Volume IV: The Return

I have so many jobs I sometimes forget which one pays...The ones that pain aren't so often the same.  I'm married, and he sits in the other room writing, and his music comes from a deep, spiritual place that I once misunderstood.  I champion the underdogs because I am one of them.  Channelling all of your being into a creative force means entering into a race with It.  Tell yourself you have a long way to go if you want a shot at being the best in the universe.

We pulled into the alley and had that "Is this the place?" conversation that lasts only seconds but feels like a waste of time.  When I climbed up out of the car, black and low-slung, I saw a black and white cat a few feet away and reached out to it.  Contrary to my current rural placement I was in a city, where cats fight not only nature for their lives, and it bit me.  Not a bad bite but it made me smile nonetheless.  Contrariness has made itself a theme in this life, and so many others, but you only want to contradict yourself for so long before you lose your glasses and have to start all over again.

The folk scene that had embraced us years before was warm and abounded with life's happiness.  They didn't need our help.  The punks and the higher-ups were similarly independent, and I found myself on a mission to find those in need.  The message has often been unclear but the messenger has always been apparent.  Take the rhythm of his and the message of hers and mix them up in a great mortar with the message of his and the rhythm of mine.  Each drop of water into the remains lubricates the communication, making it mobile.  Perhaps many of those in need are invisible to me, but I see them every now and again - they are the well-adjusted, intelligent, music-loving humans with love in their eyes and the whole world in their minds.  I am a muse, and that is as wondrous as it is terrifying, just as I chose the path without knowing the destination.

There are some lovely sights along the way - a rocking horse bobbing in the bed of a truck; a mystical sunset blanketing the cries of coyotes; cars pushing past us toward certain death on the highway seconds later; so many dead bodies and belongings of the deceased.  Karmic laws, or vibrations if you prefer, map out interactions as they are occurring, keeping you abreast of your own progress if you're willing to look.  

My favourite director walked into the cafe in Ontario where I spent my days behind the counter as a barista, one who pulls espresso shots and shoots the shit with all sorts of caffeine-addicted folk.   It is just as romantic as it sounds, and you end up cleaning toilets more often than you do making latte art and handing it to your idol.  The man who waltzed in with him was someone I loathed without merit, I felt annoyed by his presence and his demeanour until that day, when I realized - he is just unique.  He puts himself in unusual situations to be with artists, a lifestyle to which I could relate.  They were scouting locations for the anti-sequel to a favourite film of my youth, but I didn't know it.  I was too wrapped up in my recently completed second album, which seems to have been about telepathy and ecological warfare.  I was reading Thompson and Kerouac like we all do, but taking it in like no one else ever does.

He was coming through the doorway and I stared at his hat, at the crooked framed picture of old New Berlin on the wall, and his boots.  He smiled at me as his cohort introduced us - none was necessary - and I smiled and looked around for someone to share in my delight but my coworker friends were occupied or otherwise unaware of the momentous nature of this meeting.  Later, his companion, knowing about my band, asked me if I knew the rock starlet who would co-star in the film they were shooting.  I said I didn't, but I related to her, and we'd crossed paths.  He looked at me the way TV and movie producers always do.  I didn't have the words to express the impact that this occasion had on me for many years, and in fact, I'm surprised to find that I still don't.  Perhaps one day I will articulate further the joy I felt hosting my hero for a brief stay.  I didn't ask for anything, just gave him my word and my handiwork.  I hope he enjoyed that god damned coffee!

I found this path not knowing where it ends, and I shall not stray.