Sometimes a song comes to you. I wonder if they’re like food cravings, coming to you to fill a need you feel. Maybe they’re just reflections of states of mind, a mirror on the present, and a glance back at the past.
Today’s song was written and released by one of my all-time preferences, Bob Seger. Most of us have used that expression in retrospect about something or someone, saying, “Even now, I’d go to them, if I could.” “Even now, after all we went through, I still miss them.” Bob was always good about writing about relationships, looking back at them, and wondering.
That’s what this one is all about. I don’t have any suspicions ’bout why I’m streaming it in my head. Sometimes a song just comes to you.
I inadvertently type this post’s title as ‘Sunday’s Dream Music’. Last night was a dreams-on-parade night, with at least three vividly remembered dream. One most remembered moment had my wife and I leave the military service. We were following a friend. He took off and we got lost. Making a wrong turn, we entered a hot area of sandstone caves.
First, I had written about sandstone caves in my novel earlier in the week, so its dream presence intrigued me. Meanwhile, as my wife and I walked among the sandstone caves, I was saying, “I don’t think this is the right place. We took a wrong turn somewhere.”
Others were with us. They stopped to talk while I scouted ahead. As I did, I saw a huge cougar entering a sandstone cave. Hastening back, I got my wife’s attention and gestured her forward. Whispering, I said, “There’s a cougar up ahead. It went into that cave.” Pointing, I went on, “We’re definitely on the wrong track.” As I did, the cougar walked out of the cave, prowled around for a second, and then turned and continued.
We backtracked to a highway. As soon as we reached the highway, I saw a large shopping center. “I think that’s where we need to go,” I said, and led on. Yes, I found the store where my friend had gone, a Giant Eagle Supermarket. From a cougar to a giant eagle. That cracked me up today as I reflected on the dreams.
Once I’d thought about the dreams for a time and started doing other things, my stream delivered Madonna’s 1987 hit about love, dreaming, and sleeping, “La Isla Bonita”.
I’m streaming the original Beatles’ version of “With a Little Help from My Friends” (1967). Don’t know. My streaming began with Ringo singing the third verse.
“Would you believe in love at first sight?”
“Yes, I’m certain that it happens all the time.”
Why this, today? Don’t know. Some inhibitor breakdown in the stream, a word caught in the wind, a flash in the brain, or maybe a neuotransmitter collision. I usually imagine my neurotransmitters as little sports cars racing through my head on beautifully constructed highways and country roads. Lately, though, ala Sim City, my neuro landscape is more like a hot and humid city under constant expansion, construction, and repair. There’s a lot of jackhammer and bulldozer noise. Big rigs transport loads of information as commuters struggling to get to work in their part of the brain creep along in traffic.
I don’t know what triggered what filters on my mental streams this morning to be streaming this song. Dreams? Yes, I had several vivid dreams that I recall. Stress? Don’t think so as I don’t seem stressed today. Cats, food, mineral deficiency, too much of a mineral or vitamin?
I don’t know. The human body is a mysterious beast without a decent, modern diagnostics button. Something may have mis-fired, or it all worked exactly as planned. Either way, I’m now streaming “Lovefool” by the Cardigans (1996) on an infinite loop. Posting about it usually stops the loop, so…here we are.
Something mellow popped into my head yesterday. I’d finished some yardwork and was enjoying the warm late afternoon air. The temperature, sunlight, humidity, and silence combined into a rarefied sense of relaxation. “Groovin'”, the Rascals’ hit from 1967, began wending through my memory stream.
Thinking about the song reminded me of an incorrect lyric where people sang, “Life would be ecstasy, you and me and Leslie.” Everyone wondered, “Who is Leslie?” Leslie was “endlessly” misheard as Leslie. It’s a fun mondegreen, innit? I like singing Leslie instead of endlessly because it makes me laugh inside. Yes, I’m a simple-minded guy.
Hope you soon have some sunshine and time to relax and do some groovin’. If you’re not sure how to groove, I can’t help you. I think it’s something that you need to grok.
I’m picking up good vibrations today. Spring has sprung. Tulips and daffs are fading, shedding, and drooping (sounds like I’m talking about my hair and body), but the rest of our area is richly green. Trees are coming into their fullness.
The vibrations could be coming from my coffee, though. Its rich smell triggers a wonderful vibration deep in my nethers. The taste accentuates it, and then, when that caffeine arrives, it’s like, take it home, baby.
Or, it could be the productive results of a good night of rest, some wild and interesting dreams, a pleasant morning work-out, or a contact air from the neighbors smoking some early morning marijuana.
There’s a good chance that it’s all these things. Whatev, the Beach Boys’ 1966 hit, “Good Vibrations”, immediately piled into the stream. Absolutely one of my favorite songs, I enjoy it for the multiple changes, the theremin’s use, the quick but delicate bass line, the harmonies, and the lyrics. It came out when I was ten years old as well, so I float back into some finer times when the melody is in my stream.
To begin, today’s song has an interesting video associated with it. Beginning with a clothed woman under water in the bathtub and held down by a breezeblock, you think, what? Then everything goes backwards, and the story is revealed, and it’s not what was expected.
The song hooked into my stream because the stream is fond of repetitive lyrics. The song’s final words go,
Okay, don’t know why the stream introduced this song today. See, the stream works in mysterious ways. See, right there, the stream immediately wants to flow with another song. Therefore, we’ll have *drumroll* A THURSDAY TWOfer.
First up, we have a 1964 entry, the Rolling Stones covering “Time Is on My Side”. As I wrote, I don’t know why I’m streaming it. I was eight when it came out, but I’m familiar with the song because I have seven or eight Stones CDs, and it’s on one or two of ’em. I don’t think my dreams prompted this stream. Dreams were strange — of course, yeah? — and included muddy water and male relatives from my wife’s side of the tree. Nothin’ ’bout time was featured, but it’s stuck in me head and must be released.
The second, almost naturally, has to be “Mysterious Ways” by U2 (1991). You see how that’s all connected, yeah? Sure.
Let it rock, let it roll. (And that triggered a THIRD song, but we’ll stop now.) Hope one of them works for your theme song today. If you got another, get yer ya-yas out, and let me know.
Perhaps it was the Notre Dame fire, or the moment late last night when I stepped out to a startlingly dark skin and a fantastic array of our starry universe. But later, I was found to be humming the 1988 song by The Church, “Under the Milky Way”.
Sometimes, when this place gets kind of empty
Sound of their breath fades with the light
I think about the loveless fascination
Under the Milky Way tonight
This one comes from old school disco by one of the greatest performers of that era, Donna Summer. I was thinking, “He works hard for his money.” I was being cynical after reading an article about a CEO – Jamie Dimon – and the millions he makes while his workers struggle to pay monthly bills. Dimon didn’t impress Rep. Katie Porter. Dimon, of course, is one of the saviors of the economic meltdown last decade. He’s also one of its architects by pushing for unfettered greed.
My mind has once again sidetracked me. Donna Summer came out with “She Works Hard for the Money” in 1983. It was a worldwide hit, subject to hours of airplay, so you may have heard it before, and incorporates all of classic disco’s elements, from the beat to the techno sound.
I thought it was an appropriate song for those Monday morning back to the grind blues.
