Tweeter-de-deedily Deet

Why I'm doing this remains unclear. What I hope to achieve (I must needs always have goals) remains unclear. But I'm Twittering, even though it sounds more like a bird with Turrets than a social networking fad. This coming from the man who rails ceaselessly against the social-isms Facebook and MySpace. 

Actually, I think Twittering is more of an onomatopoeia. But, of course, you only hear it when the Fairy Godmother's out back changing your year-old rotting pumpkin from Halloween into a sleek ride to the ball. So odds are you're not familiar with the Twittering sound itself (cf. "Bedknobs and Broomsticks").

I think, at the least, it will provide fodder for this blogger. For longer exposes on the things that are really close to being nothing at all. Now all my ideas could have the uniting quality of lasting value! Well...  with a little help from my Fairy Godmother anyway (who, is, as it turns out, is not much older than me and had the unfortunate lack of foresight to sell some of her stocks high. Not all of them mind you. So she's not out on the street or anything. But, well, she can't quite retire by the time it strikes midnight any more).

Let's see how this goes...

The Curious Case Of The Trash Can In The Wind Storm

I have a limited, sophomoric understanding of physics. But what happened last night seems impossible. The wind was strong all night. A great, unseen staccato of gusts shook the house, flickered the power, and moved my trash can. But not only moved it. Guided it through a Borgesian labyrinth to the front of the house, nestling it in a cement corner of the house and steps.

I have drawn this phenomenon to scale, with the Trash Can represented in light blue, and the two possible paths in black and yellow:

Now the black line is the course I believe the trash can took. The yellow line represents the more plausible course. However, this feels more implausible when one considers the dynamics of navigation required amidst the wind tunnel between the two houses, the degree of the right angle and lack of space between the two cars. However, the black line is also unlikely given the fact that the gate (two barn-type, shoulder-length doors), represented in brown, opens towards the cars and the space between the red car and the house, while enough exists, hardly merits the likelihood of successful of travel without setting off the car alarm.

Yet it did happen. And I, in my socks and t-shirt and jeans, pondered it at great length in the aria of wind singing around the house this morning. I traced the possible paths while holding the Trash Can. Measured the breadth of passage between all the necessary straits...

It is indeed a most curious case.

Singular Moments

As any parent can attest, there are singular moments that epitomize the inexorable joy of being a parent. Moments when the child shows some keen insight into life or expels some uncontainable excitement towards a surprise you worked laboriously. Many times these moments count coo on us. They sneak up. Catch us unaware.

I've shared many in these spaces. But hardly a day goes by without some small instance. Last night, for example, I was holding him in the dark, rocking in the chair, his head buried in my shoulder and a blanket. I was saying "I. Love. Isaac." He responded, at my prodding to he loves: "Love Dadda Momma." I love being a Dad.

But a most notable occurrence came over the weekend. I was away. I wouldn't see him until Monday AM. I knew I would miss him. I even took him to McDonald's for a Friday AM breakfast (he loves pancakes). Something I try to do every time there'll be a significant time lapse. He talks on the phone these days, but still only when it's convenient to him (again, I apologize to all of you he's called at 6:15am on a Saturday). But it's not the same.

Anyway, the entire time I was gone, the Mrs. said he asked constantly for Daddy. Looking all over the house, looking out the window, checking the bed. The Mrs. and Mrs'-Sis. were looking at some of his baby videos on YouTube. Some of those videos include me. And it was those videos that Isaac insisted upon watching over and over again. Now Isaac isn't a computer kid yet (though in another singular moment, he points at the computer and says "Apple"), merely taken to banging on the the keys -- especially the CAPS lock which emits a green LED light when depressed. But his insistence was emphatic. To the point where he sat for the better part of an hour (several times over the weekend) with the computer on his lap, in my recliner, rocking slightly, giggling, pointing out Dadda while watching and re-watching only the videos that included me.

A child's love is persistent and profound and utterly simple. And when it shows itself, in a smile, an expression, a hug, reality comes apart. Whatever Huckabee blanket is torn, from the top down, by these happenings, to think that another one, another child is coming who carries my love...

Working On A Review

My first Springsteen Album was The Rising. Then, for $10 bucks a few years later, I elected to go with a 4-disc Best of collection. Then I got Devils and Dust. Then The Ghost of Tom Joad, Nebraska, The Seeger Sessions and Magic. Finally: Working on a Dream. I'm a relatively late comer to Springsteen. So much so that for me to even claim The Rising is his best album might get me shot. 41 times too.

I liked Magic. Not at first. Not for a number of listens. And not for the reasons of it being overtly political. I know it is. But it doesn't sound political to me. Not when I listen to it. I'm a sucker for good lyrics I guess. But Magic grew on me. So much so that I get extremely sad when I hear Long Walk Home. Mainly because if you juxtapose that with the grandeur and excellence of Thunder Road, you hear the voice of a musician who's done with the speed, cars and pace of life. Who's set to talk that slow, deep greens of summer walk into the night. It was a great final song for what was to be a final album (not including the tributary Terry's song as a hidden track). It summed it up.

Then I hear word of a new album. And I get excited. Maybe we're stopping to smell the roses on that walk home. Maybe we want to get carried home by a little bit of a breeze. But then Working on a Dream comes out. And I don't like it. And I'm one of a very few who don't.

Gone, most notably, are the Walt Whitman working man dirges backed by the greatest band in the world. Replaced with effervescent lyricism that only works to Bruce's strength when it's just him and his guitar and only then hidden in a story. With the backing depth of the E-Street Band he needs nitty-gritty lyrics. And this album doesn't have that. Too much attention to lyric bridges and chorus' that repeat. Springsteen, in a band setting that echos deeply of rambling instruments, needs to ramble. When he doesn't, everything gets held back. And so I don't like the album.

Working on a Dream and My Lucky Day are cool songs. I like them. But I expect more than a pop music number from Bruce churned out to satisfy that radio hit. Much, much more. I expect unbalanced, rambling poetry. Stories set to music. Almost psalmic in nature. What Working on a Dream is is a manufactured, forced work that, while great because the artists are great, fails to reach the level we'd expect. Except for one thing...

I can't dance. At least not well. But I can hear rhythm. One time, at a dance lesson, the instructor, waiting a half-step for me to begin my role of leading, stopped me after the dance. She said I was one of only a few people she had met who danced to a singular, backing, un-obvious beat of the music. I've thought long about that. How to explain what maybe that means. Music is a lot like math. If a song has a beat. A number of beats per measure. The beats that people dance to. Then maybe what I listen for and hear so vividly is the factor that goes into making that number.

Explaining all that my point is this: on the album, maybe Queen of the Supermarket is the key. The legend. The factor. It embodies the old Whitman rambling poet style with a tinge of maturity and profundity. It has some weird, almost off-putting musical interludes. And the lyrical line delivered with the quiet intensity of beginning a rise to crescendo. This song maybe is the beat to which the rest of the album is to be understood. But even still, I won't like this more than Magic.

And certainly not more than the all-encompassing energy and transcendence of The Rising. And as I talk the long walk home staring into a sky of memory and shadow, I keep finding myself returning to Thunder Road, Rosalita, Sandy, Born to Run, Jungleland. And when I get there...home.... to a place of quiet... then give me any of Bruce's solo stuff.

Peculiar Colloquialisms

After spending the better part of the weekend out in the snow, it occurs to me that there are some expressions I can no longer tolerate.

A preface: each area of the country is entitled to colloquialisms. Coke/Pop/Soda, Tennis Shoes/Sneakers/Kicks etc. But some are just simply foolishness and resound of malapropisms. Which, if you are not aware, malapropisms sound a little like Moxie tastes.

Here's my recent additions to the annoying colloquialisms list:

1. Toboggan. It's a sled. A type of sled. It is not a hat. Why is it not a hat? Well, simply, because a hat is a hat. Do not ask me why I'm not wearing a toboggan. You can't wear a toboggan. You just can't.

2. Sled Riding. As opposed to Sled Walking? Perhaps Sled Galloping? Just call it Sledding. Hey! We're all going sledding, wanna come? Yeah. That sounds great. Let's go. Who's Car Driving?

3. Major Snowstorm. 8 Inches of Snow over 18 Hours is barely a snow storm. And yet, the roads still are not cleared 36 hours later. "But hey," I am reminded casually and ineffectually, "This isn't Boston, Aaron." Quite astute of you. "But hey," sarcastic, caustic, annoyed "It's not Florida. IT'S THE FREAKING MIDWEST!"

Colloquialisms: The Sound of Moxie Being Made.