Lounging again in McDonald's

[tariki]

Back in McDonald's (have I ever been away?) and some workman is repairing some piece of electrical set-up. Quite a shrieking of electric drilling, and it makes a change from children screaming. 

Well into pop biographies at the moment and one quote caught my eye...

I have always believed that rock ’n’ roll comes down to myth. There are no “facts.”  (Lester Bangs, in "Rod Stewart")

Not actually reading a Rod Stewart biography, but the quote was from another book sampled. No "facts". It makes me think of the art of translation......and it is an art. Samuel Beckett apparently suffered much as he sought to translate his own works, written in French, into English (or vice versa) Sometimes he gave up the job as impossible. Very easy to translate "the cat sat on the mat" but when you get down to nuances of expression within one language to translate/express the self-same thought/feeling into another becomes a daunting task. The implications of all this is far reaching. I leave it to you. 

For me it relates to "judgement", particularly of others. Reflect upon this:-

It’s difficult to be a legend. It’s hard for me to recognize me. You spend a lot of time trying to avoid it…. The way the world treats you is unbearable…. It’s unbearable because time is passing and you are not your legend, but you’re trapped in it. Nobody will let you out of it except other people who know what it is. But very few people have experienced it, know about it, and I think that can drive you mad. I know it can. I know it can. (James Baldwin, interviewed by Quincy Troupe)

It's difficult to be anybody in this world, where "hell is other people". In a preface to a bio of Elvis Presley I found this:-

“Suspending moral judgment is not the immorality of the novel,” Milan Kundera wrote in what could be taken as a challenge thrown down to history and biography, too. This suspension of judgment is the storyteller’s morality, “the morality that stands against the ineradicable human habit of judging instantly, ceaselessly, and everyone; of judging before, and in the absence of, understanding.” It is not that moral judgment is illegitimate; it is simply that it has no place in describing a life.

To be honest, thoughts on this bring me to tears, still being emotionally raw from ditching anti-depressants (into the second week now)

We are all living "lifes" and the judgements are terrible at times. "Judge not, lest you be judged". So true. We can know ourselves in the judgements we make of others, and we can therefore stand condemned while the one we judge rests in the mercy and grace of Reality.

But whatever, back to the biographies. Reading one on Charlie Watts at the moment. A good man, beautifully flawed as we all are......" there is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in" as Leonard Cohen sings in "Anthem". Just stop trying to make a perfect offering! 

As Keith Richards, his bandmate, said:-

He was a very private man. I always had the feeling that I wouldn’t necessarily step over or enquire about something, unless he wanted to talk about it. There was no side on him, there was no act to follow. Charlie was just what you got, which was Charlie. He was the realest guy I ever met.

So Charlie was just Charlie, which says it all, or says nothing. Take your pick. 

PS One story from the book made me laugh, about Keith Richards in his library, on steps reaching and stretching up to get a book on anatomy by Leonardo da Vinci from the shelves. He slipped and did his collar bone. Keith reports that while he never got the book, he learnt a lot about anatomy! 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 17 by tariki

[tariki]

Back in McDonald's. Sunday afternoon, my morning chores done. Washing my loved one's feet, putting out the week's rubbish (all this recycling makes it a job for rocket scientists, trying to work out just where each minor bit of debris goes. We have 5 different containers outside in the yard. It takes great dedication trying to save the world from oblivion) then getting our towels washed and dried in the communal laundry room, where fisty cuffs threaten if the machines are all being used - particularly if I'm faced with a smaller resident incapable of self-defence. Then cooking sunday dinner. We now have some yorkshire puddings in the freezer, which we call "dog's dinners" - which started a few years back when one resident who could afford some serious dinning at local restaurants spoke of liking a good yorkshire pudding, and referred to the "stick 'em in the oven" type as unfit to give to a dog. Me and my loved one caught each other's eye and kept quiet about the 10 for 50p yorkshires we got at the local Tesco's. Now we just call them "dog's dinners" without really thinking about it. 

 "Are the dog's dinners in" or "don't forget the dog's dinners".

Now we are more affluent and buy the Aunt Bessies variety, 10 for £2. Very nice.

This reminds me of another term of endearment we have, for a guy who has an apartment in our retirement complex who we call "unsuitable". When he first arrived our resident Christian lady, a bit prim and proper, whispered to us in the communal lounge that just perhaps he was "unsuitable" for our home. Not sure exactly why she thought this, maybe she had seen him with his fly's undone. Not sure. But whatever, ever since, when we see him walking by we say "there goes unsuitable". Well, it takes all sorts I say.

I really am waffling. I'm onto my chocolate milk-shake now.

 

Recommended, if only for your dog:-

(Just remember that the empty packaging must go into the correct re-cycling container at your local large supermarket. By no means must it go into the plastic recycling just outside your apartment in the yard)

 

Edited April 21 by tariki

[tariki]

Just thinking lately of another song, "The One I Love" by David Gray. I seem to remember mentioning it before somewhere, but at my age the memory is sometimes not what it used to be - some say it is the first thing to go, for me it is the second.

I'm trying to learn it on my guitar, simple chords, quite easy, and I will add to my repertoire of "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" and "The Wheels On the Bus". I first heard the song when on the night shift at Wilko's, when I was a Stock Replenishment Executive (AKA Shelf Filler) They played a tape each night and we all had our favorites. We all joined in with "We Gotta Get Out Of This Place" and "Do You Wanna Be In My Gang" (don't mention the name of the artist Pike!) We all dreaded the Christmas tape, which being in the retail trade, would start early November, two months after the first Xmas stock came in.

 

 

 

But I'm waffling again, in McDonald's with my coffee. But yes, "The One I Love", which I liked, and not listening intently to the lyrics - concentrating instead on making sure the AnuSol was placed on the correct shelf and aisle - took to be a simple "boy meets girl" love song. "You're the One I Love" yeah, yeah, yeah. Then some of the lyrics started to penetrate my mind/heart, words about bullets whispering through the grass, and tracers in the sky, of blood leaking out.

 

 

 

 

So I looked up the lyrics, and its about a guy breathing his last on some battlefield (take your pick, there's plenty to choose from) and with his dying breath his vision is not of heavens or hells, but of his first dance with his loved one, holding hands on the old dance floor. Or maybe his last dance. Gut wrenching, and now two weeks into kicking my anti-depressants, tear jerking. But somehow, strangely, tears more of affirmation than despair. Anyway, here is the song....

Gonna close my eyes
Girl and watch you go
Running through this life, darling
Like a field of snow
As the tracer glides
In its graceful arc
Send a little prayer out to ya
'Cross the falling dark

Tell the repo man
And the stars above
That you're the one I love, yeah

Perfect summers night
Not a wind that breathes
Just the bullets whispering gentle
'Mongst the new green leaves
There's things I might have said
Only wish I could
Now I'm leaking life faster
Then I'm leaking blood

Tell the repo man
And the stars above
That you're the one I love
You're the one I love
The one I love

Yee hee, yee hee

Don't see Elysium
Don't see no fiery hell
Just the lights up bright, baby
In the bay hotel
Next wave coming in
Like an ocean roar
Won't you take my hand darling
On that old dance floor

We can twist and shout
Do the turtle dove
And you're the one I love
You're the one I love
The one I love

Yee hee, yee hee

 

Not sure about the "yee hee, yee hee" bit, just might leave it out when I try entertaining the grandkids.

Who is the "repo man"? I see it as that love cannot be repossessed. Love is the hidden ground in which we live and move and have our being. Someone once said that love is the reason that there is something rather than nothing, and another (Meister Eckhart) said that "love has no why". So tell the repo man to stuff it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Make of that what you will, meanwhile maybe think of the things "you might have said" to your own loved ones, and say them. Before you're shot down.