10. Little girl I want to marry you.

While I gather my thoughts on current events, I figured I’d reblog this early post, a reminder of what this blog was originally about. Nice to see how certain I was – sitting there on the other side of the world – that this Jersey girl was my future wife.

Runaway American Dream

For the ones who had a notion
A notion deep inside
That it ain’t no sin to be glad you’re alive
I wanna find one face that ain’t looking through me
I wanna find one place
I wanna spit in the face of these Badlands.

~ Springsteen, Badlands.

 

So why her, what does she have that’s so special? What makes it all worth the long separations, the heartache, and the not inconsiderable expense?

These are questions I’ve honestly never bothered to ask myself, not – as you may think – for fear of what might lay coiled within the answers, but because those answers have always been self-evident. No one else has ever made me feel this way and no one else has ever taken the time to really know me.

I’ve experienced loving relationships, but no other love has come as close to me – the real…

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My spine is the Bass line

A personal fave from a few years ago.

Runaway American Dream

 

I was thinking about bass players the other day. It seems to me, they don’t get anywhere near the recognition they deserve. It’s not surprising I suppose, they lack the flash of lead guitarists or the charisma of vocalists. Even the drummer is more front and center as a rule. Sure, some bassists also front; Sting, Suzi Quatro, Phil Lynott, but they are celebrated more for their fronting personas than their playing.

No, I’m thinking of a different breed; the ones who stand solidly to the side and just do their damned job; the rhythmic, throbbing engine room of any band. And a thankless job it is too sometimes. I’ve actually known people who can’t distinguish a bass line in the music they’re listening to – just can’t pick it out – and to those people, I generally say You’d certainly notice it if it wasn’t there.

With…

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White Winter Hymnal

Is he back? Who knows? It’s been a long (and eventful) absence. I may be speaking to dead air by now. Every now and then I’ve dropped in to see how you are all getting on but the urge to write anything creative has been.. absent. And so the blog has languished and probably been forgotten, it might be for the best. Do I have anything left to say? Did I ever have anything to say?

That’s not for me to judge.

Frankly, I’m working too damned hard these days in truly menial labour to care all that much.

One piece of news may be of interest to some of you, we’re leaving Jersey. Yes, our time here has come to an end. As of the very near future, we’ll be calling Lancaster PA home. I’m excited by the prospect. Lancaster UK is actually where my family originates on my grandmother’s side and there are many symbolic connections to be found in this very pretty city in the heart of Amish country.

Perhaps the move will inspire some posts.

In the meantime, here’s a piece I wrote standing on a train platform after a night spent unloading a truck full of Christmas crap.

 

 

Cold early morning in Bridgewater

 

Down the tracks, under the overpass

A doe crosses

Proud silhouette in the backlit white cloud

Of her steaming breath

Ephemeral

All unaware

As the train from New York

Appears silently in the distance

Made insubstantial

By the haze of morning’s mist

The deer declines to shift from the trackside

Nosing her way through the glistening weeds

I wait for the blast from the driver’s horn

But the train bears down with mesmeric rhythms

More seductive than startling

The deer if she has noticed

Remains unharried

Unhurried

Then, as anticipation hangs in the chill

That horn blares

And the deer

Leaps

Bounding

Bounded by grace

 

The train speaks its language of power

The deer remains eloquently silent

I stand in awe

Of the unrepeatable moment.

 

Words and image are my own.

©2019