In Which I Meander the Dotted Line

The Easy Listenin' 
Mobile...

Back when I was a kid being chauffeured around in our wood-paneled Vista Cruiser station wagon, the AM/FM radio was always tightly controlled by our parents. My dad grew up on a tobacco farm in rural Granville County, so I hazard a guess that his true preference was for country music, old-time or otherwise. However, because my mother detested country music with the kind of vehemence people normally reserve for, say, Hitler, he kept that in the closet. If we listened hard enough, though, we might catch him whistling Farther Along or You Are My Sunshine.

My dad fancied Karen Carpenter.
Apparently, so did Nat Stine's dad.

So, what was the soundtrack of our dysfunctional car rides? One of three things: WUNC, which played classical music back then, WYYD, which played muzak (elevator music, we called it), or WRAL's adult contemporary. Yes, I am deeply familiar with the soft hits of the seventies: Captain and Tennille, the Carpenters, Helen Reddy… folks like that. I think my dad had a secret crush on Karen Carpenter... and she did have a voice like butter... Of course when we were very young we thought it was fine. As I blossomed into a surly teen and found out that WQDR (album rock back then) was where it was at… well, let’s just say my preferences were slightly more metal than our parents’. Led Zeppelin. Cream. The Who. And Elton John, of course – but he was considered cool back then. 

This was more my speed.

Nevertheless, we continued to be fed a steady auditory diet of smooth melodies, maudlin lyrics and syrupy orchestrations. Ew. To my teenange ears, it was like fingernails on a chalkboard... Oh! The humiliating uncoolness of it all!!! I survived, though, and here I am today, telling you the tale.

And now we fast forward to the current day, which will take us in my usual roundabout way to what I am really going to talk about. (Picture those Family Circus cartoons where the mom tells Jeffy or PJ to walk from point A to point B, but dotted lines show how the kid’s actually path shoots off in a hundred directions – petting the dog, getting cookies from Mrs. Wilson… oh wait, wrong comic! Sure I could have just said, “let’s talk about these two songs” but it wouldn’t have been nearly as fun as telling you about the cavities we got from excessive Paul Williams consumption…!)

Anyway, I remember a cool woman in my office – a stellar mother – told me that she always let her (teenage) kids pick what they would listen to in the car. So I thought, due to my previous pain, “that’s what I’M going to do.” And so I do. When Bill was too little to care, I picked the stuff – usually something I considered pretty good, but not too obnoxious. He knew Van Morrison’s Moondance album from beginning to end. Also James Taylor’s Sweet Baby James, Hank Williams Greatest Hits and the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper.

Bill's Pinewood Derby homage...

But now that he's nine, he’s starting to have his own preferences and, like the aforementioned cool mom from my office, I let him pick the tunage. You know what he picks ten times out of ten? The Who. That child loves those guys. Especially Keith Moon, who, although not a great role model, could really beat the skins. Bill even put a Who logo on his Pinewood Derby car and made little Lego figures to go with it of the guys in the band. It was awesome if I do say so myself.

to these guys...

Now, as I’ve said, I’ve been listening to the Who for roughly 40 years. Album radio has ensured that I have heard Won’t Get Fooled Again and Baba O’Riley more times than I can count… so by now it kind of goes in one ear and out the other. Until Bill. Hearing these songs as my kid hears them for the first time… it’s almost like hearing them myself for the first time… again. So let’s just say that my appreciation of the Who has been reignited.

 

who actually looked like this.

Bill invariably requests Who’s Next or Meaty Beaty Big and Bouncy for our rides to school and cub scouts and Target and the like, so I’ve had plenty of time to mull over the classic songs and their meanings and implications. Two songs, have especially unfolded for me in new and different ways. (And now we come down to the true raison d’etre of this post!)

"naked, stoned 
and stabbed..."

First, Bargain. It’s fairly obvious that this passionate declaration is religious. Pete Townshend is a follower of Meher Baba, who was an Eastern guru. The gist of it is that Pete would give up everything he has to find spiritual enlightment through his guru – and would consider a bargain… the best he ever had. Of course my Western, thoroughly Christian brain applied it to seeking and following Jesus Christ… it resonates with quotes from the Bible like, “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.” (Matthew 13:44) and “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.  For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it.” (Mark 8:34-35)

But one day, we’re driving along, Bill and me, listening to this forceful, anthemic song, and I hear Roger Daltrey sing out, “To win you, I’d stand naked, stoned and stabbed…” I realized that this song is not about ME and what I’D give up for Christ, but about JESUS Himself and what He gave up for every me on earth!!! That is to say, each one of us is so amazing to Him that He would and DID stand naked, stoned and stabbed to purchase us from our own stupidity! AND He considers it a BARGAIN!! (Can I get a "Hallelujah"?!) I much prefer this interpretation, as 1. I am lazy, and 2. Even if I were to do all the work this song implies, I couldn’t save myself.

"Can I buy your magic bus?"

Okay, moving right along. This next one is sort of a stretch, but it really works for me. Magic Bus. This joyful, rockin’ good tune – performed with all the  fervor of a charismatic worship service – is about a guy who boards a bus every day to visit his girlfriend. He values this privilege so much he wants to buy the bus for his own personal use. “I don't care how much I pay, I wanna drive my bus to my baby each day.” Which, again, expresses the sentiment that attaining the object of one's desire is worth everything one owns. (Again, Matthew 13:44)

This song can be taken straightforwardly – as in "boy do I love my girlfriend;" some imagine it as an ode to the narrator’s drug of choice. But one day recently, I heard it in my mind as an expression of intention and appreciation for contemplative prayer. As in, “every day I hop on board the contemplative prayer bus to be united with God.”

"Nooooooooooooooo..."

In this scenario, our protagonist chants “I want it, I want it, I want it, I want it…” as a sort of contemplative exercise such as those devised by St. Ignatius of Loyola. Then the guy in the background goes, “You CAN’T have it!” This would be Satan, naturally. Or “the enemy,” “the evil one,” Mr. Scratch, Voldemort, Sauron...* That a-hole tries to tell us we can’t buy the Magic Bus, (ie. pray worth crap and why would God want you anyway) and therefore, getting to our “bay-bay” (ie. achieving union with God) is either impossible, or much too costly. Of course we’ve already established that we are willing to spend whatever it takes to get there… and fortunately for us, as mentioned above, it is our “bay-bay” who has paid the enormous cost and made the amazing journey to reach US. Yes, please!

How ‘bout another “Hallelujah!” and an "Amen!"





*Miranda Priestly in The Devil Wears Prada, Mr. Scratch, Louis Cypher in Angel Heart, Daryl Van Horne in The Witches of Eastwick, John Milton in The Devil's Advocate, Duchess the cat in Babe, Denis Leary as Slater in Secret Lives of Dentists...

Coupla Things

I'm generally not a 
meme sharer, but I did feel this one...

It has occurred to me that maybe more people would read my blog if the posts were shorter. I’m not sure why it matters to me how many hits I get or whatever, but it IS something I notice, sadly. Are my entries just too long and rambling and detailed and full of tangents and all that? Is reading one of them like spending 30 minutes listening to my son talk about the playground wars? Should I just make my point and get the hell out of Dodge?

David's motley crüe

I guess I could, but that wouldn’t really be me. No... long, rambling, detailed, full of tangents are definitely words I’d use to describe my thought processes. So… it’s like you’re just peeking into my head… for a while. 

That said… I thought I’d experiment with a shorter post… if nothing else, because I just wanted to point out a couple of things I tripped over in my “daily” Bible reading.

David and
Jonathan, BFFs

See, right now I’m in I Samuel, which tells the story of Samuel, Saul and David. Samuel was a prophet who had to anoint Israel’s first king. Saul was Israel’s first king, but before the oil was dry on his forehead, he messed up… “royally,” as they say. So Samuel is instructed by God to anoint David as king. The problem now is that Saul is still alive and royally pissed. He's always trying to nail David to the wall with a spear, so when David makes himself scarce Saul hunts him down like dog.

It’s at this point that the writer of Samuel mentions this little tidbit:  “All those who were in distress or in debt or discontented gathered around [David]…” (I Samuel 22: 2) I guess I noticed it because it went so beautifully with the previous post I wrote about Jesus being the King of Broken Hearts. I know David is NOT Jesus, but he’s sort of the prototype… One of the things the Jews said about the Messiah was that he would be the Son of David. And to be literal, he was actually one of David’s descendants – in addition to being the Messiah AKA the Son of David.

Bruce Cockburn knows
who Jesus came for!

There are plenty of things in David’s life that sort of pre-echo (I know that’s not a word or a thing, but it works for me here!) Jesus’s life… like his work as a shepherd, for instance.,, and the way he was rejected by his own family, and hunted down by the establishment... you get the picture.

So when I see this part about David attracting all the folks who are in distress and debt and all, well… I know that’s me. And it’s why I am attracted to Jesus, the friend of (according to Bruce Cockburn) “shepherds and street people, hookers and bums.” Because "The Son of Man [another of the Messiah's monikers] came to seek and to save the lost.” (Luke 9:10)

Okay, so moving right along… the next day I read something else that popped out at me. You see, in I Samuel 23, our hero David is still on the run from crazy King Saul when this happens: “And Saul’s son Jonathan went to David at Horesh and helped him find strength in God.” (v16) What I like about this is that it’s a great description of what I perceive my job as a friend to be. 

Haha! You're going to have to read the 
whole post and click on the link to 
find out what this has to do with anything!

When my friends are down, it’s not my job to fix everything, or to tell my freaked out friend, “You can do it!” Although this advice can be helpful in some cases (as in this charming song on a video that we bought my son when he was 2 – and if you neglect to click on this link, you will most assuredly be sorry), it still leaves the friend with the responsibility for “doing it.” 

Now, I don’t have anything at all against hard work. I mean, I do it sometimes. But I’m thinking that rather than telling my exhausted friend, “You can do it!”... if I'm going to be a good friend like Jonathan, I'll be saying “God can do it!” Because He can…. And that’s really what a desperate, in debt or discontented person needs to know.

(Okay, so... that wasn't so short. Maybe it's not in my skill set to be brief?)

He Talks to Angels and the Stars Start to Spin

Merle and Doc Watson...
reunited and it feels so good.

Well, we just got back from our yearly pilgrimage to the Merlefest bluegrass festival, and it was kind of a different one. Usually we are there nearly every waking moment – or maybe it just feels that way. I love it there, don’t get me wrong… it just seems like an awful long time to be in one place where the quantity of port-a-johns way outnumbers the quantity of indoor “seating.” This time, though, rain and cold kept us from sticking it out too long on any given day... which was a little disappointing, but it was fine.

Jim Lauderdale, rockin'
a Nudie suit

Anyway, it was the first Merlefest without Doc, its founder and driving force. Sure, he was getting up there, but he was still the benevolent spirit that infused the festival with goodness and mercy. Oh wait, no – that was God. But still, Doc started the whole thing in memory of his late son Merle, and now I guess we’re doing it in memory of them both – two musicians who could play the hell out of their guitars.

The musicians who knew Doc best did do a special tribute one night for him, but the rest of the weekend... well, people mentioned him occasionally, but the man they really talked about was George Jones. Maybe because the wound was fresh – we just got word of his passing on Friday. George’s music was  straight country rather than bluegrass – not exactly the type championed at Merlefest… but as a man, he was exactly the type of guy we’re all about.

1960s George Jones,
rockin' a Nudie suit

Jim Lauderdale, a fantastic musician who always comes to the festival, might actually be considered George’s "successor." If anyone COULD fill his shoes, Jim could do it. He’s got the talent, the charisma, the Nudie suits, the plaintive country twang, and the hard-luck story it would take to live up to George Jones’ legacy.

Heck, once I saw Jim play George in a production called Stand By Your Man: The Tammy Wynette Story. His portrayal of the man they call “Possum” was eerily accurate. Jones lived a wild, drankin’, partyin’ life… His love life was turbulent as well – heck, he was married four times. But of singing, Jones was a master. He could wail and croon… he wrung every bit of emotion out of any song he sang.

More recent Gorge
Jones... RIP

And that’s why Jim Lauderdale crowned him (in song) The King of Broken Hearts. If you click on this link, you can hear Jim explain the title, and the awesome song.) Oh sure, George Strait tried to sing it, but it was Jim who wrote it and meant it. And during his set at Merlefest, when Jim introduced the song he did so with a quaking voice, full of grief and missing. 

He did the song right, though, because he’s a great performer. Anyway, I love the title The King of Broken Hearts, but I think it belongs to someone else. Or some One else! And I’m pretty sure you know where I’m going with this… that’s right… the Man of Constant Sorrow.* Or as Isaiah called him, the Man of Sorrows. (Isaiah 55:3)

George and
Jim together

You know – the one who said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.” (Matthew 5:33) Yeah, that guy, Jesus. I love Him. He pulled all our sorrow and brokenheartedness onto Himself and bled it out of his own body.** Yeah, it’s nasty. But it’s altogether real. And wonderful. And scandalous. And beautiful.

I love Him more than I can say, and surely much less than He deserves, this King of Broken Hearts. But no amount of love or “goodness” on my part can make Him love me more, or make Him more concerned about my broken heart. Because it is His first priority no matter what. He was betrayed, beaten, ridiculed, spit on, hung on a tree and stabbed for my broken heart. And for yours.

I always loved this verse from a song called The Disappointed by XTC… “The disappointed all congregate at my house.” Because it reminds me of church. I go to a church with a wide mix of people, but I’m not going to lie to you – there are some beautiful, well-to-do people in that mix – people that look like they could be clip-art models. I remember once when I was very young, and even more obviously broken than I am now, I was sitting in church and I noticed an extremely handsome, well-dressed man with a lovely family… the look on his face… just full of hurt. I thought to myself, everyone here is sitting on a pile of sh*t. I can’t assume that just because they look like they have it together… that they do. Because they most likely don’t... otherwise why would they seek solace from the King of Broken Hearts? Of course, that's not the only reason people go to church, but it's a likely one.

Our church has a
generous share
of clip-art-looking
families.

He's not judging
you, he's just
trying not to poot.

Now, I was deep in therapy at this time and sometimes when you get deep in therapy, you get so busy looking at yourself, that you start to think everyone else is fine – that you’re the only one who is messed up and needs special consideration. But this subtle event at church marked a distinct increase in the amount of empathy I had for others. Not that I’m not still selfish as all get-out, but now, I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt a bit more than I used to. I mean, I didn’t think people were terrible before, I just didn’t think of them as flawed creatures that may or may not be hauling around a big suitcase of crap from their past... or, as my friend Grace says – that look on their face may not be a grimace or judgy look - they might just be trying to hold in a poot. 

So... anyway... I’m definitely off track now with this… I guess I just wanted to talk a little about George Jones, who I miss – and Jim Lauderdale, who I have a crush on… and The King of Broken Hearts, who is our God.***

*I linked to Ralph Stanley's version of this song because, well, he just sounds more like the title than the smooth-singing Dan Tyminsky who provided the voice for George Clooney in O Brother Where Art Thou. Here's THAT version. If you really prefer looking at George Clooney, here's that one.

**Read Isaiah 55 and John 19 and you'll get the whole picture.

***Okay, one last song, a prayer to the King of Broken Hearts...