Time For A Confession

Coming out in this way may cause some schisms in my friendships, due to it being so 'off the wall', but it feels right for me to confess now. I am a Time Traveler. Not in a Bradbury sort of way, but as real as anything else about me.

It's a power that I almost always have no control over. I can recall a relatively recent attempt by me to deliberately take a trip back a few decades, that was met with nearly disastrous results. It usually comes all by itself like the wind, which appears out of nowhere and blows where it will. Music is the vehicle, or shall I say catalyst, almost every time. It's a gift which is both a blessing and a curse.

In this body, there beats the heart of an artist (in the form of a singer/songwriter/musician) and therein lies the very root of the reality of this power. For instance, just hearing a certain song on the radio in the car or at work can propel me back to a time in my early teens where I am hiding behind the bowling alley smoking a cigarette. The song will then take me back to the last time I heard it and drop me off there. Fortunately, I have no problem returning to the present time from that point. These experiences are full of wonder, but quite often they are accompanied by deep feelings of longing or heartache. Again; a blessing and a curse.

The movie "The Time Traveler's Wife" is the closest example of this phenomenon that I can think of. The big difference between the traveler in the movie and me is that he has a totally physical experience, whereas I do not. One thing we do share is that we don't have the power to change anything, but can only witness the Past as it happened. The reality of this is most stark when I hear a song from the 1940's or earlier, and find myself in a time before I was even born.

As I continue to reflect on all of this, which I will probably always do, I think I may have been to the Future a number of times when I was a lot younger. Normally, it has always been the Past that I visit.

Lyrics to songs often play a large part in the intensity of the experience, and very lately I have come to regard a specific song recording as the most powerful and expansive version of what I am attempting to describe. The song "Wicked Game", as penned and sung by Chris Isaak--and it's lyrics--causes the greatest breadth of travel along my timeline of any song before or since. I am whisked back to a time that is nearly before my earliest memories and then deposited back to the present moment on every occasion.

As often happens to many of us, a song can get "stuck in my head". Currently, the song "Wicked Game" crowds out almost every other thought.

Rest in Peace, Dear Bonnie

Bonnie and I were together for over twenty years. In that time, she made it clear to me who was her best friend in the world. Their friendship went all the way back to high school, and even though many miles and many years had kept them physically separate, the friendship endured. I knew it to be a genuine 'heart connection'. In all our years together, I heard Bonnie refer to her only as "Linda from Savannah".

I figured that Bonnie and Linda From Savannah must have shared some terrific laughs over the years, since Bonnie saw tremendous humor in things that I wasn't so quick to laugh over. An example I often give is that she could erupt into uproarious laughter at someone tripping and falling on their butt, and only worry about their physical condition afterward. My leaning is to empathize first, and then see the humor in the situation, in that order. Sometimes, I don't see the humor at all. I have often heard it said that I am "too serious". Bonnie was a lot more free than I, in that respect.

Bonnie has been gone for over two years, and I am starting to recall many examples of that tendency in her. It actually awakens that sense of humor in me. Oddly enough, very early in our relationship I became aware of her love of the Three Stooges. I found out in our first weeks together that she actually had the hard copy of Moe's book, Moe Howard &The Three Stooges, whereas I only had the soft cover version. Unlike most every other woman on the Earth, she was a fan. Laughing at pratfalls came natural to her.

An incident that stands out in my mind happend at a Mongolian Barbeque restaurant that we frequented. We were standing across the counter from the chef as he cooked one of our meals on the large, circular stone grill. I had just handed him my bowl, filled with the ingredients I had chosen; the last being a half serving spoon of peanuts from a large, punchbowl-sized container on the counter. Bonnie and I were chatting, and as I was gesturing I accidentally hit the large serving spoon that I had shoved back into the peanuts in the bowl. Peanuts went flying everywhere, like confetti. Respecting my sensitivity, Bonnie did her best to keep from laughing out loud; largely to no avail. Even years later, when we would share this memory, she would laugh uncontollably and I would eventually smile. It's easier for me to smile today, and even chuckle to myself as I recall that moment. Bonnie helped me in that.

So the other day, during my lunch hour--after having started a conversation on Facebook with Linda From Savannah the day before--I was texting her about Bonnie's undying love and friendship for her. As I alternately texted and took bites from my homemade meal of sweet and sour pork and brown rice, I became animated as I edited the messages. As I reviewed something I had just typed, my hand hit the fork embedded in the meal, and brown rice went flying all around me. I immediately felt a "presence" and wondered if perhaps Bonnie was letting me know she approved of what I was typing.

As I get older, this type of thing seems to happen more and more.

Snapshot Of An Emotional Landscape

Lately, a number of songs have gotten "stuck in my head", as happens to apparently everyone whether they are a songwriter or not. Some of them are a little disturbing (in a way) and cause me to wonder about the author and his or her state of mind. This has led to an epiphany of sorts for me.

The latest tune to visit my awareness like this is the song by the Who, entitled "Behind Blue Eyes". The line 'My love is vengeance' triggered the disturbance. With the help of Google, I quickly found the lyrics and read them a few times. I had already come up with the phrase of the title of this post, but it became cemented in my psyche due to my pondering of the Who's song.

To use a metaphor, our emotional state is not unlike the sand; ever-shifting due to the winds of change. The temporary dunes that are created by these winds are just that: Temporary. Thank Goodness, actually. What a horrible thought to have one's love always be Vengeance?

So, today I look at all these musical works of art (particularly the ones that get stuck in my head) differently than in times past. I now find myself automatically applying that metaphor in my awareness. The oddest thing about all this is that it causes me to see that I am still learning at this late stage of the game. Or is it that my awareness is just running deeper than before?

Upon re-reading this post, I'm thinking it might seem a little trite. Maybe the short version would be better, as in a quick conversation with myself:
"Is that how Pete Townsend feels??"
"Well, no....not all the time. It's just really a snapshot of his emotional landscape."
"Oh, right."

As my old friend, fellow-musician, fellow-writer and wordsmith Walter Jowers used to say,
"As you wuz."

Time Marches On

(I wrote this four days after Tax Day this year, but had it set as a draft . I've decided to go ahead and post it today, even though it's been about seven months. I'll do an addendum later. The story did not have a happy ending)


Being in my seventh decade on this planet, I've seen quite a few folks---many of them relatives, loved ones and very close friends---swoop the scene (as Lord Buckley would put it) and exit the planet before me. The longer I live, the more this will happen. Well, until it's my turn to leave. Then, those that remain will be ruminating on my leaving....maybe.

A great line from one of George Carlin's books, found in a "top 100" list, was the thought that "there are people on this Earth who really don't like you." A hard pill for ego-driven people (who would that exclude?) to choke down, but one that I have found myself able to swallow. I happen to like me, and that's enough for me at this point. That might sound like I'm lonely, or alone, which I'm not. Truth be told, I have more than just a handful of loved ones and close friends; more than I can count using all my fingers. Maybe no toes are needed. I haven't sat down to really tally it all up, but off the top of my head that's what I come up with. I have to guess that more than a few will cogitate on my passing, when I leave them. It doesn't matter much.

Recently, I was out in the sun where I can see a lot better, even without my reading specs. I was sitting in a quiet setting, drinking some tea and just 'grooving', as we aged flower-children used to say. Anyhow, I had a very vivid flashback, of a time in my very early youth---perhaps single-digit age---where I was looking at my Grandma's hand and noticing that her skin was not like mine. It was more translucent, and waxy looking. The veins in her hand had also migrated to just under the skin, unlike my youthful flesh. The image was pretty vivid in my recollection, and when I sat the other day---looking at my own hands in the bright sunlight---I noticed that they now resemble those of 'Gramma'. What an odd awakening.

So, I guess it should come as no surprise that I just heard that a dear friend, who is only one year my junior, was just diagnosed with lymph cancer that has apparently traveled to his brain. The outlook is grim. Doctors, of course, will be more than happy to do all the ugly stuff that we all know they do in these cases, but they offer a slim chance of my friend surviving even a handful of years. If I'm still in shock, how must he feel?

"Nobody gets out alive" becomes more and more true for me, as the months pass. In just the last year, I have said goodbye to a number of close friends; most of them either musical co-conspirators, or confidantes. This ain't getting any easier.

Not exactly in a funk, but pretty reflective at the moment.

A Celebrity Ghost Story?

Lately, as I recount stories of my musical past, I open up windows to memories that have a lot of dust on them. After blowing off the dust, I find that some are pretty interesting, for old relics. The following story is true. I hesitate to do much interpreting, and choose to leave that to the reader.

In the latter half of 1963, when I was sixteen years old, I was playing live Rock and Roll music quite a bit. Back then, there wasn't a glut of players or bands like there is nowadays. Instead of three bands on every street, like today, there were more like three bands for a given town---if that.

So, I had plenty of chances to gig with bands other than my regular one, which at that time may have been The Tempests, a five piece teen Rock band that played high school dances and such. That band was actually the precursor to the Escavels; a much more well-known band name from Wheaton High School in the mid-1960's.

John Belushi's band, The Ravens, needed a lead guitarist for a gig being held in the basement of a local Catholic school. It was a chance for me to make a fast and fun $15.00, so I accepted without a second thought.

It couldn't have been a school function, since there was liquor being served, but I can't recall the reason for the event. Maybe it was a "just turning 21 party" or something. In any case, the serving of the drinks was not very supervised.

Being that I was in the band, I got my drinks for free and proceeded to take advantage of the situation. I drank quite a bit, for such an inexperienced drinker. Lack of experience didn't overshadow the exuberance, though, and I got absolutely plowed. I remember quite a few screwdrivers and beers.

When I was dropped off at home, after the gig, it was late enough that my parents were already asleep. I was starting to feel ill, by the time I got upstairs to my bedroom, and recall throwing up in the bathroom; missing the toilet a bit. I don't recall cleaning up, either. I'm sure Mom quietly cleaned up, without saying a word to anyone about it. That would have been just like her.

I got into my bed, in the room I shared with my brother Stevie. He was 12 years old at the time. I fell asleep pretty quickly, probably with the room still spinning somewhat. Anyone who has gone to bed drunk knows that sleep is fitful at best. Unless you are totally passed out, there are those little moments of consciousness that continually interrupt slumber.

Some time during the night, my brother was standing next to my bed trying to reason with me. I was still quite 'foggy', but knew that it was my brother. For some reason, he had on his "Sunday coat" and little clip-on tie. It made no sense to me. He kept trying to get me to respond, telling me not to "do this" to my mother. After his harping on me got to the point that I was not going to be able to go back to sleep, I said, "Just a minute" and got up to turn on the bedroom light.

I flipped the switch for the overhead light, and squinted against the harsh bulb. It had been dark and I was still not really sober. I spun around to look at my brother next to my bed and said, "What do you want?", but there was nobody there. Quickly, I turned to see Stevie still laying in his bed; sound asleep. My heart was pounding as I stood with my hand still on the light-switch.

Very slowly I came to realize that because I was laying down and looking up, the height of the little boy next to my bed would have been quite a bit shorter than Stevie. More like that of my deceased brother Allan, who had died a month before his seventh birthday. He had been gone for over seven years.

I turned off the light and got back into my bed. My heart was still pounding. I tried to make sense of everything that had just happened, while in my head I kept hearing the phrase "Don't do this to our mother", over and over.

When I Was A Boy...

When I was a young man, I always hated to hear older people talking about the past. I particularly disliked them saying how they had it rougher than we did, and vowed to myself never to do that. Times change, I guess. (and we forget our promises)

It was forty-four years ago, that I experienced the "Blizzard of 1967", as Chicago would eventually know it. That whole event would actually encompass more than three days of that month, not only for me but for the whole city.

The band I was with at the time, "The Morning Blues" (sometimes spelled Mourning), had been playing at the Cheetah, which was an early discotheque-type club that had taken residence in the Aragon Ballroom, on Chicago's Northside. We had been hired for a multi-week stint, and played there four nights a week: Wednesday through Saturday. Thursday was usually the slowest of the four.

On Thursday the 26th of January, though, only one or two actual customers had come into the club by our second break. This was around 9:00 p.m. It had been snowing since early that morning, and although only 4" had been predicted (not unusual for the Windy City), it had not yet stopped coming down. The club owner told us he was closing for the night, and that we'd better get moving, since the whole city was starting to close up shop. By about 9:20, we were out the door.

I can't exactly remember why, but I didn't have a ride back to the suburbs that night, and needed to catch the last train out of town, which would be pulling out around 10:40 p.m. Normally, there would have been plenty of time for me to get to the Northwestern train station, but the city was starting to actually choke on all this snow. On top of my not really being dressed for the weather (we were too cool to wear winter clothes, much less winter boots), I was having to haul a borrowed Fender Twin-Reverb amp home with me that night. The amp was pretty heavy; probably over 75 pounds.

I lugged the amp up the stairs of the "L" platform, which was located right outside the club, and waited for the train to the Loop. I don't remember having to wait for long. Soon enough, the elevated train arrived on Michigan Avenue, where I would catch a bus to the train station. The scene was starkly white, and just a tad scary. The street was absolutely deserted.

After a bit of a bone chilling wait, a bus appeared down the street through the veil of snow that continued coming down, as it had since around 5:00 a.m. that morning. It was now after 10:00 p.m. When the bus arrived at the stop, I stepped in with one or two other people, only to find that it was already filled with passengers. There was just barely standing room. Since all the seats were taken, I turned the amp with the speakers facing away from any shuffling feet, and sat down on it. I remember it being plenty warm inside the bus, no doubt due to all the bodies putting out 98.6 degrees. Still, the clock was ticking, and my nervousness had it's own chilling effect on me.

When the bus arrived at the station, I literally ran (as much as one can, with a suitcase-sized amplifier in tow) the half-block distance from the entrance to the ticket window. It was exactly 10:40 p.m., but I found to my relief that the train had not left yet. I would not have to sleep in the station, or have to wait until 5:40 in the morning for the next train.

The West Line train, which would take me to Wheaton, was not nearly as crowded as the bus had been. It would be a comfortable ride, and I might even catch up on some sleep during the trip. I settled in, and expected to be on my way shortly. Back in those days, every train had a 'smoking' car. I lit up a Camel and leaned back, relaxing as much as I could. I was still feeling the effects of a serious dose of adrenaline.

Just before 11:30 p.m., I heard a conductor explaining our obvious delay to another passenger: The tracks ahead were being cleared, and things were not going too quickly. It had now been snowing for over 18 hours. At one point, either a passenger or conductor made a "snack run", and the waiting was made a little more bearable. Passengers also started becoming more sociable. Around this time, I finally resigned myself to accept whatever came next, not that I really had a choice.

I eventually drifted off to sleep, occasionally waking up and looking at my watch. It was now hours that were ticking by. At about 2:25 in the morning, I awoke to that unmistakable feeling of the train lurching forward, and knew that we were finally getting underway. I calculated that I would arrive in Wheaton some time between 3:30 and 4:00 a.m., though the trip normally only took about 40 minutes. I was a little off.

At nearly 7:30 in the morning, the train squealed to a halt at the Wheaton train station. Plows had been busy all night, but in the brightness of the morning it was obvious that traveling by car would be dicey at best. There were no cabs available. After a short phone call to my folks' house, verifying their immobility, it was clear that I would need to trudge the last mile-and-a-half on foot. I dreaded the thought of toting that heavy amp the whole way, but I didn't worry for long. The larger storage lockers at the station were just big enough for a suitcase, and in this case the heavy Fender amplifier. After securing my load, for just two quarters, I headed off on the last leg of my journey.

The next couple days were spent digging out. The family car had been buried to the rooftop, with the drifting, and there was a whole lot of driveway and sidewalk to clear. We took our time. We also took quite a few snapshots, a few of which I still have.

I revisited my childhood a little, by doing things like repeatedly jumping off the garage roof into the deeper drifts of snow. I was nearly 20 years old at the time, but during those few days I felt half that age. There was a great feeling of freedom, for some reason. It was also a time for small adventures. At one point, we needed some groceries and it fell upon me to take our old childhood sled and pull it to the store, load it up, and pull it back home. It was almost like going back in time.

For the rest of the weekend, we did the few things that we were able to, and just enjoyed being snowed-in. By Monday, things had more or less returned to normal and Chicago went back to bravely facing the rest of the Winter the way it always has.

A New Ploy To Extract More Money From The Consumer?

(I just copied this from another of my blogs, since I wanted to make sure it got read by maximum people)


Is "Out Of Stock" the latest in the lame bag of tricks that companies will be using, since outright heavy price increases don't go over too well in this economy? I'd say being on the lookout for more of this, might be in order. Not so clever re-wording (or re-framing) of the situation, does not help it fly, at least in my book. Here's a recent email exchange, for an example:

-----Original Message-----
From: Greg Gillette
To: klutterback@aol.com
Sent: Thu, Oct 21, 2010 4:25 pm
Subject: kava kava

Thank you for your continued loyalty to Whole Health Products. We are writing because an item you have on your Convenience Plan, Kava Kava Extract 200mg, 150 capsules is out of stock and we do not have a tentative date for its return.

However, we do have the 60 capsule bottle in stock. This product is identical to the product you have been receiving, except for the different capsule count per bottle. The current price for the 60-capsule bottle for our Convenience Plan customers is $14.98. Because you are a loyal long-term customer, we will give you a discount of 15% off that price, reducing the price to you to $12.73 per bottle.

Your Convenience Plan order was set up with 1 bottles shipping to you every 75 days. If we do not hear back from you before this date, we will automatically change your shipment to the new size bottle and leave the quantity of bottles the same.

Please let me know if you need to change the quantity of the order to correspond with the new capsule count. I apologize for any inconvenience.

Thank you,

Whole Health

866-381-7693

To: greg@wholehealth.com
Sent: Fri, Oct 22, 2010 7:35 am
Subject: Re: kava kava

Gillette:

So, out of the goodness of your heart you are going to give me 60 (60% less) capsules for the exact amount (to the penny) that I have been paying for 150 capsules? Does 'out of stock' mean you can't find a slightly larger bottle in which to put 90 more capsules, in order to honor our original agreement? Or perhaps this is actually just your way of increasing the per capsule price to me by 250%, and then attempting to explain away the increase with this unsatisfactory excuse. In any case, this is absolutely unacceptable to me.

Do NOT attempt to charge my card for anything other than what I agreed to originally, which is 150 capsules at the price of 12.73 per bottle plus shipping. That is my reply to your email.

K.L.Utterback


I guess I should be thankful that they weren't waiting outside my home, with a loaded gun, to rip me off, eh? Maybe this is a kinder, gentler robbery technique that we are expected to accept without complaint.

What a world.
---------

And now, boys and girls...the thrilling conclusion to our story. It seems that niceties have been excluded in this reply to my last email to Greggy-poo.

-----Original Message-----
From: Greg Gillette <greg@wholehealth.com>
To: klutterback@aol.com

Sent: Fri, Oct 22, 2010 9:36 am
Subject: RE: kava kava

The Kava Kava raw material price has gone up tremendously in price. Our price went up and thus, our customers’ price did as well. I will cancel your convenience plan for the kava kava.

The lack of salutation, or signature for that matter, indicates that somehow I'VE become the asshole. I guess telling the truth first, instead of deceptive (I'm sure they would say "creative") wording, is something that really isn't in the marketing strategy here. My take is that they really aren't "sorry for any inconvenience". Ya think?

I read once that if you steal $4 from someone, you are a thief and liable to receive punishment. On the other hand, if you sell a widget that cost 10 cents to make, and charge $4.10 for it, you a the marketing genius of the week and liable to appear in Business Genius Quarterly.

In a brick and mortar world, what I did was probably something like pushing the sales-kid against the wall, slapping the crap out him, and making him say the truth out loud. He didn't really sound too happy, did he?