Bluebird

Scores of reasons to think about the Bluegrass this week:  the NCAA tournament, the spring meet at Keeneland, and notes from cousins and friends who call Kentucky home. 

One note about a bus ride brought back an acoustic memory of my ride on a Blue Bird bus.  In fourth grade my family moved from the parish boundaries of St. Athanasius Church to a more pastoral area by the apple orchards on Fegenbush Lane.  We weren’t the only family to make that move, and the parish elders did some "gerrymandering" to retain some of the flock.  That redistricting necessitated some long bus rides to and from school.  In 1976, my rides were on a Blue Bird bus. This video about the making of Blue Bird buses says no two of the corporation's buses are alike (really?), but mine was special because there was an awesome stereo on board. The bus driver, a gentle soul with curly hair and sparkling blue eyes, really liked the song “Bluebird,” and I heard it daily on his Blue Bird bus.

Hadn’t really thought of that song in a while, but it flew into my heart with some others this week.  Happy surprise. Those who know me know I prefer Mick and Keef to Paul and Linda. Yet Paul and Linda's lyrics inspired more work on my piece of creative writing about anam cara. John O’Donohue writes about this special soul friend connection in his book Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom: “Often secrets are not revealed in words, they lie concealed in the silence between the words or in the depth of what is unsayable between two people.”  My friend Scrappy Jud Newcomb touches on this connection in his song “Space Between,” (“What the fearless heart has seen/It lives in the space between/ The once and future king and queen”), and that song makes me think of another Celtic term, thin place, a portal to access a magical realm.  Although finding thin places, let alone parking spaces, can be a strain in today’s world of cement, bards can still point the way. 

The bards Paul and Linda inspired me to write more about the magic of love in my novel manuscript yesterday, ironically just in time for some Cardinals to turn Kentucky blue (bluebirds!) for the NCAA games. The final game might transport some Kentuckians to Bluegrass bliss. Ultimately, the soul friend holds the key for the journey beyond the Bluegrass.

Late at night when the wind is still/

I’ll come flying through your door/

And you’ll know what love is for

-“Bluebird,” Paul and Linda McCartney

April Fools

Yesterday I was doing a little spring cleaning and dusted off My Acoustic Memory. In observation of this great national holiday, April 1^st, Rufus Wainwright rings in “April Fools” for us on the MAM blog.

Today as I look at my copy of Rufus’s eponymous CD, I don’t find any newspaper clippings or other souvenirs stuffed in the jewel to remind me how it landed in my collection.  My favorite Houston station KPFT played lots of Loudon Wainwright, and they likely plugged Rufus.

In 1998, the year of the CD’s release, Queen Elizabeth II knighted Sir Elton John, who apparently calls Rufus the “greatest songwriter on Earth” per this Amazon reference. That same year I saw Rufus and his sister Martha at a little acoustic venue on Richmond Road in Houston.  I distinctly recall having my toes stepped on by too many teenagers who arrived late but intent to stand right in front of a young Rufus.  Beck and I had arrived early, in spite of stopping by Taqueria La Tapatia, as was the custom when traveling down Richmond Road, usually on the way to the Menil Collection.

I didn’t like Martha’s vocals so much that night but find them interesting on this recent video of the song “April Fools.” The lyrics on some of the other songs of the CD like “Imaginary Love” keep Elton John from playing the fool with his bold claim.

Cause every kind of love, or at least my kind of love/

Must be an imaginary love to start with /

Guess that can explain the rain, waiting walking game/

Schubert broke my brain to start with

The CD sat in my teenage daughter’s room for years in Chapel Hill, Loudon’s hometown.  I was surprised to find it on my shelf today but certainly happy to have it in my possession on April Fools.

But in the stars and closer to home in any planet/

It ain’t hard for me and dear JoJo to see/

That you will believe in love/

And all that it’s supposed to be

-Rufus Wainwright, “April Fools”

Women Be Wise

This year I’m going to be a wise woman and say what I want. I’m telling y’all what to send me for Christmas cause I want to make it easy on everybody.  So hurry Santa, here’s my list, along with the song that made me want the CD:

Raul Malo, Today, “Let’s Not Say Goodbye Anymore”

Lavelle White, Miss Lavelle, “Tin Pan Alley”

Glenn Campbell, See You There, many songs including “Galveston”

Beulah (Sippie) Wallace,  Blues Legend, “Women Be Wise”

Check out Sippie’s version of “Women Be Wise” and compare it to Bonnie’s cover.  Bonnie Raitt produced Sippie’s album, Sippie.  (I’m smart like that because I listen to KDRP out of Dripping Springs, Texas.) I was still in college when Sippie died so I never got to see her sing live.

I just saw Lavelle sit in with the Resentments this summer at the Saxon Pub.  Correction, she did not sit even though Plank offered her a chair.  She wanted to stand and strut.

Now women be wise/
Keep your mouth shut/
Don't advertise your man

Sippie Wallace, "Women Be Wise"

I'll Tell You What I Want, What I Really, Really Want

New chapter in the MAM blog.  I have a milestone approaching.  I’m about to become a woman of a certain age with a zero behind it. On Christmas.

Today Johnny Goudie, the Cuban-American music phenom who brings you the incomparable podcast "How Did I Get Here?"  posted an Esquire article about music.  It’s worthless.  We don’t have to pay for it anymore.  Musicians don’t make enough to buy mayonnaise much less a mansion.

Help me help myself.  No, help me help musicians.  I want music for my birthday.  Want to know what to get me for my birthday?  Music.  Tune into the blog between now and Christmas and I’ll drop you a major hint about what I want for my birthday. Please give me a CD for my birthday.  Now I’m begging.

Some of these CDs I’ll be asking for in upcoming blog entries are ones I used to have.  Some of the CDs I want will replace albums my parents sold at yard sales so they could pay for my college education (back when proceeds from an album could pay a tuition bill).  Sob.  Some will replace music  I gave to friends. 

Please send me a CD.  Don’t worry if someone else sends a duplicate.  I’ll put it into the hands of a friend who also needs music.  These CDs will not go to waste, I assure you.

Some of my requests will make you scratch your head.  She wants that?  I can already hear Dan Ardia saying, “That’s derivative crap!” Well, yes, Dan, some of it is, but it’s all about the acoustic memory on the MAM blog.  I’m taking a trip back in time.

Today I’m sitting on the bus in my acoustic memory.  In real time I was in CVS buying riboflavin for migraine prophylaxis (at a certain age, prophylaxis is required for less and less) and I heard this song from the 1980s.  Takes me back to a yellow school bus with a stereo.  The Centre soccer team was traveling to play a team from Eastern Kentucky. Those mountain women put bruises on our shins, and Joe Jackson slipped angst into our hearts.  Yes, I want Joe Jackson Night and Day.  Thank you, CVS for my acoustic memory.  

And while you’re making all my dreams come true, shop at CVS.  It’s in my retirement portfolio.

We are young but getting old before our time/

We’ll leave the TV and the radio aside/

Don’t you wonder what we’ll find/

Steppin out tonight?

Joe Jackson

"Steppin Out"

Mad About Men

I can’t stop watching that television show about the Madison Avenue advertising agency. You know, the one based in the 60s that chronicles Don Draper’s sorry life.

The harder they come, the harder they fall, and this bird fell late.  Season 6 marks my first year of indentured servitude on Sunday nights.

Did you hear that song on Mad Men?  What song, you ask.  Any song.  Think about it, what song do you remember hearing on Mad Men? I’ve dissected away the draw of scenes where folks smoke and drink ad lib. What remains are a few nice suits and some darn good songs. They’ve hooked me with the songs. It’s acoustic memory central.

I just finished Season 1, and “My Special Angel,” (written by Bobby Helms but made known to me in the late 60s by the Pennsylvania group the Vogues) stands out as the most tongue-in-cheek song selection of the whole season. After learning that the neighbor threatened to kill the Draper dog if it attacks another one of his birds, we see Mrs. Draper in a pink peignoir, coiffed and manicured, of course, shooting the neighbor’s birds out of the sky with a shotgun while we listen to Bobbie Vinton sing “My Special Angel.”  

I can hardly wait for the Season 6 finale tomorrow night.  I don’t care what Don Draper does.  I’m just in it for the songs.

You are my special angel/

Right from paradise/

I know that you’re an angel/

Heaven is in your eyes

“My Special Angel”

--Bobby Helms

She Came in Through the Bathroom Window

A bird flew into my bathroom this morning.  She gave me a quite a start when I entered the room and heard her fluttering about. The bird brain thought about nesting in my drying lingerie before trying to escape through a skylight.

I'd carelessly left the window open after taking some photos of pink blossoms. But really the mistake was all hers.

The moral of the story is don't fly into every open window, especially when the beauty of the tree outside trumps the beauty of the woman inside with the broom.

She came in through the bathroom window/
Protected by a silver spoon/
But now she sucks her thumb and wanders/
By the banks of her own lagoon

"She Came in Through the Bathroom Window"
--J. Lennon, P. McCartney

Naked Eye

What’s the worst thing you’ve ever seen?  Don’t think about this too long.  The worst you’ve ever seen.

Now, is that image worse or better than the image of a child who has been shot at close range with a semi-automatic weapon?

Michael Moore’s suggestion that photos of the Sandy Hook victims should be released is being criticized, and Fox News, of course, is stating that the Sandy Hook parents object.  But we know that may not be uniformly true because one mother took the governor by the hand and led him to her son’s casket. Fox couldn't reach that parent.

When I saw victims of drunk drivers at the state medical examiner’s office in Louisville, and when I sat at my microscope at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center diagnosing lung cancer, I often thought, if only everybody could see this. Seeing is believing there should be a change. Seeing firsthand is sensing the gravity of the problem, sensing it right down to your curling toes. 

If legislators could see victims of mass slayings with a naked eye, would they be more inclined to ban assault weapons?  That’s an interesting question that Veronique Pozner posed before Michael Moore.  But given the averted massacre at the University of Central Florida this week, it’s a question I hope we can answer sooner rather than later.

With my naked eye/

I saw all if I said it all/

I could see

“Naked Eye,” Jill Cunniff