jam

so often when i listen to live music, i find myself fixated on who i wish were also there, hearing and seeing the performance.  i can be obsessed with my certainty that this person or people would be transformed or should be exposed or inspired by what i am experiencing.  i will torture myself with trying to record the most exemplary clips or trying to capture the tone and magic of a live performance with still photography.  (from a phone, to make it all the more absurd.)   and at the end of the show, i leave wistful.  

it just occurred to me last night:  what an idiotic waste of a concert that has been. 

ironically, that clarity arrived at the end of a show in which a misguided, ungrateful thought of who could be enjoying it alongside me never once entered my mind.  i can't claim that i realized the irony of hinging my enjoyment on that of another and hence consciously made this change though. it was more likely due to the fact that one of those who i often long to share things with was there with me: todd.   

a first, of its sorts, really.  though i've taken him to many concerts, we've never shared a table at a live music venue (i.e. a bar) and sat shoulder to shoulder as adults...  perhaps it's semantics.  perhaps it's maternal nostalgia.  or maybe it was the glass of wine i enjoyed.  whatever the cause, i contend it was a first.  

my memory uses shorthand when it comes to media.  i rarely remember what a book was about, what happened in a film, or even who sings a song or what a certain musician's style is.  but in the scribbling notes of my mind, i can usually recall my opinion.  often it's as rudimentary as a thumbs up or down; but occasionally there's an exclamation scrawled in the margin.  

when todd asked me about the musician i invited him to see last night, i said, the most amazing f'ing guitarist i've ever seen.   he asked what kind of music he played.  shrug  he asked me who his music resembled.  shrug  he was understandably skeptical of my high marks with little to substantiate and said, i guess i'll see..but he won't hold a candle to hendrix, i'm sure.  silently i hoped to myself that my memory's headline wasn't skewed or exaggerated.  

it wasn't.  

and when i looked over at todd's face, transfixed on the magic happening a mere seven or eight feet away, the only person brought to mind was myself at his age...  there's nothing quite like being audience to a jam.  a spontaneous merging of magnanimous talent and the acoustic art that it creates.  

jam.  yum.  

my favorite way to spend a saturday night and put on a biscuit sunday morning. 

d:  savor the sweetness, jessica

b:  my shorthand review held up

g:  the musicians in my life

eighteen

eighteen and sixteen.  the boys are officially on their way out.  

friday night, todd's birthday request was attending the opening of Straight Outta Compton.  so, we threw our fifty buck contribution into the $60 million box office debut and claimed seats at the theater that topped the country in opening weekend Compton ticket sales.   

that's right.  an atlanta theater holds the #1 position in box office sales for last weekend, leading a top ten with nine LA area theaters.  (why do i feel a touch of pride about that?) 

what a movie.  tremendously moving.  engrossing in the complexity.  heart-breakingly enlightening.  and in contrast to the aforementioned pride, utterly humbling.  

one of the pivotal events in the film occurred in my eighteenth year and the entirety of the story spanned my adolescence.  yet, here i am over twenty years later, sitting beside my eighteen year old son,  and getting an education.  although the music and names were familiar, the story was altogether foreign to me.  and that was so very sobering.  

it's boggling how much longer my own childhood felt to me than my boys' has.  to me.  although at times i've thought their "eighteen" would never arrive; overall, the paradox of time has compressed their youth into an instant. 

however, when i left the theater friday night shoulder-to-shoulder with my peers and his, i realized how much broader his life experience has been, than mine was at the same age.  so much content in so little time.  how much bigger his world is.  and in turn, how much bigger mine is.  

ever-expanding.  

ever-learning. 

ever-grateful. 

d:  put it on the required viewing list.  everyone.  asap.  

b:  straight outta lake claire, my heart and mind were moved

g:  shared experiences that continue to enlarge my world

surf

there's a metaphor i've heard used to describe the world view i hold and it goes something like this... just as every drop of the ocean is wholly ocean, the ocean is wholly comprised of these drops.  (substitute each of us for each drop and the ocean for a universal spirit and you get the idea.) 

perhaps it's because i grew up at the ocean or perhaps it's my water sign dominance, but for whatever reason that depiction of spirit has always resonated with me strongly.  and because of that, or maybe owing to this, i find great comfort and renewal in water.  when things are uncertain or upended in my life, i am drawn to it and without exception it brings me back to clarity and alignment with my better side.  

i spent saturday on the lake with friends and while i was there, something caught my attention...and has remained there nagging at me and asking to be incorporated to my world view metaphor.  it was a water sport.  one i've never seen before.  granted, i've spent most of my water hours in the salted variety; but over the past (nearly) twenty years that i've lived in atlanta, i've gotten my lake water-wings too.  and in neither setting have i seen this particular skill in this particular way.  

the boat involved was moving quite slowly and, with an inboard motor, creating a deep wake behind it.  the young guy performing was, at first, holding a ski rope with one hand and standing on a surf board, off to the side of the boat.  the rope was loose, with plenty of slack and i was at first boggled by what was going on.  within seconds, he had dropped the rope and repositioned himself on the board, maintaining an easy balance.  

the boat was still moving peculiarly slowly, very close to the guy, but the casual body language of the board-rider made it clear that all was going according to plan.  next thing you know (and though i'm drawing out the story, this was all within a matter of a few seconds..) he was surfing.  

literally surfing the perpetual and steady wave created behind the boat.  i laughed when i realized how obvious it all was and watched in awe.  i'm not a surfer myself, so this is pure speculation, but i imagine the hardest part of surfing is waiting for the perfect wave.  spotting it, timing it, wiping your brow at the wrong second and missing it, waiting for it again.  

this guy, however, had found a way to capitalize on the inherent, perfect curl that follows a slow moving boat and ride it.  quite simply, ride it.  truly genius.  

while so many lake sportsmen (and sportswomen) are trying to find the smooth, glassy place between the wake's wave and remain steadily within it; this guy was relishing the leading edge of forward motion and riding it.   something i can easily bring into my ever-evolving metaphor of life.

d:  casual, easy balance in the curl

b:  i've caught the perfect wave

g:  a lesson learned and a spirit renewed