the whitewashed gable
And you’re in the dark again. Now recall

The glazed foreshore and silhouetted log.
That rock where breakers shredded into rags,
The leggy birds stilted on their own legs,
Islands riding themselves out into the fog.

And then drive back home, still with nothing to say
Except that now you will uncode all landscapes
By this; things founded clean on their own shapes
Water and ground in their extremity.

(Seamus Heaney [source])

…and:

It’s impossible to say a thing exactly the way it was, because what you say can never be exact, you always have to leave something out, there are too many parts, sides, crosscurrents, nuances; too many gestures, which could mean this or that, too many shapes which can never be fully described, too many flavors, in the air or on the tongue, half-colors, too many.

(Margaret Atwood, from The Handmaid’s Tale [source])

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Sky-Blessed

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[Image: ‘Untitled, Hateruma-jima, Okinawa, 1971,’ by Shomei Tomatsu]

From whiskey river:

How to Grow Clouds

It takes a lot of work: it is necessary to weed very carefully, to toss out muck and small stones by hand, to kneel on the earth, bend over, dig about in the soil, water profusely, collect caterpillars, exterminate aphids, loosen the ground and serve the earth; when your back hurts from all this and you straighten up and look at the sky, you will have the prettiest clouds.

(Karel Capek, translated by Andrew Malcovsky)

…and:

Postscript

And some time make the time to drive out west
into County Clare, along the Flaggy Shore,
in September or October, when the wind
and the light are working off each other
so that the ocean on one side is wild
with foam and glitter, and inland among stones
the surface of a slate-grey lake is lit
by the earthed lightning of a flock of swans,
their feathers roughed and ruffling, white on white,
their fully grown headstrong-looking heads
tucked or cresting or busy underwater.
Useless to think you’ll park and capture it
more thoroughly. You are neither here nor there,
a hurry through which known and strange things pass
as big soft buffetings come at the car sideways
and catch the heart off guard and blow it open.

(Seamus Heaney, from The Spirit Level [source])

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Get to Know What Real Is

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From whiskey river (italicized portion):

People don’t realize how much they are in the grip of ideas. We live among ideas much more than we live in nature... I think a person finally emerges from all this nonsense when he becomes aware that his life has a much larger meaning he has been ignoring — a transcendent meaning. And that his life is, at its most serious, some kind of religious enterprise, not one that has to do with the hurly-burly of existence.

(Saul Bellow, from Conversations with Saul Bellow [source])

…and:

I
Don’t trace out your profile —
forget your side view —
all that is outer stuff.

II
Look for your other half
who walks always next to you
and tends to be who you aren’t.

(Antonio Machado, Moral Proverbs and Folk Songs)

…and (paired with the Bellow quote above):

That it doesn’t strike us at all when we look around us, move about in space, feel our own bodies, shows how natural these things are to us. We do not notice that we see space perspectively or that our visual field is in some sense blurred towards the edges. It doesn’t strike us and never can strike us because it is the way we perceive. We never give it a thought and it’s impossible we should, since there is nothing that contrasts with the form of our world. What I wanted to say is it’s strange that those who ascribe reality only to things and not to our ideas move about so unquestioningly in the world as idea and never long to escape from it.

(Ludwig Wittgenstein)

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The Object of My Affectation

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[Alfalfa, of the Our Gang comedies, sings of his love for sweet little round-faced, soft-focus Darla. And yes, I know: the song title doesn’t have that extra syllable in it. :)]

Whom, exactly, do you try to impress?

Note that I’m not asking about classes or groups of people. Most of us would like to be regarded favorably by our families and friends, our co-workers, the critics and audiences, and maybe even — ha ha — total strangers on the bus and in, ahem, Genuine Joe’s coffee shop (little in-joke there). And I know we’re not all “on” all the time, even the most determined poseurs among us: everyone has moments of utter un-self-consciousness, when our guard is down, we’re at our easiest and most natural, and we’re not actively evaluating what someone might think of us.

No, I’m just wondering, well…

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Monday Bounce

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I’m pretty sure I posted a link to this on Facebook and/or Twitter a couple months ago, when I first encountered it. For some reason it’s found its way back into my head today, and has been positively ringing there for the last several hours. When a song will simply not leave me alone, my solution is to just, well, listen to it. It goes away immediately. So, as much for my own sake as for yours…

Here’s “Don’t Worry, I’m Yours” — DJ Dain’s ingenious mashup of Bobby McFerrin’s “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” and Jason Mraz’s “I’m Yours.” (The ukulele accompaniment, as I understand it, actually makes this a three-way mashup: it came from a recording called “Wonderful World,” by the late Hawaiian musician Israel Kamakawiwo’ole.)

Lyrics to both songs are below, displayed side by side so you can (if you’re clever and, unlike me, somehow able not to get lost in the catchiness!) follow along with the interleaved audio.

Don’t Worry, Be Happy
(by Bobby McFerrin)

Here is a little song I wrote
You might want to sing it note for note
Don’t worry be happy
In every life we have some trouble
When you worry you make it double
Don’t worry, be happy

Ain’t got no place to lay your head
Somebody came and took your bed
Don’t worry, be happy
The landlord say your rent is late
He may have to litigate
Don’t worry, be happy
Look at me I am happy
Don’t worry, be happy

Here I give you my phone number
When you worry call me
I make you happy
Don’t worry, be happy

Ain’t got no cash, ain’t got no style
Ain’t got no girl to make you smile
But don’t worry be happy
Cause when you worry
Your face will frown
And that will bring everybody down
So don’t worry, be happy (now)

There is this little song I wrote
I hope you learn it note for note
Like good little children
Don’t worry, be happy
Listen to what I say

In your life expect some trouble
But when you worry
You make it double
Don’t worry, be happy
Don’t worry don’t do it, be happy

Put a smile on your face
Don’t bring everybody down like this
Don’t worry, it will soon past
Whatever it is
Don’t worry, be happy

I’m Yours
(by Jason Mraz)

Well you done done me
and you bet I felt it
I tried to be chill
but you’re so hot that I melted
I fell right through the cracks
Now I’m trying to get back
Before the cool done run out
I’ll be giving it my bestest
And nothing’s going to stop me
but divine intervention
I reckon it’s again my turn
to win some or learn some
I won’t hesitate no more, no more
It cannot wait, I’m yours

Well open up your mind and see like me
Open up your plans and damn you’re free
Look into your heart
and you’ll find love love love love
Listen to the music of the moment
baby sing with me
I love peace for melody
And It’s our God-forsaken right
to be loved love loved love loved

So I won’t hesitate no more, no more
It cannot wait I’m sure
There’s no need to complicate
Our time is short
This is our fate, I’m yours

Scooch on over closer dear
And I will nibble your ear

I’ve been spending way too long
checking my tongue in the mirror
And bending over backwards
just to try to see it clearer
But my breath fogged up the glass
And so I drew a new face and laughed
I guess what I’m be saying is
there ain’t no better reason
To rid yourself of vanity
and just go with the seasons
It’s what we aim to do
Our name is our virtue

But I won’t hesitate no more, no more
It cannot wait I’m sure

Well open up your mind and see like me
Open up your plans and damn you’re free
Look into your heart
and you’ll find that the sky is yours
Please don’t, please don’t, please don’t
There’s no need to complicate
Cause our time is short
This oh this this is our fate, I’m yours!
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Surprised by What You Want

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[Video above: “Rio,” by Hey Marseilles. Lyrics at the foot of this post.]

From whiskey river:

I feel as though I stand at the foot of an infinitely high staircase, down which some exuberant spirit is flinging tennis ball after tennis ball, eternally, and the one thing I want in the world is a tennis ball.

(Annie Dillard [source])

…and:

Born Thirty Years Ago

Thirty years ago I was born into the world.
A thousand, ten thousand miles I’ve roamed,
By rivers where the green grass grows thick,
beyond the border where the red sands fly.
I brewed potions in a vain search for life everlasting,
I read books, I sang songs of history,
and today I’ve come home to Cold Mountain
to pillow my head on the stream and wash my ears.

(Han-shan, Cold Mountain [source])

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The Steam Drill Only Made Nine (Lord, Lord)

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When my siblings and I were kids, at some point Mom and Dad bought us a huge collection of LPs of music of all sorts — a passive music-appreciation course, of sorts, for kids in a small town. The entire set arrived in a cardboard box which none of us (but Dad) could lift. Each album was enclosed in its own slim box, with its own little brochure full of lyrics and other notes. (One album came with an additional surprise: the one about orchestral music included a small, slender conductor’s wand.)

I sometimes wonder whatever became of that set. Some of the albums got broken, for sure, but it’s hard to believe they all did. Maybe they ended up in the homes of my adult sisters and/or brother, or maybe — less likely, but you never know — maybe they’re taking up space down in Mom’s basement.

On the other hand, I don’t wonder what happened to the music itself. It — much of it — remains stuck in my head.

Among the hoariest of complaints by an older generation (any older generation) about the younger are those about “the music nowadays.” I try to keep an open mind, myself; I’ve heard too much wonderful music by people decades younger than I am to do otherwise. But I do worry from time to time about the looooong golden thread of folk music… and the prospect that it may be in jeopardy.

Well, no, that’s not quite right. Not the music per se. Let’s say I worry about the future of the stories which the music tells, and the language in which those stories are told.

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Think You Know What’s Coming?

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From whiskey river:

If you knew what was going to happen, if you knew everything that was going to happen next — if you knew in advance the consequences of your own actions — you’d be doomed. You’d be as ruined as God. You’d be a stone. You’d never eat or drink or laugh or get out of bed in the morning. You’d never love anyone, ever again. You’d never dare to.

(Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin [source])

…and, from the whiskey river archives (the commonplace book):

How Much Happens in a Day

In the course of a day we shall meet one another.

But, in one day, things spring to life —
they sell grapes in the street,
tomatoes change their skin,
the young girl you wanted
never came back to the office.

They changed the postman suddenly.
The letters now are not the same.
A few golden leaves and it’s different;
this tree is now well off.

Who would have said that the earth
with its ancient skin would change so much?
It has more volcanoes than yesterday,
the sky has brand-new clouds,
the rivers are flowing differently.
Besides, so much has come into being!
I have inaugurated hundreds
of highways and buildings,
delicate, clean bridges
like ships or violins.

And so, when I greet you
and kiss your flowering mouth,
our kisses are other kisses,
our mouths are other mouths.

Joy, my love, joy in all things,
in what falls and what flourishes.

Joy in today and yesterday,
the day before and tomorrow.

Joy in bread and stone,
joy in fire and rain.

In what changes, is born, grows,
consumes itself, and becomes a kiss again.

Joy in the air we have,
and in what we have of earth.

When our life dries up,
only the roots remain to us,
and the wind is cold like hate.

Then let us change our skin,
our nails, our blood, our gazing;
and you kiss me and I go out
to sell light on the roads.

Joy in the night and the day,
and the four stations of the soul.

(Pablo Neruda; translation by Alastair Reid [source])

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