Today’s song choice is one the cats were singing to me this morning.
Oh, wait, I was singing it to them.
Yeah, do that a lot, sing to the cats. I was singing “A Cat Like You,” which is based on the Smithereens’ 1989 song, “A Girl Like You”.
I’d been talking to the ginger blade, which prompted the singing. I was telling him at the time, “You’re a unique cat.” Which he is, standoffish and sweet, wanting to be closer, unsure how to do it, galloping everywhere with a fanfare of trumpets (or some it seems from his posture).
Then, though, I thought, they’ve all be unique. Some were unique in ways that made you laugh, others had unique properties that made them lovable and sweet, and there were a few with exasperating uniqueness, tetchy and frustrating. A few packaged it all.
So, to the cats, and cats like them, always unique.
Tell me, again, how does this mind thing work? How do memories, dreams, events, and thinking interplay to bring other things up? I don’t have a grasp. I know I’m young, just in my sixties, but I do want to know.
Take this morning. Up and busy with cat attentions (this is where the cats gather to ensure that I’m going to feed them, and the head floofherder guides me to the write location by tapping my legs with a helpful paw, or darting across my path when I turn the wrong way). Not thinking of much, to be honest. Hadn’t had coffee, was drinking hot water.
I guess, if anything, I was thinking, “Oh, sunlight! And it’s not even eight! Yea!” And I was thinking, “Spring ahead with the clock soon, yea.” (And then doing the comparisons; so if it’s seven now, this will be what it’s like at eight, right?”
Into all of this came a song. As the sound entered my stream, I thought, hey, I know that song. That’s “Tubular Bells”. Theme music for the The Exorcist.
Song and movie came out in 1973. The movie was Oscar nominated and much talked about. It terrified people, and they wanted to talk about it. They were talking about it in restaurants and parties, cars and houses, on the radio and television. It was non-stop Exorcist.
“Tubular Bells”, by Mike Oldfield, was everywhere, too. The real question is, why did it make the jump from early 1970s memories to active placement in the stream today.
Guess it’s a haunting melody (heh, heh).
Any of you out there in netland familiar with this movie and song?
This song, “Goodbye Stranger”, arrived in the stream after watching people at the coffee shop and on the streets, and inadvertently eavesdropping (they speak, I have ears…it happens).
A woman regularly brings her dog into the coffee shop. She usually sits back by the community table, where I like to work when I can. Her dog is often a cause for conversations with others. So I’ve learned that her dog is a rescue from an animal hoarding situation, that she’s had to work with him, that his name is Atlas, that he does much better now, but that other dogs’ barking makes him nervous, that he is her service dog. I’ve learned others had dogs like him, or saved from similar situations. He’s often compared to a Ridgeback but he isn’t one, not a true Ridgeback, she says.
But I’ve never heard her name, or why she needs a service dog, nor why she is bald. She wears dark glasses, but she watches people, back from her space by the wall, with her service dog beside her…
I’ve decided that I don’t want coffee shop friendships. I’m there to work. Cruel of me, innit? So I keep myself to myself, but as I leave each time, I feel her eyes watch me, and imagine I turn my head and say, “Goodbye, stranger.”
But I don’t. It has caused the 1979 Supertramp song to find itself in my stream.
I was working at the community table yesterday in the coffee shop. Another couple joined me. Plenty of space, no prob.
The community table is usually used by people powering up ‘puters. This company were only sitting and chatting. They were to my left. She was closer. He was keeping his voice low and demonstrating a pensive, almost furtive air, as if afraid of being overheard.
I don’t pay them — or anyone at the table — much attention; I’m there to do my thang. But I do often hear on some level. It’s part of the background blend of the coffee house business environment. He was complaining about another woman, and what she said and did. (Wife? Sister? Friend?) Whatever she did (his voice dropped into the bowels of softness when he addressed this) had him very upside. (Mother? But he looked in his fifties..) (Co-worker?)
Then the woman said, “You and I know what she will do, and does do. Others won’t know until they experience.”
“I still need to warn them.”
“I know, I understand, I understand.”
Drinks were consumed in silence for a little time. (Ah, secrets. Insights. The things that we know that others don’t.)
I left soon after (nothing to do with them, just finished for the day). Walking along, thinking about my writing, etc., (clouds were moving in, and the sun’s heat was missed), I slipped back onto her comment, “You and I know.” That planted the seed of an old Dave Mason song, “Only You and I know”.
I had to think a while as I walked about what year that song must’ve come out. Fitting it into my personal history, I struggled – ’69, ’70, 71? Had to wiki it upon my return: 1970.
That prompted a death check to confirm Dave Mason is still kicking (he is, seventy-three years old). I enjoy the song (along with the Bonnie and Delaney version) but haven’t heard it in a looonnng time. So I fixed that last night, and share it with you today.
Walking yesterday afternoon and admiring the light on the hills (not much snow on Grizzly, bummer, we need more snow in the mountains, wonder how the snow pack is in the Sierra Nevadas) (I should check) (mental note, search for snow pack update) (it is February, and that’s when they usually come out) (and March), I thought one piece of sky and landscape looked like a silver bowl of light.
‘Silver bowl of light’ is a line used in “Suddenly I See” by KT Tunstall (2005). “Suddenly I See” was suddenly in my stream, where it managed to survive a night of dreams (one about eating chocolate cake) (funny, another dream about eating cake) (what’s that all about?) and into the morning, officially earning the title, “This Morning’s Earworm”.
So, passing it on so that it may escape my mind. Cheers
Once again, I get up, begin the day, and develop an earworm. My morning earworms are frequently related to my dreams or my thoughts. A third category consists of songs that leap in. I suspect that I heard reference to them or part of them in passing and they snuggled into the folds of my mind until a quiet moment arrives when they can burst through into my stream.
(It’s odd how word association will cause a flash-in of another song; in this case, I had been about to write, ‘break through’, which triggered “Break on through to the other side”.) (Remember that one? Jim and The Doors? The 1960s?).
This morning’s streaming song is out of 1968. I didn’t know who performed it; Google and Wikipedia revealed it was The Foundations (I only remember them slightly). So, here’s this morning’s flow, “Build Me Up, Buttercup”.
This one came into the stream out of nowhere. I call it nowhere, but it’s connections in my brain, innit? Sometimes, the how and why of deliveries to the stream is self-evident; other times, the connections are deep or nebulous, or too esoteric for the conscious mind to easily hunt down.
Either way, I like to go with the flow. So, today, from 1970, we have John Fogerty with “Long As I Can See The Light”. It’s post CCR, but an interesting cover, from 2010.
Just from the line, “Don’t look back in anger, I heard you say, at least no today,” I began streaming Oasis and “Don’t Look Back in Anger” (1996). I like the song but some of the rhymes don’t make sense. It’s like several different stories and perspectives are being shared, and none are finished.
But to not look back in anger is my takeaway for today.
This song is arrives from memories that my dream about Mom’s house stirred.
After thinking about the dream and remembering the period, I recalled a return visit. I’d brought some tapes to listen to. One was Uriah Heep, which had the song, “Sweet Lorraine” on it. I enjoyed the album and song, but the Moog synthesizer Uriah Heep used took Mom aback.
I claim to so vividly remember her listening and asking, “What is that?”
I answered, “It’s music,” because I knew she was referring to the synthesizer. It wasn’t the first time she’d questioned my music, always with a mild scowl, but never a demand to turn it off. (Turning it down was often requested, though.)
She, as expected, answered, “That’s not music,” which made me laugh. Her subsequent eye roll (she’s a master at it) increased my laughter.
So, for Mom and old times, Uriah Heep with “Sweet Lorraine” from 1972, when I was sixteen. Side note: David Byron, the lead singer, was another who died too young, 37.
Today’s music was brought to me by the muses. That’s my assumption.
See, I’d finished walking, and arrived at the coffee shop. Beginning to unpack my ‘puter stuff, set up, plug in, and turn on, I thought, time to rock. In response, “We Will Rock You” by Queen (1977) kicked into my stream. I decided it was my muses (sounds like a stadium full of them in there today) singing to me.
With a song like that, I expect an interesting writing session, good or bad. Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 