Good morning, little sweetheart! Happy Christmas!
I’m kinda just taking it easy today, writing a little and recording a couple of basic tracks and thinking of earlier years when I was with you or my mom or later, with your folks.
Even though today is kinda lonely, Sylvia will be here day after tomorrow and we’ll have a little Christmas of our own, then, and the following week, head out to see your folks and have a second with them, too.
Today, I’m remembering especially our first Christmas, little sweetheart, when you gave the beautiful scarf you knitted while doing the play up in Boston and the breathtaking Christmas letter you included with it - part of which is now tattooed on my right arm.
Christmas is such a good day to remember all the things you taught me about love and all that really matters.
Merry Merry Christmas, my angel. Thinking of you with love and forever.
Wednesday, December 25, 2019
Tuesday, December 24, 2019
Christmas Eve
It’s Christmas Eve, little sweetheart, and I’m on my own, just quietly spending the evening watching on a movie and having a few of those cookies I bake each year. Sure do miss you tonight. We’ll be heading out to see your folks (Sylvia arrives on Friday) first week of January and I’m very much looking forward.
Tonight, I’m just keeping quiet and lighting a nice fragrant candle. It’s a pine and balsam one. I’ve never watched the hours long midnight mass from Rome that they broadcast on Christmas Eve, so I think I’ll do that in a few hours.
Thinking of you, as ever, and asking that you be near me tonight and in the days ahead. With all my love…
Tonight, I’m just keeping quiet and lighting a nice fragrant candle. It’s a pine and balsam one. I’ve never watched the hours long midnight mass from Rome that they broadcast on Christmas Eve, so I think I’ll do that in a few hours.
Thinking of you, as ever, and asking that you be near me tonight and in the days ahead. With all my love…
Sunday, December 22, 2019
Hot Chocolate Memories
Little sweetheart, I made myself some hot chocolate last night and, of course, thought of you!
It’s so funny that I rarely think to do that for myself, I always like it once I have. At Thanksgiving I was looking for a packet of gravy starter in the little bin I keep seasonings in and I found a bit of hot chocolate mix. I set one out. That was weeks ago! I only got around to making it tonight. I’d even bought a bit of whip cream at D’ags last week when it was on sale but it had remained unopened in the fridge since then.
It was lovely sitting here on the plaid couch where you and I would often ensconce ourselves together, to sip from the mug quietly, listening to a show on WFMU and thinking of you.
I remember that although you most liked making hot chocolate with milk at home, that you kept a packet or two in your bag when we went out so you could ask for a cup of hot water and make it for yourself at the table.
There’s something so lovely in this memory of you carrying hot chocolate mix with you wherever you go, little sweetheart, and I’m so glad it came to mind tonight.
Thinking of you, on this morning after the night of the Winter Solstice - the darkest night of the year. With all my love.
It’s so funny that I rarely think to do that for myself, I always like it once I have. At Thanksgiving I was looking for a packet of gravy starter in the little bin I keep seasonings in and I found a bit of hot chocolate mix. I set one out. That was weeks ago! I only got around to making it tonight. I’d even bought a bit of whip cream at D’ags last week when it was on sale but it had remained unopened in the fridge since then.
It was lovely sitting here on the plaid couch where you and I would often ensconce ourselves together, to sip from the mug quietly, listening to a show on WFMU and thinking of you.
I remember that although you most liked making hot chocolate with milk at home, that you kept a packet or two in your bag when we went out so you could ask for a cup of hot water and make it for yourself at the table.
There’s something so lovely in this memory of you carrying hot chocolate mix with you wherever you go, little sweetheart, and I’m so glad it came to mind tonight.
Thinking of you, on this morning after the night of the Winter Solstice - the darkest night of the year. With all my love.
Saturday, December 21, 2019
Special Broadcast
Canadian podcasters devoted their entire show today, little sweetheart, to our album Til Morning Is Nigh. They broadcast it in its sequence and entirety and said the nicest things about it.
The introduction leading up to it yesterday began “Tomorrow! The best Christmas album of all time! The one and only Bipolar Explorer” and after the broadcast today they said “we couldn’t even think what to say after - it’s perfect!”
I listened later in the afternoon and it was so wonderful to hear your voice soaring above the guitars, little sweetheart. It’s funny how after spending so much time listening to every little detail while working on the albums that after they’re released, I might not listen again for months and then be surprised, as if hearing them anew when broadcast.
Feeling very close you, my little sweetheart, and sending all my love, always. Always.
The introduction leading up to it yesterday began “Tomorrow! The best Christmas album of all time! The one and only Bipolar Explorer” and after the broadcast today they said “we couldn’t even think what to say after - it’s perfect!”
I listened later in the afternoon and it was so wonderful to hear your voice soaring above the guitars, little sweetheart. It’s funny how after spending so much time listening to every little detail while working on the albums that after they’re released, I might not listen again for months and then be surprised, as if hearing them anew when broadcast.
Feeling very close you, my little sweetheart, and sending all my love, always. Always.
Wednesday, December 18, 2019
Snow Squall
We had the craziest weather today, little sweetheart.
It’s been cold and rainy for days and I hadn’t been for a run in a week but it was sunny this morning, so I was able to get one in in the early afternoon. After I got back the weather was still really nice - the light bouncing off the buildings was almost a spring-like one, I noticed as I sat here at my desk. Just about 10 minutes later it had grown incredibly dark and was suddenly snow - the wind kicking it around even more.
After an hour it stopped and brightened again to twilight just before the sun went down. I walked up to the little church at 77th and West End for the Wednesday night candlelight service. They asked me to read the opening passage and later I came forward and lit a candle for you and said our prayer just like always. Both Christmas and New Year’s fall on Wednesday this year so there won’t be another service until the second week in January. I’m glad I went.
Then as I came out after, it had snowed a bit more. Everything was blanketed with a pretty covering of free snow and it looked rather magical. The walk home was cold but I was bundled up with the beautiful sweater you made for and gave me for our first Christmas.
The holidays seem especially sad this year, somehow, little sweetheart and I miss and my mom terribly. But I ask quietly to hear your guidance and to strengthen my faith that you are safely in God’s care and that I will be with you again and forever in just the blink of an eye.
With all my love.
It’s been cold and rainy for days and I hadn’t been for a run in a week but it was sunny this morning, so I was able to get one in in the early afternoon. After I got back the weather was still really nice - the light bouncing off the buildings was almost a spring-like one, I noticed as I sat here at my desk. Just about 10 minutes later it had grown incredibly dark and was suddenly snow - the wind kicking it around even more.
After an hour it stopped and brightened again to twilight just before the sun went down. I walked up to the little church at 77th and West End for the Wednesday night candlelight service. They asked me to read the opening passage and later I came forward and lit a candle for you and said our prayer just like always. Both Christmas and New Year’s fall on Wednesday this year so there won’t be another service until the second week in January. I’m glad I went.
Then as I came out after, it had snowed a bit more. Everything was blanketed with a pretty covering of free snow and it looked rather magical. The walk home was cold but I was bundled up with the beautiful sweater you made for and gave me for our first Christmas.
The holidays seem especially sad this year, somehow, little sweetheart and I miss and my mom terribly. But I ask quietly to hear your guidance and to strengthen my faith that you are safely in God’s care and that I will be with you again and forever in just the blink of an eye.
With all my love.
Floor Work
Little sweetheart, I'm kinda full force going at two projects simultaneously - both, of course, always, for you!
One is the memoir and the other is the next album.
I've notebooks everywhere - some filled ready for transcription, others mid-scrawl - and little notes scribbled on random pieces of paper strewn about the apartment. Every morning I try to organize them a bit, get them in the queue of what next to address as work goes twofold forward.
Today, while I was going for a second cup of coffee I saw and remembered a few lyric ideas I had scrawled on the back of an unopened piece of yesterday's mail. I had several pieces like it for the same song already set out last night on the desk to my left where I put my coffee cup in the morning to remind me to work on the song today. I brought the pieces in the kitchen and my music notebook and those scraps on the desk all to the floor next to my guitar pedals and grabbed a pen spreading it all out. A dedicated spot for this work!
And I suddenly thought of something I once heard Joe Strummer say about writing lyrics - "grab whatever you can, push everyone out the way and fall to floor to get it down because it only makes sense in that moment when it comes forward. You''ll lose it if you wait. Get it down, then. Now!"
This is so perfectly true, don't you think, little sweetheart?
It's coming. It takes time for it all but it's coming. As another writer I remember says about it - "think slow, write fast."
It will be done, little sweetheart, it will be done. I know because I know you are sending it all to me. And I'm listening, my love. I promise, I promise it get it all down - for you!
With all my love.
One is the memoir and the other is the next album.
I've notebooks everywhere - some filled ready for transcription, others mid-scrawl - and little notes scribbled on random pieces of paper strewn about the apartment. Every morning I try to organize them a bit, get them in the queue of what next to address as work goes twofold forward.
Today, while I was going for a second cup of coffee I saw and remembered a few lyric ideas I had scrawled on the back of an unopened piece of yesterday's mail. I had several pieces like it for the same song already set out last night on the desk to my left where I put my coffee cup in the morning to remind me to work on the song today. I brought the pieces in the kitchen and my music notebook and those scraps on the desk all to the floor next to my guitar pedals and grabbed a pen spreading it all out. A dedicated spot for this work!
And I suddenly thought of something I once heard Joe Strummer say about writing lyrics - "grab whatever you can, push everyone out the way and fall to floor to get it down because it only makes sense in that moment when it comes forward. You''ll lose it if you wait. Get it down, then. Now!"
This is so perfectly true, don't you think, little sweetheart?
It's coming. It takes time for it all but it's coming. As another writer I remember says about it - "think slow, write fast."
It will be done, little sweetheart, it will be done. I know because I know you are sending it all to me. And I'm listening, my love. I promise, I promise it get it all down - for you!
With all my love.
Tuesday, December 17, 2019
To Be Faithful
Little sweetheart, I sat down to watch Gandhi last night and was struck by the filmmakers preface at before the movie had even truly begun. All of it is terribly resonant as I write to, of, about and for you.
It helped me, once I'd begun composing book one of the memoirs, to write down a sentiment much like this, giving myself permission to get to as much as I can, chasing down every thought and memory and recording them but not cursing myself for not gathering up everything. Indeed, allowing for further volumes so that I can do just that and not setting about the impossible task of getting everything between the pages of just one book, so that even just setting out, we've already said that nothing ends, not even these writings - we just run out of paper, to return again immediately thereafter.
The most important part, just as in the last sentence of the image below, to be faithful in spirit.
Always, little sweetheart. May I ever be faithful to your spirit, faithful to you. With all my love.
It helped me, once I'd begun composing book one of the memoirs, to write down a sentiment much like this, giving myself permission to get to as much as I can, chasing down every thought and memory and recording them but not cursing myself for not gathering up everything. Indeed, allowing for further volumes so that I can do just that and not setting about the impossible task of getting everything between the pages of just one book, so that even just setting out, we've already said that nothing ends, not even these writings - we just run out of paper, to return again immediately thereafter.
The most important part, just as in the last sentence of the image below, to be faithful in spirit.
Always, little sweetheart. May I ever be faithful to your spirit, faithful to you. With all my love.
Saturday, December 14, 2019
As In Baking, As in Life...
I was making a second batch of Christmas cookies last night, little sweetheart. I wanted to do some work but it was so noisy on the street outside, I decided to bake instead.
I had on my playlist of Christmas favorites - you’ve heard a few of them - which included two 30 minute radio documentaries I recorded off the air when the BBC broadcast them years ago. One about the annual Advent service “Darkness to Light” at Salisbury Cathedral and the other interviewing former boy choristers and people involved with the famous 9 Lessons and Carols service at Cambridge.
Between the two of them is a song I heard a few years ago released by the Sheffield band, The Crookes - “You Bring the Snow”. It’s an incredibly bittersweet song longing for “just one more Christmas like when we were young”.
The first time I heard it, and I think probably every time after, it has made me ache for you… and it did tonight. Oven mitt in hand, cutting the little stars and angels and bells, the smell of ginger and molasses and longing for you, my heart so heavy, I just cried and cried and cried. Weeping, aching for you. And all the while shuffling along between the counter and the oven going on with my task.
Very much like how I keep going through my life. Heartbroken to be separated from you but with faith that you are safely in God’s care, that I will be with you again, soon and forever, and that I simply must carry on doing all the things I’m meant and you very much want me to complete.
Yes, little sweetheart, I will remember and honor and call to you always. Always. With all my heart, with all my love. Forever.
I had on my playlist of Christmas favorites - you’ve heard a few of them - which included two 30 minute radio documentaries I recorded off the air when the BBC broadcast them years ago. One about the annual Advent service “Darkness to Light” at Salisbury Cathedral and the other interviewing former boy choristers and people involved with the famous 9 Lessons and Carols service at Cambridge.
Between the two of them is a song I heard a few years ago released by the Sheffield band, The Crookes - “You Bring the Snow”. It’s an incredibly bittersweet song longing for “just one more Christmas like when we were young”.
The first time I heard it, and I think probably every time after, it has made me ache for you… and it did tonight. Oven mitt in hand, cutting the little stars and angels and bells, the smell of ginger and molasses and longing for you, my heart so heavy, I just cried and cried and cried. Weeping, aching for you. And all the while shuffling along between the counter and the oven going on with my task.
Very much like how I keep going through my life. Heartbroken to be separated from you but with faith that you are safely in God’s care, that I will be with you again, soon and forever, and that I simply must carry on doing all the things I’m meant and you very much want me to complete.
Yes, little sweetheart, I will remember and honor and call to you always. Always. With all my heart, with all my love. Forever.
Remember!
Little sweetheart, in listening to and thinking of Christmas music, including our own, I sometimes forget that we've made not one but two Christmas albums!
There's been so much attention to the more recent and rather more epic one from last year, Til Morning Is Nigh, that sometimes the earlier one BPXmas (2014) gets less attention. That's okay, mostly, but I certainly wouldn't want the song I wrote especially of and for you - the lead track, "It's Christmas, Sweetheart" - to be overlooked.
It's one of the first of our songs that the great Irene Trudel played on her show on WFMU it could be seen as beginning their wonderful advocacy of us. We even did a video for it, which calls so many things to mind and memory, not least because Jason was still in the band at the time.
I know you are closer than I can imagine, little sweetheart - I have faith! - and that we will together again soon and always. With all my love...
There's been so much attention to the more recent and rather more epic one from last year, Til Morning Is Nigh, that sometimes the earlier one BPXmas (2014) gets less attention. That's okay, mostly, but I certainly wouldn't want the song I wrote especially of and for you - the lead track, "It's Christmas, Sweetheart" - to be overlooked.
It's one of the first of our songs that the great Irene Trudel played on her show on WFMU it could be seen as beginning their wonderful advocacy of us. We even did a video for it, which calls so many things to mind and memory, not least because Jason was still in the band at the time.
I know you are closer than I can imagine, little sweetheart - I have faith! - and that we will together again soon and always. With all my love...
Friday, December 13, 2019
Tis The Season
We're well into Christmas season, little sweetheart and I'm thinking of and longing for you.
We heard that a Canadian podcast is going to play our 8th album, last year's Til Morning Is Nigh, in its entirety in a special broadcast next Saturday, December 21st - the night of the Winter Solstice. I'll put a link up to it as soon as its available.
We did several videos as well as the documentary for the album but I think my favorite of them might be for Noel, because it features your vocals so prominently and there's lots of nice footage of you, mostly from our wonderful trip to Ireland together.
I love you with all my heart. Forever. Forever.
We heard that a Canadian podcast is going to play our 8th album, last year's Til Morning Is Nigh, in its entirety in a special broadcast next Saturday, December 21st - the night of the Winter Solstice. I'll put a link up to it as soon as its available.
We did several videos as well as the documentary for the album but I think my favorite of them might be for Noel, because it features your vocals so prominently and there's lots of nice footage of you, mostly from our wonderful trip to Ireland together.
I love you with all my heart. Forever. Forever.
Thursday, December 12, 2019
Enfolded
I went uptown to that little candlelight meditation, last night, little sweetheart.
I went last week too and found it was much colder walking home than walking there. I’d very much wished I’d brought the beautiful scarf you made for me. So, tonight, I put it and a pair of gloves in my backpack, not needing them for the walk top but at the ready for the walk back, in case it was so bitterly colder after, again.
Since last week, they’d put up Christmas decorations, little sweetheart. It was mostly pine wreaths and garlands. The had them wrapped around the banisters leading up the steps outside the front door and in wreaths around the crowns of the pews at each aisle. I sat in my place in the back and sang along with the chants, coming forward when it was time, to light a candle for you and say our prayer. The lights darkened after as the meditation began and everyone was silently in contemplation for a long while.
My thoughts, as always, fly to you, and after the service resumed with two final songs, a prayer and the benediction, I wrapped myself up in your beautiful scarf and braved the cold. I needed it! Just as I need you. And there is something so magical in being literally wrapped up, enfolded in the beautiful warm scarf you made for me with your very hands. It keeps me close to you.
May it be ever so. With all my love…
I went last week too and found it was much colder walking home than walking there. I’d very much wished I’d brought the beautiful scarf you made for me. So, tonight, I put it and a pair of gloves in my backpack, not needing them for the walk top but at the ready for the walk back, in case it was so bitterly colder after, again.
Since last week, they’d put up Christmas decorations, little sweetheart. It was mostly pine wreaths and garlands. The had them wrapped around the banisters leading up the steps outside the front door and in wreaths around the crowns of the pews at each aisle. I sat in my place in the back and sang along with the chants, coming forward when it was time, to light a candle for you and say our prayer. The lights darkened after as the meditation began and everyone was silently in contemplation for a long while.
My thoughts, as always, fly to you, and after the service resumed with two final songs, a prayer and the benediction, I wrapped myself up in your beautiful scarf and braved the cold. I needed it! Just as I need you. And there is something so magical in being literally wrapped up, enfolded in the beautiful warm scarf you made for me with your very hands. It keeps me close to you.
May it be ever so. With all my love…
Wednesday, December 11, 2019
German Radio
Little sweetheart, you’re on the radio!
Over the weekend, the band made its German Radio debut. Radio TFSC featured “Flag Day (Summer Dream Version)” - which I think is our favorite mix of the song because your vocals are way up front and it has the backwards guitar on it - and then added it to their rotation along with another track featuring your central vocals, “No Answer”, both from our double-album, Sometimes in Dreams.
I don’t know yet if this station archives their broadcasts to MixCloud, but if so, I’ll get a link up to the programs right away.
With all my love…
Over the weekend, the band made its German Radio debut. Radio TFSC featured “Flag Day (Summer Dream Version)” - which I think is our favorite mix of the song because your vocals are way up front and it has the backwards guitar on it - and then added it to their rotation along with another track featuring your central vocals, “No Answer”, both from our double-album, Sometimes in Dreams.
I don’t know yet if this station archives their broadcasts to MixCloud, but if so, I’ll get a link up to the programs right away.
With all my love…
Tuesday, December 10, 2019
Of Kindness...
I had my six month dental check up last week, little sweetheart, then dropped back in at the office today to ask about some issues regarding what my insurance was willing to cover. Nothing urgent but I thought it would go faster if I walked over there instead of trying to do it on the phone. The results were mixed, I think - it took a helluva long time anyway, the waiting room was pretty full.
Anyway, what I wanted to tell you was something else. When I arrived, the receptionist was speaking in Spanish to a rather elderly man who was sitting across the room. It kind of went on for a while even as other patients came and went or waited to check in. Me, too - I just stood there waiting.
Eventually the logjam kind of cleared. The waiting room emptied and the receptionist went in the back to talk to my dentist. There was just me and the elderly Spanish man and what seemed like maybe his brother.
The first guy was sort of taking care of the second. He got up and got their coats out of the closet and then helped the second guy put his coat on. It was very sweet. Then the second guy, who seemed a bit more frail and understandably needed a bit more help, took the first guy’s coat and helped him in turn. I wondered if they were brothers and the whole thing was so lovely and gentle and kind, it made me think of you immediately.
The second man had been looking at me the whole time. The first one spoke to me in English, then. He said they were dealing with some insurance thing. I told him, same here. And then I wished them both a Happy Christmas.
It was a really nice moment and when little things like this happen, I feel ever more close to you and the unfailing kindness that you brought to everyone whose lives you touched. I’m so grateful for you. And I love you with all my heart, forever.
Anyway, what I wanted to tell you was something else. When I arrived, the receptionist was speaking in Spanish to a rather elderly man who was sitting across the room. It kind of went on for a while even as other patients came and went or waited to check in. Me, too - I just stood there waiting.
Eventually the logjam kind of cleared. The waiting room emptied and the receptionist went in the back to talk to my dentist. There was just me and the elderly Spanish man and what seemed like maybe his brother.
The first guy was sort of taking care of the second. He got up and got their coats out of the closet and then helped the second guy put his coat on. It was very sweet. Then the second guy, who seemed a bit more frail and understandably needed a bit more help, took the first guy’s coat and helped him in turn. I wondered if they were brothers and the whole thing was so lovely and gentle and kind, it made me think of you immediately.
The second man had been looking at me the whole time. The first one spoke to me in English, then. He said they were dealing with some insurance thing. I told him, same here. And then I wished them both a Happy Christmas.
It was a really nice moment and when little things like this happen, I feel ever more close to you and the unfailing kindness that you brought to everyone whose lives you touched. I’m so grateful for you. And I love you with all my heart, forever.
Monday, December 9, 2019
Voices... and Your Own
I was listening Carol’s show this morning on WFMU, little sweetheart, and I heard something that kind of stopped me in my tracks. It was a song by a group I didn’t know, The Clogs. but the guest vocalist on it was Matt Berringer from The National. His voice is so embedded in my memories of you that it takes me to you instantly.
I remember discovering The National together, little sweetheart, getting that “Dark Was The Night” compilation at Easy Street Records when we were up in Seattle together for the reading of 7 Pages, then you sending me an mp3 of that song from Boxer with the line about “I waited for 29 years to find you”. You were 29 at the time and it seemed so very much about you and I finding one another, you saving my life, filling it with light and love.
I remember tears pouring down my cheeks when you spoke of your certainty that you would pass away before I and that you wanted me to speak at your funeral and to listen to our songs and remember you. It’s so very hard to hear those voices and songs that meant so much to us, little sweetheart, that music that came to be our own. It still cuts me to the core. But I do love you forever and with all my heart.
Please be with me today, little sweetheart. Let me know that you are near and strengthen my faith to know that I will be with you again, soon and forever. With all my love.
I remember discovering The National together, little sweetheart, getting that “Dark Was The Night” compilation at Easy Street Records when we were up in Seattle together for the reading of 7 Pages, then you sending me an mp3 of that song from Boxer with the line about “I waited for 29 years to find you”. You were 29 at the time and it seemed so very much about you and I finding one another, you saving my life, filling it with light and love.
I remember tears pouring down my cheeks when you spoke of your certainty that you would pass away before I and that you wanted me to speak at your funeral and to listen to our songs and remember you. It’s so very hard to hear those voices and songs that meant so much to us, little sweetheart, that music that came to be our own. It still cuts me to the core. But I do love you forever and with all my heart.
Please be with me today, little sweetheart. Let me know that you are near and strengthen my faith to know that I will be with you again, soon and forever. With all my love.
Sunday, December 8, 2019
December 8
Today is the 39th anniversary of John Lennon’s death, little sweetheart.
Although you were only one year old at the time, I think of you, of course, because you loved The Beatles and one of our first connections was you very sweetly, very thoughtfully bringing your DVD set of The Beatles Anthology to rehearsal to let me borrow. We hadn’t even spoken of it, you just knew that we both liked them so you grabbed them and brought them to work with you.
Tonight I walked up to The Dakota. There weren’t too many people around but crossing Central Park West into the park you could hear that folks were gathered there at Strawberry Fields singing along to Beatles songs. There’s often a guitar player or two there and people talking pictures but there was what sounded to be an entire band with full drums playing and a crowd circling them 10 deep singing along.
I climbed up on a park bench to get a better look. Everybody had their phones out and were taking photos or filming. And I did too. I took a little clip when everyone was singing the bridge of “A Day in The Life” - the sort of wordless bit leading into the last verse - and then the song that followed, “The Ballad of John and Yoko”.
It was a very New York kind of moment and you were, as ever, so very much in my thoughts. With all my love forever.
Although you were only one year old at the time, I think of you, of course, because you loved The Beatles and one of our first connections was you very sweetly, very thoughtfully bringing your DVD set of The Beatles Anthology to rehearsal to let me borrow. We hadn’t even spoken of it, you just knew that we both liked them so you grabbed them and brought them to work with you.
Tonight I walked up to The Dakota. There weren’t too many people around but crossing Central Park West into the park you could hear that folks were gathered there at Strawberry Fields singing along to Beatles songs. There’s often a guitar player or two there and people talking pictures but there was what sounded to be an entire band with full drums playing and a crowd circling them 10 deep singing along.
I climbed up on a park bench to get a better look. Everybody had their phones out and were taking photos or filming. And I did too. I took a little clip when everyone was singing the bridge of “A Day in The Life” - the sort of wordless bit leading into the last verse - and then the song that followed, “The Ballad of John and Yoko”.
It was a very New York kind of moment and you were, as ever, so very much in my thoughts. With all my love forever.
Saturday, December 7, 2019
Theatre Dream
I had kind of a funny dream last night, little sweetheart, but was the more blessed for it because you were with me!
There were several of us all together in a group at some kind of theatre performance. It had a very fringe-y feel to it material-wise but also seemed to be in a Broadway house - like an old theatre with lots of seats, kind of cramped but grand. The show was some kind of one-woman show and a little weird, not exactly realism. The performer was even a bit confrontational and I can't remember if she directed her ire at us exactly but we were a bit unsettled and tried to slip away.
We had to go down some crazy side door stairwell, like an old emergency exit or something and we got separated at first. I was looking around for you as I headed down the stairs trying to make an escape into the street when you came out from around a corner. You'd been to "merch" table or something because you had on a tee shirt and had a bag of a bunch of other things. Crazy, right?
I'm not sure what all this means aside from let's-get-the-hell-out of-here-as-fast-as-we-can-but-first-you're-going-to-get-your-money's-worth. Most important, I think, of course, is that you and I are together. May it be forever so!
With all my love.
There were several of us all together in a group at some kind of theatre performance. It had a very fringe-y feel to it material-wise but also seemed to be in a Broadway house - like an old theatre with lots of seats, kind of cramped but grand. The show was some kind of one-woman show and a little weird, not exactly realism. The performer was even a bit confrontational and I can't remember if she directed her ire at us exactly but we were a bit unsettled and tried to slip away.
We had to go down some crazy side door stairwell, like an old emergency exit or something and we got separated at first. I was looking around for you as I headed down the stairs trying to make an escape into the street when you came out from around a corner. You'd been to "merch" table or something because you had on a tee shirt and had a bag of a bunch of other things. Crazy, right?
I'm not sure what all this means aside from let's-get-the-hell-out of-here-as-fast-as-we-can-but-first-you're-going-to-get-your-money's-worth. Most important, I think, of course, is that you and I are together. May it be forever so!
With all my love.
Friday, December 6, 2019
Material Memory
I’m being extra careful now, little sweetheart, with the beautiful leather jacket you gave me on our last Christmas together.
I had been pretty much wearing it everyday regardless of the weather for the last eight years. Like I told you, we were very worried that the wear and tear to it was too much, too far gone for a restoration but the great folks at Superior Leather did manage to repair it beautifully. I’ve only had it out for a month or two as the weather has grown cooler and am very careful with it, hanging it up after in a place of honor.
The other day I saw a tiny gap in the stitching, less than one inch in length, and took it back. Then said they couldn’t just patch up that tiny bit because it was at the join of the old leather and the new and there wasn’t quite enough mass to the latter for it to take hold quite right. They said we could eventually replace that half of the right sleeve but that if it didn’t get any bigger, it would probably be alright for now.
So, I’m keeping an eye on it and also wearing other jackets sometimes, saving this very special treasured one so it lasts as long as possible. And the nice lady, Samantha, at Superior said to go ahead and wear it! Not to be afraid. Just like she told me when I brought it to her last spring, so heartbroken, how kindly she told me that I “hadn’t done anything wrong”.
Anyway, I broke out my old 3/4 length black overcoat. Remember it, little sweetheart? The Calvin Klein one? It’s rather lightweight with a zip-in lining you can use when it gets colder and I used to wear it all the time before you got me the beautiful leather jacket. There’s tons of pictures of you and I together where I’m wearing it, including most all of the ones on our trip to Ireland.
Tonight, I was walking to D’Agostino’s with it on and when I reached into the left pocket I felt something - it was one of the pens, a black one, that I got when we stopped into a store outside Bantry during our Irish adventure. It had been in there since then!
It was raining out, tonight, so I also was wearing my black boots. I had such a sense memory of being in our neighborhood in San Francisco, of being in the Inner Sunset, because this coat, with a hoodie, and those boots were what I wore almost every day there striding up and down the hills just south of Golden Gate Park with you or dashing out to pick up something for us at the deli or Roxie’s or Crepevine of an evening before coming home to your warm, waiting, loving arms. What a lovely feeling it was! As if I could almost touch our life!
How I miss and love you, my little sweetheart. Please be near me today, won’t you? And take me to you the moment heaven will allow. With all my love forever.
I had been pretty much wearing it everyday regardless of the weather for the last eight years. Like I told you, we were very worried that the wear and tear to it was too much, too far gone for a restoration but the great folks at Superior Leather did manage to repair it beautifully. I’ve only had it out for a month or two as the weather has grown cooler and am very careful with it, hanging it up after in a place of honor.
The other day I saw a tiny gap in the stitching, less than one inch in length, and took it back. Then said they couldn’t just patch up that tiny bit because it was at the join of the old leather and the new and there wasn’t quite enough mass to the latter for it to take hold quite right. They said we could eventually replace that half of the right sleeve but that if it didn’t get any bigger, it would probably be alright for now.
So, I’m keeping an eye on it and also wearing other jackets sometimes, saving this very special treasured one so it lasts as long as possible. And the nice lady, Samantha, at Superior said to go ahead and wear it! Not to be afraid. Just like she told me when I brought it to her last spring, so heartbroken, how kindly she told me that I “hadn’t done anything wrong”.
Anyway, I broke out my old 3/4 length black overcoat. Remember it, little sweetheart? The Calvin Klein one? It’s rather lightweight with a zip-in lining you can use when it gets colder and I used to wear it all the time before you got me the beautiful leather jacket. There’s tons of pictures of you and I together where I’m wearing it, including most all of the ones on our trip to Ireland.
Tonight, I was walking to D’Agostino’s with it on and when I reached into the left pocket I felt something - it was one of the pens, a black one, that I got when we stopped into a store outside Bantry during our Irish adventure. It had been in there since then!
It was raining out, tonight, so I also was wearing my black boots. I had such a sense memory of being in our neighborhood in San Francisco, of being in the Inner Sunset, because this coat, with a hoodie, and those boots were what I wore almost every day there striding up and down the hills just south of Golden Gate Park with you or dashing out to pick up something for us at the deli or Roxie’s or Crepevine of an evening before coming home to your warm, waiting, loving arms. What a lovely feeling it was! As if I could almost touch our life!
How I miss and love you, my little sweetheart. Please be near me today, won’t you? And take me to you the moment heaven will allow. With all my love forever.
Wednesday, December 4, 2019
The Music Matters
Something reminded me today, little sweetheart, of the Pogues's song "Dirty Old Town". And it took me instantly to you.
I remember it being one of my favorite moments in Tir n nOg, at the end of the act, when we all came forward and sang it together. And I remembered you texting me a few months later when you were out and saying that it just come up on the jukebox in the bar you were in, that it made you think of me, think of us.
And it made me think in the way that I have so very often and increasingly since the accident that nearly took my life, that it is music writ large that is the primary moving force in our lives. In mine. The instantly resonant power of music - hearing something that strikes you to the core and composing our own, too - that is such a gift in this life.
Just as you are. You - the greatest gift of all. With all my love...
I remember it being one of my favorite moments in Tir n nOg, at the end of the act, when we all came forward and sang it together. And I remembered you texting me a few months later when you were out and saying that it just come up on the jukebox in the bar you were in, that it made you think of me, think of us.
And it made me think in the way that I have so very often and increasingly since the accident that nearly took my life, that it is music writ large that is the primary moving force in our lives. In mine. The instantly resonant power of music - hearing something that strikes you to the core and composing our own, too - that is such a gift in this life.
Just as you are. You - the greatest gift of all. With all my love...
Sunday, December 1, 2019
First Snowfall
It's the first day of December, little sweetheart. Also the first day of Advent. And... the first snowfall of the season.
It's coming down very prettily right now. A little too warm to stick - 34f - but looking nice through the window.
It gets dark so early these short days of the year, little sweetheart, and being overcast all morning, the sun has never really come out yet.
I remember so well your coming here in mid-December right after the play closed in Boston and going up on the roof when we saw that it had begun to snow. You'd brought your trusty Nikon along with you and we took several pictures. One of them, with you all bundled up, the snow falling and the skyline behind you, became the back cover of one of the albums.
I'm feeling so sad today, my little sweetheart, but will try to busy myself with all the things I need to do. I know and have faith that you are closer than I can imagine. And my prayers and every thought flies to you!
Please be with me today. The beautiful snow, falling quietly in the darkness of this day, brings such memories - of you. With all my love...
It's coming down very prettily right now. A little too warm to stick - 34f - but looking nice through the window.
It gets dark so early these short days of the year, little sweetheart, and being overcast all morning, the sun has never really come out yet.
I remember so well your coming here in mid-December right after the play closed in Boston and going up on the roof when we saw that it had begun to snow. You'd brought your trusty Nikon along with you and we took several pictures. One of them, with you all bundled up, the snow falling and the skyline behind you, became the back cover of one of the albums.
I'm feeling so sad today, my little sweetheart, but will try to busy myself with all the things I need to do. I know and have faith that you are closer than I can imagine. And my prayers and every thought flies to you!
Please be with me today. The beautiful snow, falling quietly in the darkness of this day, brings such memories - of you. With all my love...
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