Emotional Indigestion

Something odd has happened to my writing. I used to post a nice balance of matter-of-fact, serious, humorous, cryptic, and just plain off the walls entries. You know, moments of darkness and light – like the blog title says. Lately, it has been of the more cryptic and “huh, what did he just say?” variety (or lack of variety).

It is not writer’s block … it is something quite different. I have been writing more than ever. I have three blogs (at least) written and the start of what could quite possibly be a book going – and I am unwilling to do anything other them let them sit in the memory of my computer.

My writing has become quite personal; too personal, in fact. I have chosen to let loose the raw, emotional side and put it to print. Is it suitable for this forum? I am not so sure. Taken out of context, it would appear that my life is pure hell and that I am a tormented soul who will never be anything other than a victim of circumstances. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Blame it on the time of year, call it a life crisis, peg it on the economy, chalk it up to emotional and spiritual indigestion… It doesn’t really matter. But until I can find some perspective on all of this and return to my usual sometimes serious, sometimes less-than-serious, smartass self, I think I will step away from the blogging… for now, at least. (Previous sentence subject to change at whim).

That doesn’t mean I will stop leaving smartass comments on YOUR blogs.

Autumn Rain

I wish it would rain
the sunlight shines unknowing, uncaring
when I feel as grey as November skies

Chill nights, autumn leaves
are now memories cold that taunt, that tease
from a past that slowly grows faint and dies

Landscape unchanging
I envy you in your complacency
you mock me with your endless summer guise

But all things must change
just as sunlight will surely turn to rain
a cloudscape will soften endless summer skies

I wish it would rain…

Goodbye Blue Sky

Richard Wright 1943 – 2008

The world lost a legendary musician yesterday. You may not know the name, but you know his work. Richard Wright was the keyboard player and a founding member of Pink Floyd. He died at the age of 65 from a brief battle with cancer.

The voice and guitar of David Gilmour stand out as the trademark sound of Pink Floyd. The songwriting and lavish conceptual work of Roger Waters made the band rise to the heights of one the most successful bands of all time. But there in the background, were the subtle layers of sound that Richard laid as the foundation for songs that we all know so well. His soft keyboard work on “Shine On You Crazy Diamond,” his beautiful piano sound on “Us and Them,” the unforgettable effects, organ, and strings of “Echoes”… and the list goes on.

Not so long ago, founding Floyd member and cult hero Syd Barrett died and brought the mad genius back into the light for a while. I don’t expect the unassuming Wright will get that kind of attention. But I will remember late nights in a happily altered state (we are talking about Pink Floyd, after all…) listening to “Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun” with my stereo turned very low so I would not wake my parents. I also didn’t want them to smell the aroma coming from my room.

Every once in a while, Richard would step forward and do something musically dynamic and remarkable. I will conclude with the finest of these efforts - the very appropriate “Great Gig In The Sky.”

Say hello to Syd, Richard...

For Michael Collins, Jeffrey, and Me

I’ll go in reverse order…

For me:
I need to reclaim my life. My whining, ranting, bitching, kvetching, and otherwise being various shades of miserable about my job are evidence that I need to either accept it or move on. I could write another rant about this week’s events and how it spilled into this weekend, but I am not going to. I am claiming my life as my own.

For Jeffrey:
Damn, but the picture in the last blog really does look like Jeffrey. Well, if you put him in a suit and got him to yell into a phone… I am sure he would look quite dashing in a suit and I have a feeling he could yell into a phone just like that. For those of you who don’t know who I am talking about, look to the right of the blog and see .99centPoetry. His profile picture may not look like that, but trust me… that’s him.

For Michael Collins:
Who the hell is Michael Collins? Exactly. You remember Neil Armstrong and you probably remember Buzz Aldrin. They got the glory of being the first men to walk on the moon while Michael sat in his little orbiting capsule looking at a grey landscape, knowing he would never set foot on this familiar, yet alien world. There are times when I feel like I understand how Michael Collins must have felt. Not the glory part… the being so close that you can almost touch it, but having it out of reach.

Bonus point to anyone who can identify the origin of the blog title without looking it up…

Not Exactly a Vacation – Epilogue

Let’s not call it time off. Let’s call it staying at home (mostly) and being constantly annoyed, harassed, and generally pissed of at people who can’t think for themselves for FOUR FREAKING DAYS.

Earlier, I said that I have not whined about work for a while. I intend to change that...

It is official. I did not have one day of my “vacation” where I was not contacted by work for reasons from the ridiculous to the more ridiculous. When, on Wednesday, I issued an edict that I would no longer be looking at or responding to emails, but rather acting like I was on vacation, I thought I was pretty clear. Unfortunately, it didn’t stop there.

Monday was a Holiday, so nobody was at work… thank God for Holidays. Tuesday was countless emails about getting what I needed to do a payroll from home (my fault for choosing a payroll week) and several “while I have you” emails. Wednesday was doing payroll at an ungodly hour because the cable guy was coming to repair our wireless signal – we already talked about that, but let me reiterate that the cable guy was an IDIOT! When the emails starting coming to my personal account, I had to issue aforementioned edict. Thursday was the panic about getting ready for a hurricane that IF it was actually heading in this direction would not be an issue for at least five days. Did that deter them from panicking? No. Did my edict hold? No. Did not responding to emails work? No. That’s when the phone calls started.

Let me say at this point that I am not a genius, a psychic, or in possession of any superhuman abilities… in other words, these are things that anybody can handle if only they would allow their brains to engage before working their mouths.

I snuck into work very early Friday morning to get out the plans for the hurricane shutters (even if it was too early to put them up) and directions for changing the system voicemail message (which didn’t need to be done). I made a copy of each to leave as a present for my boss and almost got out the door… almost. I could hear someone downstairs as I was leaving and I knew it was my boss *sigh* She is a very, very nice woman and she looked like she was about to burst into tears. It seems that in three sort days, the crazies had gotten to her to the point where she felt like she was losing her mind. Uh, yeah…I understand. You see, she and I share an office; we’re roomies and we get along very well. We bounce ideas off of each other, laugh a lot, and make the best of a… let’s say, difficult work environment. We’re a team. Uncouple the team, and apparently there is trouble.

I listened to her for an hour (did I mention that this is my vacation?) and when she said that she was starting to feel better, I recognized my cue to leave and possibly have one day of a vacation-like illusion. No such luck… While finally doing something with a friend that resembled having a life, the phone rang – Incoming text message “r u there?” I turned to my friend and said “Why do I do this to myself” as I, the world’s slowest texter (not a real word), responded. We were out, and about to head home, so I allowed myself those five short minutes before I called. Hurricane panic again. I was brief, I was curt, I was in no way going to be party to a plan that was a knee-jerk reaction to an undetermined problem that would involve going into work over the weekend which, by the way is STILL PART OF MY VACATION.

So that is how I spent my week off. My goodness, am I SO primed for Monday…

Don’t Read This…

…If you are put off by a passion for music and all of the technical geekdom that goes into making it happen. Your attention may wane and your eyes may glaze over… you have been warned.

So, what have I been doing on my (sort of) vacation? Painting the bathroom that I started two years ago? Nope. Getting the Hi-Def and digital service for the TV I bought in January? Nope. Taking care of doctor appointments, dental appointments, bank accounts, car servicing, etc., a.k.a. known as getting your life together while you have the opportunity? Nope.

What I have done so far is have daily communication with work, culminating in doing payroll from home yesterday (starting at 5:30 am), finishing just in time for the cable guy to show up and try (“try” being the operative word) to fix our wireless signal. Payroll got done and like the good geek that I am, I told the cable guy how to fix the problem… why did I even call for service? Anyway, work demands continued to persist, so I had to make a declaration that I was no longer reading my email and I was going act like I was on vacation. Remote log-in disconnected, not answering work calls… enough.

Now I am free to continue to put more time into what I have been doing, on and off, since last weekend – putting together my home recording studio. When I owned a home in New Jersey (1986 to 1998) I had a full home studio and I had a blast doing a lot of composition and recording there. The format at the time was cassette, so if I am to resurrect any of it, I have a lot of converting to digital to do. I had to leave behind a lot of equipment for my move to Maine (a home studio in a B&B just doesn’t work), so I have only a few essential pieces remaining from that setup – and a lot of stored music files on 3 ½” disk that I have no way of reading in a format that I no longer have the software for. Hello, Musician’s Friend…

Musician’s Friend has a catalog and website that turns me into a kid in a candy store. Since I play several instruments, there is always something I “need.” I have been pretty successful in deleting the emails with advertised specials (mostly), but now that I am intent in getting a scaled down studio together, the credit card has been used and abused.

So what have I put together so far? Ok, here’s the geeky part:

A small workstation with rails for rack mounting synthesizers and effects modules
My old analog (cassette) Tascam 424 Portastudio multi-track recorder (4 tracks)
A new(er) Tascam DP-01 Digital Portastudio multi track recorder (8 tracks)
An M-Audio pre-amp
My cherished Proteus 1 (256 rock/pop sounds) and Proteus 2 (256 orchestral sounds) synthesizers
An ART FXR Elite Multi effect rack
A Korg K61P controller keyboard
A M-Audio 88 hammer action, weighted key digital piano/controller keyboard
An Oberheim Strummer (emulates strumming action for synthesized guitar sounds)
Cakewalk Home Studio recording and sequencing software
A Fender Strat electric guitar (is there any other?) and Fender amp
A 1968 original Ovation 12 string acoustic/electric guitar that I have owned since 1973
An Epiphone mandolin
Shure 545SD and 5565 microphones
Sony Studio Monitor system
Sony Studio headphones ( to keep David from... well, to keep David...)

Is that enough? Hell, no… Ordered and on its way:
Alesis mixing board with built in digital signal processing (are you still with me?)
Yamaha synthesizer (cheap, but an easy way to add more sounds)
Various wires, cables, and replacement ac adapters that seem to have gone missing in all of my moving from place to place

While that may sound like a lot, here is what I left behind in my moves:
Three classic synthesizers (two Korgs and a mini-moog) and an A-frame keyboard stand
A piano
A Tama drum kit
Korg drum machine
A flute
An Alto Sax
A violin
Two dulcimers
A Crate 1000W PA system
A wireless microphone headset
Microphone stands
Various percussion toys…
And a room that was able to accommodate all of this (eyes glazing over, are they… skimming over the details?)

That is all well and good, but you may ask, “where is the output – I don’t hear any music?” All in good time… it takes a while to get this all together, get the electronics talking to each other, practicing, composing, recording, mixing down to stereo – and then you will hear the music. I promise.

In the mean time, I am covered in miles of cable that looks like spaghetti on steroids – and loving it.