Category Archives: musings

It’s what I do.

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Lately, I’ve been thinking about moving. Oh, I’m not going to go anywhere (most likely), but this line of thinking stirs up frequently in my head. It is a familiar refrain. I realized today that when I was younger I had a sort-of self identifier of “I move. It’s what I do.”

I moved frequently growing up, and then continued that trend into my adult life. For many years I had a ritual of listening to Bowie’s “Ziggy Stardust” while packing. Now when I hear it, I get a strong desire to dip back into the unknown.

There is a feeling I always get when packing my stuff up for a move. Most of the moves I’ve made have been to cities I’ve never even visited. Leaving is a looking forward to the possibilities. I don’t know what is next, and that is exciting. I’ve always loved that feeling and it is part of what drives me to make those big changes. The idea of what might be out there is so much better than the present reality (even if the present is pretty okay), that I take that leap into the unfamiliar.

A bunch of years ago I made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t move /from/ anymore, but I would only move if I had some compelling reason to move /to/. This requires me to not pack up and get in my car and drive drive drive when that GO feeling tightens my chest. It also means that when I consider the idea of changing locations, I have to really look and see if I am moving towards a better possible future, or moving away from some frustration or disappointment.

As they say in business, “location is everything.”
How do you know if the location you live is right for you?

more human than human

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I’ve been missing my dad this past week or so and I just now figured out why. Of course. It’s Holiday Season…with all the talk of family get-togethers and such. And this is one of the first years in many that my mom’s side of the family hasn’t done a good Thanksgiving gathering.

But when I really think about holiday family gatherings and my dad, I have to admit that he was usually an ass. He had a tenuous relationship with his family – they were all very close, but he was considered (or perhaps moreso considered himself) the black sheep of the family. So, as tends to happen during these festivities, they were often fraught with difficulties.

I remember one Christmas in New York with my dad’s family where he taught me how to pour him a proper drink (2-3 fingers full with a couplea ice cubes) and we played hours of Atari. That was great for me, but in retrospect, it was rather rude of him.

There was a Christmas where he came to Illinois to have the holiday with my mom and grandparents. I think we were having a big extended family get-together that year. It was the one and only time we did that. Dad was drinking a lot and was rather unpleasant. Nothing terrible, just not fun to be around. He spent a fair amount of time alone in the basement drinking and smoking cigarettes and being rather anti-social and surly. My mom was furious. I was young and just knew that dad wasn’t being a good guest and kept trying to keep him entertained.

When you are a kid, you think that adults have things figured out. That somewhere along the line they realized how to live life. But as you grow older, at some point not only do you realize that your parents were just flying by the seat of their pants, but suddenly you are in your late thirties or forties and realize you don’t know jack…and here you are a full-fledged “adult”.

I don’t know if that realization frightened me or just made me kind of sad.

The knowledge that my dad didn’t know shit and was just doing the best he could, well, I guess it sucks when you realize that your folks are human. Humans are fallible and have the ability to fuck things up. When you are a kid, you see your parents as more than human (and not like the White Zombie song, although I have met some ‘rents who might fit that category. Maybe there really are replicants running around posing as humans. But I digress) and when you realize that they are just plain ole’ people it can be disappointing. What have we to look forward to if we are just going to grow up into staying plain ole’ people? I was kinda hoping to grow up and become one of those infallible “adults.”

Lost Cross 25th Year Reunion

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We have known each other for 25 years. I was one of the young ones of the group. I was 14 when I met Steve and Levi, 15 when I really started to hang out with them and Malcolm and Groble and Joy and James and a whole slew of others. Except for one or two other kids my age, everyone else was in college. (Now that 4 year age different means little, but then…it was huge.)

I grew up with these people. We grew up together. I had trouble at home, and this group became my family. They still are. After all these years. We are lucky. Not everyone gets to have such a close-ness with a group people they knew for those few tumultuous years of the late-teens and early twenties. It is a uniquely kind-hearted, giving, bunch. And most of them would just as soon punch you as hug you for saying such a thing. My good nights at basement shows at Lost Cross were measured by how many bruises I ended up with. It was hardcore and I was an angry teen.

Holy shit am I tired. It is 3:30am on Saturday night/Sunday morning. I didn’t want the evening to end. I still don’t. I hang on to a thread of consciousness in order to write this.

I didn’t know what to expect. I reconciled with my past many years ago and had trepidations to revisit it. I was worried that it would be too surreal, too awkward, too weird.  I thought it would be difficult to see people, that I would be surrounded by familiar strangers and a room full of nostalgia.

Instead, I found my family waiting for me.

We are punk rock.
To me this has always meant hard, fast music, drinking and smoking, and a tight-knit bond of intelligent, thoughtful people.

These are my people.

….

I wrote that last night, but wanted to include photos but was too tired. This morning I thought “maybe I’ll edit it first.” But I’ve decided to leave it be.

It is almost 12 hours later – 2:30pm on Sunday – and my head hurts. I met more friends for breakfast/lunch today and now I’m ready for a nap.

So, that said, ya’ll are on your own for photo-viewing this time. I haven’t the energy to chose and embed. Here are pics I took yesterday and last night. (I did motivate enough to put some captions on these photos.)