Alexandersmap

    Category: Music

    • The Changes You Take Yourself Through

      Everybody needs a change
      A chance to check out the new
      But you’re the only one to see
      The changes you take yourself through
      – Stevie Wonder, Don’t You Worry About A Thing

      In New England, October is the time of tangible, visible change. The world transforms around you in such strikingly obvious ways that even the most inward-facing among us look up and see it. The days get shorter and darker, the air crisp and demanding of attention, and of course the leaves paint the landscape in an explosion of color. No wonder this is the time of year most people who live here point to as their favorite.

      It seems a good time to celebrate change. The incremental changes we see around us are also happening within us. We grow incrementally better or worse, depending on our focus and applied effort. And because we’re humans you might make tangible progress in one area while you slide a bit sideways in another. Such is life.

      When you write and publish every single day you force yourself to become a keen observer. And you become more efficient in putting thought to paper (or onto the screen and whatever database in the Cloud they take up residence in). Sometimes you’re the only one to see the changes you take yourself through, and sometimes a percentage of the world takes notice. The only part that’s important is that you take yourself through it to see where you go next.

      Change. We get so caught up in getting there that we forget to celebrate here. Dance in the moment that you recognize that life is this short wonderful eruption of thought and emotion and transformation. Maybe turn the volume up a bit more today. For there’s urgency in the air. Celebrate where you are. You’ve come so far already.

    • You Only Need to Know

      “Great minds have purpose, others have wishes. Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortunes; but great minds rise above them.” – Washington Irving

      Washington Irving was right on the mark with this observation. Imagine if he’d lived to see people staring at their phones all day? There are so many distractions today, and never enough rising above them. So it seems anyway.

      But there are plenty of people living with purpose. People who are driven to succeed in the path they’ve chosen for themselves. The trick is to find that purpose and focus on it like your very life depended on it. For in so many ways, it does.

      You know it’s up to you, anything you can do
      And if you find a new way
      Well, you can do it today
      Well, you can make it all true
      And you can make it undo
      You see, ah-ah-ah, it’s easy, ah-ah-ah
      You only need to know
      – Cat Stevens, If You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out

      You only need to know what you want to do, your purpose, and then, well, you can do it today. At least begin to do it today. And isn’t that the tricky part? To stop telling yourself stories about what you are and go write a new story. Rise above the wishes and distractions and misfortunes that life stirs in our little pot and see just how far you can take this purpose of yours.

      Injecting clever quotes and catchy tunes into your day is one thing, but finding purpose and following it are another. The point here is that there’s so much noise in our lives that we never really listen to hear what our calling is. If you aren’t listening, you aren’t focused. And you miss the purpose as life noisily passes you by.

      Listen. Focus. Find a new way (yes, you can do it today).

    • More Than Just Names

      Sleeping beauty awakes from her dream
      With her lover’s kiss on her lips
      Your kiss was taken from me
      Now all I have is this
      – Bruce Springsteen, Countin’ On A Miracle

      Twenty years. I’m still here, just as I was that day, but everything has changed. What seemed important on the morning of September 11, 2001 disappeared from my mind when I heard Howard Stern, of all people, explaining what was happening at that moment in New York as I drove to a job that would be impossible to focus on for a long time afterwards.

      The world has changed since 9/11. We’ve all grown hardened by violence and war and angry rhetoric. It was our generation’s Pearl Harbor, and we were ready to lash out at all who would assault us so boldly. In so many ways we’re still lashing out, but much of it has turned inward. That unified country in the days after 9/11 is far from it now.

      We all felt the impact of that day, but nobody felt it more than the families and friends of those who died that day. Bruce Springsteen wrote the album The Rising shortly after 9/11. The lyrics quoted above resonate more for me than any other, representing all that was taken from so many that day. And it plays in my head now, twenty years after that day. As the bells ring in remembrance. And the names, so many names, are spoken one after another.

      During the Super Bowl in 2002, just months after 9/11, U2 performed as the halftime show. They sang MLK and Where The Streets Have No Name with a white banner scrolling the names of those lost on 9/11. I still can’t watch it without getting choked up, and I dismiss anyone who might venture to declare any other performance at a Super Bowl as more powerful or significant.

      These songs will always be my 9/11 soundtrack. They remind us that these were more than just names. They are lives interrupted.

    • The How of Things

      “We humans live in two worlds. First, there is the outer world of appearances—all of the forms of things that captivate our eye. But hidden from our view is another world—how these things actually function, their anatomy or composition, the parts working together and forming the whole. This second world is not so immediately captivating. It is harder to understand. It is not something visible to the eye, but only to the mind that glimpses the reality. But this “how” of things is just as poetic once we understand it—it contains the secret of life, of how things move and change.”
      – Robert Greene, Mastery

      You might read a paragraph like the one above with the eye of a scientist, seeing the truth through the lens of composition of matter and chemical reaction and such. You might read it through the eyes of a politician or businessperson, immediately grasping the backroom deals and favors that occur well before the headlines catch the attention of the public. Or you might read it with the eye of an artist, seeing the structure of the words themselves and how they spin magic in their unique assembly on the page. There is indeed poetry in the how.

      There’s a light that dawns when you see this other side of things, this secret sauce of how and why things are the way they are. Lessons learned through experience and intelligent observation and time invested in the questions of how. Some people receive the gift of a curious mind early in life and immerse themselves in the wonder of how, but most of us are too dazzled by the sleight of hand to focus on how the magician does the trick.

      There’s magic in the how. Watch Paul McCartney at a mixing board isolating bits of a Beatles song and you learn the intricate composition and experimentation that went into crafting it. The magic seems to sparkle on the surface, but it’s much deeper than you might hear in a first listen. The final product is an illusion built on layers of sonic novelty and gumption. The joy lies in discovering things you missed the first dozen times you heard a song.

      The magic lies in the mix. What we see on the surface is only the tip of the iceberg. Dive deeper into the how.

    • Follow the Trail and Scatter Light

      Man dreams one day to fly
      A man takes a rocket ship into the sky
      He lives on a star that’s dying in the night
      And follows in the trail, the scatter of light
      – U2, In A Little While

      There are moments in an album or a book or an evening when you recognize the magic. Emotion wells up in you, stirring and amplifying feelings, sending you to another place. A higher place, maybe, or a darker place should the moment direct you that way. I keep climbing to higher places, hoping the view is better. Hoping I’ll become better in the process. And some of it ends up here in this blog.

      U2 hit me a few times over with All That You Can’t Leave Behind. Opening with the hit, dropping in a mournful homage to Michael Hutchence and then the heart pounding Elevation. This was the U2 I’d missed in their experimental days of the late 90’s. These were songs that stuck with you. Ear worms if you will. And then they hit you with Walk On, which grabbed me by the throat waiting for a flight from LA to Boston. When Bono starts singing “Home, hard to know where it is if you’ve never had one” while sleepily waiting for a red eye flight home… well, I’ll never hear the song the same again.

      For all that, the second half of the album is admittedly weaker. And for me, In A Little While became the unconscious end. For it was this song that got that emotion welling, that stirred and amplified those feelings. When Bono sings “Slow down my bleeding heart” I’m right with him, and I know it hit others the same way. That’s the power of a moment.

      Bono stated at one of the concerts U2 recorded that Joey Ramone’s family told him In A Little While was the song that he listened to in hospice, which changed the song for Bono, the guy who wrote it, from a hung over dolt going home at the end of the night to something bigger. Something more meaningful. I never heard the song as anything but soul-stirring, which just goes to show, art might begin with the artist, but it becomes whatever the audience wants it to be.

      I think about that as I write. About reaching moments of emotional connection in my writing. About crafting something of depth and substance, something that amplifies that nugget of desire or fear or love in your soul. Surely I’m a work in progress, but still climbing. Following the trail and scattering light. Still dreaming of flying.

    • What Song Do You Hum to Yourself?

      I want to go all over the world
      And start living free
      I know that there’s somebody who
      Is waiting for me
      I’ll build a boat, steady and true
      As soon as it’s done
      I’m going to sail along in the dreams
      Of my dear someone
      – Gillian Welch & David Rawlings, Dear Someone

      There are bigger, more far-reaching songs on the classic album Time (The Revelator), but this one lingers in my head. It likely began with my interest in all things sailing and boats and travel. Or the lullaby rhythm of the song, which comes in handy when you have young children. I no longer have a boat of my own, having sold it off in relief several years ago. For that matter, I no longer have young children, as they begin their own adventures in places all over the world.

      When you want to start living free, what exactly do you want to be free of? Work? Or the life you’ve built around yourself, sturdy and strong, that locks you into a place and time in your brief go on this planet? Are we shaking off commitments and relationships of proximity in favor of the freedom of travel, or are we running from something in ourselves? Or maybe we’re seeking something that we aren’t finding where we currently find ourselves? Fair questions to ask before you set out in your vessel of choice. But never forget that you have that agency.

      A revelator is someone who reveals the will of God to the rest of us. We all decide what this God character is in our lives. We all have our stories about the world and our place in it. There is no better revelator than time, for it reveals within each of us the truth about who we are and where we want to go. Sometimes it reveals that what you’ve wanted most is what you’ve built around yourself. And that, maybe, what you’re seeking is already here.

      Every day I wake up
      Hummin’ a song
      But I don’t need to run around
      I just stay home
      And sing a little love song
      My love, to myself
      If there’s something that you want to hear
      You can sing it yourself
      – Gillian Welch & David Rawlings, Everything Is Free

      The world will open up once again, should we ride out this time and meet it. And then what? What boats are we building? Where do you go from here? Time will surely reveal it all to us, but let’s always remember that we have a bit of a say in the matter too. Over time, if we’re lucky, we learn to listen to the songs we hum to ourselves.

    • I’ve Loved Them All

      And in the end
      The love you take
      Is equal to the love you make
      – The Beatles, The End

      Which Beatles album is the greatest? The answer is different for most everyone, but it usually comes down to Rubber Soul, Revolver and Sgt. Pepper’s each wrestling for number one, with a couple of votes each for The Beatles (White Album) and Abbey Road. It’s a bit like asking which is your favorite child; you simply love them all as they are.

      The Beatles are always in the background of my life. Always. Born at the height of their popularity, you simply grew up listening to them. For those of us born “too late”, we missed out on the anticipation of a new album being released, for it was all out there when we began listening in earnest. When you’ve heard the later work, your jaw doesn’t drop quite as far to the floor when you listen to Rubber Soul. But you still appreciate the creative leap forward from Help! (a great album itself).

      All these places have their moments
      With lovers and friends I still can recall
      Some are dead and some are living
      In my life I’ve loved them all
      – The Beatles, In My Life

      Which is your favorite Beatle? This tells more about you than you might think. For me it was always George Harrison. The quiet Beatle. And for all the brilliantly prolific work of John Lennon and Paul McCartney, it was George who dropped some of the best songs into the mix of “best Beatles song”, which is close to impossible to determine.

      With every mistake, we must surely be learning
      Still my guitar gently weeps
      – The Beatles, While My Guitar Gently Weeps

      If George has 3-4 songs that ought to be in the mix for the best Beatles song, Lennon and McCartney had even more individually, and collaboratively co-wrote some of the greatest songs ever written on some of the best albums ever released. So how do you choose the best? Look at their solo careers? Here too, the ratio seems about the same.

      We could spend our lifetime debating such things or just agree that it was a brilliant run for the Fab Four. For this business of picking a favorite is nonsense. In the end we love them all.

    • Thinking How I’ll Feel When I Find…

      I deal in dreamers
      And telephone screamers
      Lately I wonder what I do it for
      If l had my way
      I’d just walk out those doors
      And wander
      Down the Champs Elysees
      Going cafe to cabaret
      Thinking how I’ll feel when I find
      That very good friend of mine
      I was a free man in Paris
      I felt unfettered and alive
      Nobody was calling me up for favors
      No one’s future to decide
      You know I’d go back there tomorrow
      But for the work I’ve taken on
      Stoking the star maker machinery
      Behind the popular song.
      – Joni Mitchell, Free Man In Paris

      I hear a big song like this one a bit differently today than I did as a kid. Then I just heard the bigness of the song, the sonic beauty akin to a wall of sound production. Joni at her highest point in her career with one of the great side ones (back when side one mattered a lot). Now my attention locks onto the freedom of going cafe to cabaret and running into friends along the way, which seems like a grand way to spin about in Paris. And so different from the day-to-day grind of making a living and seeing things through. And maybe that’s why it was so popular, more than the inside look at David Geffen from the perspective of one of his biggest stars and closest friends.

      At its root the song is a longing to break free from that daily grind, whatever ours happens to be, and to live that carefree life in lovely places. And that, friends, is the promised land. And doesn’t require a flight to Paris, as lovely as that might be for each of us. Being unfettered and alive is a state of mind achieved just as easily hiking the spine between bald mountain peaks or walking a quiet beach offseason as it is being part of the cafe and cabaret scene in the City of Lights.

      And the question is, how much is enough? When you’ve earned enough to not be homeless or hungry, what more do you need? The restlessness in this song is the thing that’s so identifiable for anyone who climbs those corporate rungs, thinking about how they’ll feel when they find… whatever it is they think is at that next level of accomplishment. That next status symbol that shows everyone that they’ve really arrived this time.

      Last year Geffen posted a controversial Instagram photo of his stunning yacht Rising Sun in the Grenadines with the sun setting behind as COVID raged and he “self-isolated”. You can see the beauty and smugness in that photo, all at once. As I understand it, that yacht takes 70,000 gallons of fuel and who knows how much in provisions. I wonder if he feels like he’s finally found whatever it was he was looking for?

      How much is enough? Most of us will never have a comparable yacht or a private island or a ticket on a luxurious flight into space with a billionaire. I’m not condemning those who chase for more, but I don’t particularly want that for myself. Because being unfettered and alive isn’t about accumulation or status, it’s about being happy with where you are and what you’re doing in this moment.

      Think how that might feel.

    • More to See for You and Me

      “From here to Venezuela
      There’s nothing more to see
      Than a hundred thousand islands
      Flung like jewels upon the sea
      For you and me”
      – Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, The Lee Shore

      I heard about a former coworker, a guy with Israeli good looks and intense blue eyes that no doubt closed many negotiations of the heart, who succumbed to COVID after months of treatment. Younger than me, far more energy with a passion for family, travel and technology, in that order. A whirlwind of energy and intellect and movement. Quietly receding from life in a hospital bed in Miami.

      Which once again reminds me that life is so very brief, and the years of fitness and energy are even shorter. So what do we do with our days? Fritter it all away in spreadsheets and conference calls? Watch other people live their lives on social media? Or do something with our own?

      We miss too many opportunities to dance with the forests and the waves and the sky for this business of living. This busyness of living. But is it really living or just staying busy? The game of deferred living is a tragic and fatal one indeed.

      My friend is a reminder of what the stakes are, what the stakes have been, and why we changed everything. And now? Now we are living in the time of the haves and the have nots. Are you vaccinated or not? If you are, let’s celebrate our faith in science and each other and dance with the world.

      There’s so very much more to do in this short life. A hundred thousand islands are just waiting for you and me. Out there, just beyond the horizon. Waiting for us to weigh anchor and go to them. Let’s go out and meet the world.

    • Forever is Our Today

      But touch my tears with your lips
      Touch my world with your fingertips
      And we can have forever
      And we can love forever
      Forever is our today
      – Queen, Who Wants to Live Forever

      This idea of living forever is tantalizing, isn’t it? It fuels our fascination with vampires and elves and superheroes, but I’m not sure it’s in our best interest to be immortal. We waste so much time already. Maybe time running out is a gift. as Jason Isbell wrote in his magical song I quoted last week. It does tend to focus us on the urgency of the moment, doesn’t it?

      There are advancements in science that offer legitimate hope for extending life 2-3 times longer than our current lifespan. Swap out a bit of DNA code for something better and become almost invincible. To cure all ills and live a healthy vibrant 150-200 years seems like pure fantasy, but there are people like Peter Diamandis with his company Human Longevity actively pursuing this now. Which makes you wonder, to what end?

      Will longevity become like plastic surgery for the truly vain, with constant adjustments and tweaks to our genetic code based on the latest blood work? Probably. Who wants to live forever? Plenty of people. And the wealthy have the means to chase it. If you want to be in the genetic engineering game you’d better be adept at accumulating wealth before the bill comes due.

      Will our pursuit of immortality lead humanity down unethical paths? There’s no doubt. Hostile governments are likely already working on superhuman soldiers with incredible strength and no fear. 60 Minutes recently aired a segment about foreign governments accumulating information about your DNA. We’re really just at the early stages of exponential growth in genetic engineering. Ethical questions abound.

      “It is naïve to imagine that we might simply hit the brakes and stop the scientific projects that are upgrading Homo sapiens into a different kind of being. For these projects are inextricably meshed together with the Gilgamesh Project… since we might soon be able to engineer our desires too, the real question facing us is not ‘What do we want to become?’, but ‘What do we want to want?’ Those who are not spooked by this question probably haven’t given it enough thought… Is there anything more dangerous than dissatisfied and irresponsible gods who don’t know what they want? – Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens

      Pretty heavy ethical questions right there. But fair to ask. What is the mission anyway? Perfection? Dominance? Immortality? To what end? There are plenty of selfish, irresponsible people who demonstrate every day that we can’t just trust people to do the right thing. If Sapiens detailed anything in fine detail, it’s that humanity has shoved aside questions about ethics and fairness at almost every step in our existence.

      So where does that leave you and me? There’s the shared wealth of knowledge we can lean on as science sifts through what works and what doesn’t. We all know to exercise more and eat more blueberries and kale. Are we really chasing immortality or just a healthier, more vibrant life in the time that we have? Better surpasses longer on the priority list, I should think. Why would anyone want to extend a miserable life indefinitely? To hold out for just one more Fast & Furious movie to see how it all turns out?

      What do we want to want? Yikes. Forever seems pretty attractive, but personally, I’d like to master today. Forego the maddening crush of distractions pulling you towards perfect smiles and perfect abs and the perfect family and just be incrementally better than yesterday. A good start would be to be fitter and sharper through good decisions and a little discipline. String enough good days together and maybe you have just enough life in the end. Immortality is folly. But we can have today.