I don't know what... an obvious reminder of passing time maybe?
Can I have a blog entry without talking about time? Can I stop asking rhetorical questions of myself on my own blog?
Captain Narcissism strikes again. Better than Capt'n Tenille I guess. Actually I don't guess: I know. It's better.
Anyway... last night I drove back into the city from the suburbs at about 10:00. I was playing the last of a three week run of shows out in Oak Park. The show was a 50's music review I've played a few times over the last three years. It's easy, fun, and cash money. A chance to keep my chart-reading chops up and play with some very cool and talented guys.
I returned home to a backyard party in celebration of our friend Teri's birthday. Teri also lives below us with her fiance Dave. They've rented from us for almost two years and in that time we've become good friends.
It was a fantastically cool summer evening, the yard was lit up with torches, columns, and a beautiful fire, and the beer was flowing freely. Great group of people hanging out too...
The whole scene just served to deepen my lifetime-long love (excuse me, Mr. Nabakov, I've "borrowed" your favorite alliterative consonant for a moment) affair with the city of Chicago. I don't know why, I just know I've got this damn city in my blood. I love walking, jogging, driving, riding the train... anything to see parts of the city I haven't yet seen, anything to revisit familiar places with a fresh eye and be amazed anew.
I especially like the rainy days, the windy days... anything to bring the sky a little bit lower, anything for the clouds to swallow the Sears Tower's twin spikes.
There have been a few good songs written about Chicago. Not the obvious songs... like Sweet Home Chicago (although the original Robert Johnson recording is s-p-o-o-k-y)... but songs like the Pumpkins' "Tonight, Tonight"... "and the embers never fade in your city by the lake..."
Or almost anything Wilco has done... "taxicabs are driving me around..."
There's an incredible sense of place in that music, a sense of this place, of our place.
So the cool weather brought back memories of last winter, of riding the train in the post-time-change afternoon darkness, trudging through the slush, and trying to capture love with futile awkward words (do I know any other kind?)...
Travesty of Blue (Kathy's Song)
The picture where we moved you looked like me
And somehow the light arranged itself in a "t"
They always take at the start what matters the most
They always shoot first and ask questions once you're a ghost
It's raining glass on the lake tonight
As clouds divide the nightmare sky
And lightening strikes the Tower's heights
It echoes...
I saw him hanging on Western Avenue
His eyes were born in a travesty of blue
And the empty car lots gave way to something else
And the pavement cracks grew up as winter fell
It's raining glass on the lake tonight
As clouds divide the nightmare sky
And lightening strikes the Tower's heights
It echoes...
It's raining stars on the streets tonight
As clouds divide the nightmare sky
And lightening strikes the Tower's spikes
It echoes...
It echoes...
It echoes...
jbg
