Music of the Spheres

23 April 2020

Living in isolation is tough.  Today I decided all this repetition needed a soundtrack.  Truth be told I started my “Deep Within the Bunker” playlist yesterday.  Apple Music has helped with to create a 35+ song playlist.  In the application’s four suggested playlists (generated anew each week) from New Music to the Get Up I have found some great songs.  

The music I’ve picked is a weird blend.  A number of recently released songs are heavily loaded on the first half of the playlist.  Most of these artists I had never heard of before I put the Apple playlist created on. The last bit is a collection of acoustic renderings performed mostly by the artists who had hits with the songs, think Jane Says by Jane’s Addiction and The Freshmen by the Verve Pipe. Tis’ a funny thing for most of the music on the front end can be traced to the stylings of the artists at the tail end.

Music makes me feel good.  Feeling good is extremely important in getting through this period of nationwide house arrest. Music, reading, binge watching TV and walking, these are my personal coping tools.  My wife has turned to cooking. We had excellent homemade shish kofta, tabouli and pita bread last night.  Today we had very tasty and delectable pizza. My youngest has been playing online games and doing his study by computer college courses.  My oldest son is working.  The recently refurbished basement is his.

Something lightens up inside me when I hear instruments like six string Martin and Gibson guitars matched with mandolins and joined with strong voices.  My musical tastes are not everybody else’s.  Bliss can come from various directions.  I know some people that will find happiness working their way through a catalogue of death metal. The times are such that we are isolated and facing great challenges mental, physical and financial. Whatever lifts us up, we need to embrace it now.

I know there will be huge changes in this world by the time the pandemic passes. Life will no longer be as we knew it in the years before March 2020. With changes that have come and those that will come, we will need things to lighten life up life for us.  I offer music as one excellent tool for this.  Peace out my friends

  

At Evening

21 April 2020

Damn it is cold for this point in April.  Weather forecasts are saying we may get a dusting of snow this night.  Damn.  Wind has been coming up in strong bursts from the west all day.  When it catches you, the chill penetrates into your bones.  No howling sounds or shaking lawn furniture right this moment, all that happened this afternoon. 

Just got back from a walk in the golden light of this early evening. As I walked, I listened to a playlist of songs I had heard recently.  An eclectic mix.  Was listening to a song I don’t hear often by the 400 Unit and I have to say I really do like Jason Isbell’s lyrics. Watching the day fade and the evening come on, I was just blissed out by the clarity of the blue skies and the warmth of the sun on a big tree by the park.

64 years may have flown by since I was born, but I still find joy in the little things of everyday existence.  There was an old country song with some words about finding gold in the sunlight and silver in the surface of a big still lake.  Yeah, I am kind of like that.  When I walk the trees and the flowers, the sunlight and the clouds, they make me feel so very good. In those moments I am out and about I am loosed from the concerns of this world.

Retiring from day to day struggles at my workplace has been a real blessing.  Oddly I am only noticing this now, but the pandemic and social distancing kind of demanded my mind’s focus for a bit.  Still, once I figured out how we would make all our payments and got into a daily routine I feel so much lighter, yeah lighter.  Tricky trying to describe this feeling of weightless existence.  

[Interruption here, cat has demanded to have her ears scratched and her belly rubbed].

Well I will leave you with a photo of me against the blue sky, a photo of a tree in its golden glory and a song that you probably have never heard.  May you sleep in peace tonight.  As I try and do every time I create a post I will leave you with a song you probably don't know.  But I promise you it will be pretty.