SOME SONGS DESERVE A SECOND, OR THIRD LISTEN

I was driving home from work a few weeks ago, listening to my music when a special song started to play.  As the song ended, I reached up and triggered the CD player in the car back a step to listen to the song again.  After the song began to come to a close, I once again clicked it back to listen to it again.  It came to me that I do this quite often and began to think about that.  I don't do that to every song that comes in the queue.  I then realized that there are certain songs that, when I hear them, one listen is not enough.  The songs ends too soon.  I began to take notice as to what songs effected me in this manner.  Usually the main reason I need to listen to a certain song more than once are the lyrics but the music itself plays a big part in what makes me listen two or three times.  I made a list in my mind of these songs and thought I might share with you a few of the songs that land somewhere deep in my mind to make me decide to listen again.

The song that started this whole thinking process was a song that I have loved since I was pre-teen.  It is Simon and Garfunkel's recording of Paul Simon's "I Am A Rock".  This song, as most of Paul Simon's compositions are, has a wonderful melody.  It is a beautiful song that starts with just Simon and his guitar then slowly builds in intensity until at the very end when it goes quiet and soft and the final few lyrics are sung with just the guitar once again.  It is the last track on the duo's "Sounds Of Silence" album and what a way to end an album that is mind provoking throughout.

The lyrics tell of a person who is a loner.  The words try to justify to himself why he is such and tries to convince him that he enjoys being that way.  It opens with a statement about where he finds himself at the time these thoughts creep into his mind:

A winter's day

In a deep and dark December

I am alone
Gazing from my window
To the streets below
On a freshly fallen, silent shroud of snow

A rather dark and bleak picture that tends to make a person do some deep thinking.  Then comes the chorus which states the self affirmation of the individual:

I am a rock
I am an island

A simple chorus.  It is only two short lines that are emphasized at the end of each statement that makes up a verse.  I am a rock. I am strong and can withstand anything the world throws at me.  I am an island. I am my own man, my own self and I go my own way.  I think for myself and am not a follower.  It is a powerful two lines that drive his thoughts home.

In between the restating of the chorus are lines that explain why he believes he is a rock, an island.

I've built walls
A fortress, steep and mighty
That none may penetrate
I have no need of friendship
Friendship causes pain
Its laughter and its loving I disdain

 I am a rock
I am an island

During the course of my life I have hid behind those self made walls.  It is difficult for people to get to know me.  I have spent years building them and over the last several years I have been trying to deconstruct them, to raze them though without much success.

Don't talk of love
Well, I've heard the words before
It's sleeping in my memory
I won't disturb the slumber
Of feelings that have died
If I never loved, I never would have cried

I have loved and lost at love before.  It does hurt.  I was lucky to find a lasting love when I met Barbara and it was good.  Three years ago in July I found myself losing love once again as Barbara passed away and once again, losing a love hurt.  This one almost crushed me.  I did cry.  I cried by myself in a darkened quiet house.  I still do every now and again.

I am a rock
I am an island

I have my books
And my poetry to protect me
I am shielded in my armor
Hiding in my room
Safe within my womb
I touch no one and no one touches me

Ah, books and poetry.  Yes I do have my books and I have poetry.  Robert Frost's writings have brought out feelings in me as long as I have been reading it seems.  John Steinbeck effects me much in the same way.  Poems and novels full of life, meaning and lessons to be learned.  I revisit them often.  Then I also have my music whether I am playing it or listening.  Music comforts me.  I find music almost everywhere I listen.  A train rolling down the tracks behind Paul's Drive-in blowing it's whistle, well I guess they aren't whistles anymore.  Horns.  Still it is a wonderful sound.  Music is everywhere if you listen and pay attention.  I can get lost in the music and the words that I have at my disposal.  They do protect me from what is out there.  My house is my "womb".  It is where I feel safe and am comfortable.  Not a lot of people get into my house anymore.  It is sanctuary to me.  For an individual to get into that inner sanctum, I seem to require that I can trust you with my special place.

I am a rock
I am an island

And then .... and then quietly he tells himself why he feels he has to be a rock.  Why he has to be an island.  The last few lines are sung softly with just a few quiet acoustic guitar chords that are even softer than the voice as he reflects on how he has to see himself in life.

And a rock feels no pain
And an island never cries 

I can't feel pain.  I can't afford to.  I will not cry for that would show the world too much of who I truly am, how I truly feel, how lonely I truly am.

Since I first heard this song I found that I saw a lot of myself in those words and thoughts.  As I grew older I could relate deeper with them.  When I hear that song, that wonderful beautiful song and I sing softly to myself along with the recording, I feel like I am that person and I am talking to myself.  For most people this song is not that high on the list of songs that people think of when someone mentions Paul Simon or Simon and Garfunkel.  It isn't "Bridge Over Troubled Water" or "The Sound Of Silence" but to me, it is probably one of the most honest songs that Paul Simon wrote.  And so I listen to it over, and over, and over ......

I almost feel like I could end this entry at this point.  It pretty much sums it up why I feel I have to listen to a song more than once.  However there are a few more songs that lose me in what they mean.

Warren Zevon.  That name may or may not be familiar to you.  He was a great pianist with a voice that is very distinctive in a Bob Dylan kind of way if you get my meaning. You might be familiar with his biggest selling song entitled "Werewolves Of London".  Yeah, that was the kind of songs he wrote for the most part.  As humorous and eclectic as his songwriting was, if you read between the lines, he always had a message in t here.  You had to search for that message pretty hard at times but the lessons were there.  He made quite a few appearances on The Letterman Show where he was able to reach people who otherwise never would hear many of his songs. His albums were not top sellers and not many of his songs cracked the top forty.  Then came 2002/2003 and his song writing became very retrospective.

In late 2002 Warren Zevon was diagnosed with Mesothelioma.  A cancer of the lungs.  Zevon was only 55 years old when diagnosed and that diagnoses would reach it's conclusion on September 7, 2003 when he was 56.  He decided to put out one more album.  The album titled "The Wind" was a work of passion.  His passion for life, poetry, music and love.  With this final chapter Zevon would bare his soul as he had never done before.  You did not have to read too deeply between the lines to get his message in these songs.  It is a beautiful album that is sad.  It is sad yet celebratory.  It is Warren looking back and looking forward and sharing what he sees and feels.

The song off of this swan song album is a message to his wife, friends and possibly his fans called "Keep Me In Your Heart For Awhile".  It is a song telling us he is dying and how he wants us to carry on after he is gone.  It really needs no explanation or interpretation.  It is clear what he is trying to say.  There is no word twisting or assimilation, just feelings straight from his gut and his heart.

Shadows are falling and I'm running out of breath
Keep me in your heart for awhile

If I leave you it doesn't mean I love you any less
Keep me in your heart for awhile

When you get up in the morning and you see that crazy sun
Keep me in your heart for awhile

There's a train leaving nightly called "when all is said and done"
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sometimes when you're doing simple things
around the house
Maybe you'll think of me and smile

You know I'm tied to you like the buttons on
your blouse
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Hold me in your thoughts, take me to your dreams
Touch me as I fall into view
When the winter comes keep the fires lit
And I will be right next to you

Engine driver's headed north to Pleasant Stream
Keep me in your heart for awhile

These wheels keep turning but they're running out
of steam
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Keep me in your heart for awhile 

I'll be honest with you.  This song always brings a lump to my throat.  It is difficult for me to sing along to.  Most times I start to sing, but then I just listen to Warren opening up his thoughts and his heart to the world.  What a special message to leave his loved ones and friends.  "The Wind" is Zevon's farewell and this song sums up the entirety of the album.  Often when I listen to this song my mind wanders to Barbara.  This is what she would want me to do.  I know that.  "If I leave you it doesn't mean I love you any less".  I can hear Barb saying that to me.  "Sometimes when you're doing simple things around the house Maybe you'll think of me and smile".  I can hear her saying that as well and I do think of her and smile.  

Warren Zevon is no longer here on this earth.  The words of his farewell will live on for a long time though.  The words say more then even Zevon could put into words.  I have the feeling that as he finished this song he still probably thought it doesn't say what he is feeling quite strong enough.  And so I listen to this song over, and over and over ......

Leonard Cohen also did a swan song album before his death and I highly recommend to all my readers to listen to it if you get the chance.  It is a short album recorded in his apartment from his favorite chair in his last days.  It is a short album but powerful.  He speaks of his impending death, his faith, old loves and things he did not understand.  The name of this last album is "You Want It Darker". I'll give you just a small taste from "You Want It Darker".  This a verse from the song "Treaty" on that album.  Maybe it will give you a sense of Cohen at the end.

I've seen you change the water into wine
I've seen you change it back to water, too
I sit at your table every night
I try but I just don't get high with you
I wish there was a treaty we could sign
I do not care who takes this bloody hill
I'm angry and I'm tired all the time
I wish there was a treaty, I wish there was a treaty
Between your love and mine

I think Zevon's swan song serves this purpose and I have a quite a few Cohen songs that get repeated depending on my mood.  The one that I think really catches me is called "The Tower Of Song".   In this song Cohen gives us a peek into the mind of a songwriter.  He gives insight into sacrifices made for the craft.

Well my friends are gone and my hair is grey
I ache in the places where I used to play
And I'm crazy for love but I'm not coming on
I'm just paying my rent every day
Oh in the Tower of Song

The tower of song.  Writers often isolate while they are working.  They have a special room or house away from all the distractions of the world so their creativity can flow.  When he wrote this song he had been writing for a long time.  He was starting to age.  He has lost friends either to his art or death.  He wants love but he is too busy to bother with it.  The rent?  Every song he writes while locked away in the tower.

I said to Hank Williams: how lonely does it get?
Hank Williams hasn't answered yet
But I hear him coughing all night long
A hundred floors above me
In the Tower of Song 

This is one of my favorite verses in the song.  It suggests there in this tower, there is a hierarchy among the artists.  As great of a songwriter as Cohen was, he saw Hank Williams as ranking 100 floors above him.  That, my friends, is a humble man and that is what makes this verse, to me, so special.

I was born like this, I had no choice
I was born with the gift of a golden voice
And twenty-seven angels from the Great Beyond
They tied me to this table right here
In the Tower of Song

Again, his talent is not of his making.  It is a gift from God.  He felt blessed and grateful for this gift that came at such a price to him. He accepted the gift and paid the price.  That says a lot about who he was.

So you can stick your little pins in that voodoo doll
I'm very sorry, baby, doesn't look like me at all
I'm standing by the window where the light is strong
Ah they don't let a woman kill you
Not in the Tower of Song

Now you can say that I've grown bitter but of this you may be sure
The rich have got their channels in the bedrooms of the poor
And there's a mighty judgment coming, but I may be wrong
You see, you hear these funny voices
In the Tower of Song

I see you standing on the other side
I don't know how the river got so wide
I loved you baby, way back when
And all the bridges are burning that we might have crossed
But I feel so close to everything that we lost
We'll never, we'll never have to lose it again

These three verses spell out what that price was.  The sacrifice of losing loves many times.  The sorting out of the voices of creativity.  No woman can come between a songwriter and his songs.  In a way, the gift he was given was his true love I suppose.  It was what gave him pleasure.

Now I bid you farewell, I don't know when I'll be back
They're moving us tomorrow to that tower down the track
But you'll be hearing from me baby, long after I'm gone
I'll be speaking to you sweetly
From a window in the Tower of Song

Yeah my friends are gone and my hair is grey
I ache in the places where I used to play
And I'm crazy for love but I'm not coming on
I'm just paying my rent every day
Oh in the Tower of Song

And so the song ends.  Continuing to pay his rent in the tower creating songs and words until the day he died.  I think the reason this song connects with me is that need to create.   Now I am in no way saying I create as great as  Leonard Cohen did.  If Leonard Cohen thought that Hank Williams was a hundred floors above him, then Leonard Cohen is somewhere along the lines of an infinite number of floors above me.  But I do like to write.  I am not as talented with my writing as he was with his music, but it gives me pleasure.  I enjoy it.  I enjoy people reading my writing.  I feel like if I can contribute just a little something to someone's life, I may have accomplished something and so I listen to song over and over and over ....

Thinking about Hank Williams now since Mr. Cohen paid tribute to him in that last song.  Cohen was correct.  The world has produced some great songwriters over the centuries.  Some stand a little higher than others.  Gershwin, Carmichael, Rodgers and Hammerstein so many great songwriters that rank at the top not to mention the jazz and classical composers.  For my money, Hank Williams is right up there at the top with the best of them.  The lyrics that he writes are some of the most heart wrenching love songs ever written and the music that goes with those wonderful words, the melodies, is absolutely gorgeous.  Over the last 68 years since his death it seems like everyone in the music world has covered his songs and each time the song is beautiful.  Now that I think about it, it could be almost impossible to ruin a Williams song.  You can't help but find your soul being pulled into the songs whether listening or singing.  It grabs by the shirt collar and immerses you into the emotion that those songs carry with them.  My personal Hank tune and a song I consider one of the greatest popular songs ever written is "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry".  Like Warren Zevon's song discussed earlier, this masterpiece does not need to be thought about what he is trying to say.  It is straight in your face as most of his numbers are.  Hank didn't play games with words.  He wrote what he felt and did it in such a way that it speaks to everyone who gives the time to listen.  So my friends, Hank Williams' "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry"

Hear that lonesome whippoorwill
He sounds too blue to fly
The midnight train is whining low
I'm so lonesome I could cry

I've never seen a night so long
When time goes crawling by
The moon just went behind the clouds
To hide its face and cry

Did you ever see a robin weep
When leaves began to die?
Like me, he's lost the will to live
I'm so lonesome I could cry

The silence of a falling star
Lights up a purple sky
And as I wonder where you are
I'm so lonesome I could cry 

It is not a long song.  It is short and straight to the point.  It has that Hank Williams magic embedded into it and so I listen to this song over and over and over .....

I think you get the idea of why some songs, such  as these, make feel like I want more of that.  The song is over way too soon.  There are not a lot of songs that have this effect on me.  I would guess maybe 15 or less.  My mood at the time has a lot to do with it as well.  Some of those artist that I can say gives me a song or two include John Lennon, Bob Dylan, Jim Croce, John Denver, Joni Mitchell, Gordon Lightfoot, Harry Chapin, Graham Parsons, Neil Young (I really feel like I should have shared one of his songs.  Listen to "The Needle And The Damage Done" or "Long May You Run" to get a sampling).  These artists, these craftsmen have given the world a part of their soul.  I am so glad that they did that for us.  It is that part of themselves that dwell in some of these songs that make me listen to them over and over and over ....

IN MY MIND

"I’ll be all around in the dark – I’ll be everywhere. Wherever you can look – wherever there’s a fight, so hungry people can eat, I’ll be there. Wherever there’s a cop beatin’ up a guy, I’ll be there. I’ll be in the way guys yell when they’re mad. I’ll be in the way kids laugh when they’re hungry and they know supper’s ready, and when the people are eatin’ the stuff they raise and livin’ in the houses they build – I’ll be there, too."
(John Steinbeck)

"I've got nothing on my mind,
Nothing to remember,
Nothing to forget.
And I've got nothing to regret.
But I'm all tied up on the inside,
No one knows quite what I've got,
And I know that on the outside
What I used to be
I'm not anymore."
(Don McLean)

"Always give your best, never get discouraged, never be petty; always remember, others may hate you, but those who hate you don't win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself."
(Richard Nixon)

"You can go to church and sing a hymn
You can judge me by the color of my skin
You can live a lie until you die
One thing you can't hide
Is when you're crippled inside"
(John Lennon)

"The planet will be here for a long, long, LONG time after we’re gone, and it will heal itself, it will cleanse itself, ’cause that’s what it does. It’s a self-correcting system. The air and the water will recover, the earth will be renewed. And if it’s true that plastic is not degradable, well, the planet will simply incorporate plastic into a new paradigm: the earth plus plastic. The earth doesn’t share our prejudice toward plastic. Plastic came out of the earth. The earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the earth allowed us to be spawned from it in the first place. It wanted plastic for itself. Didn’t know how to make it. Needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old egocentric philosophical question, “Why are we here?” ... PLASTIC!!
(George Carlin)

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."
(Declaration of Independence) 

It is not enough to have a good mind; the main thing is to use it well.
(Rene Descartes)

"I wish that for just one time you could stand inside my shoes. You’d know what a drag it is to see you."
(Bob Dylan)

"When they knock you down, you not only have to get up, but you have to make it clear that you won't be knocked down a second time."

(Carl Yastrzemski)

Marijuana will be legal someday, because the many law students who now smoke pot will one day be Congressmen and they will legalize it to protect themselves.

(Lenny Bruce)

"I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell
I know right now you can't tell
But stay awhile and maybe then you'll see
A different side of me
I'm not crazy, I'm just a little impaired
I know right now you don't care
But soon enough you're gonna think of me
And how I used to be"
(Rob Thomas)

"Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; it is thinking that makes what we read ours."
(John Locke)

"The world is like a ride in an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it you think it's real because that's how powerful our minds are. The ride goes up and down, around and around, it has thrills and chills, and it's very brightly colored, and it's very loud, and it's fun for a while. Many people have been on the ride a long time, and they begin to wonder, "Hey, is this real, or is this just a ride?" And other people have remembered, and they come back to us and say, "Hey, don't worry; don't be afraid, ever, because this is just a ride." And we … kill those people. "Shut him up! I've got a lot invested in this ride, shut him up! Look at my furrows of worry, look at my big bank account, and my family. This has to be real." It's just a ride. But we always kill the good guys who try and tell us that, you ever notice that? And let the demons run amok … But it doesn't matter, because it's just a ride. And we can change it any time we want. It's only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings of money. Just a simple choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love instead see all of us as one. Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, to a better ride. Take all that money we spend on weapons and defenses each year and instead spend it feeding and clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would pay for many times over, not one human being excluded, and we could explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace."
(Bill Hicks)

“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.”
(John Adams)

"See the children of the earth
Who wake to find the table bare
See the gentry in the country
Riding off to take the air
See the jailer with his key
Who locks away all trace of sin
See the judge upon the bench
Who tries the case as best he can
See the wise and wicked ones
Who feed upon life's sacred fire
See the soldier with his gun
Who must be dead to be admired
See the man who tips the needle
See the man who buys and sells
See the man who puts the collar
On the ones who dare not tell
See the drunkard in the tavern
Stemming gold to make ends meet
See the youth in ghetto black
Condemned to life upon the street"
(Gordon Lightfoot)

"Books, in all their variety, offer the human intellect the means whereby civilization may be carried triumphantly forward."
(Winston Churchill)

"There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe nor politic nor popular, but he must take it because his conscience tells him it is right."
(Martin Luther King, Jr.)

"It is well known that when you do anything, unless you understand its actual circumstances, its nature and its relations to other things, you will not know the laws governing it, or know how to do it, or be able to do it well."
(Mao Tse Tung)

"I've built walls
A fortress, steep and mighty
That none may penetrate
I have no need of friendship
Friendship causes pain.
It's laughter and it's loving I disdain.
I have my books
And my poetry to protect me
I am shielded in my armor
Hiding in my room
Safe within my womb
I touch no one and no one touches me
I am a rock
I am an island
And a rock feels no pain
And an island never cries"
(Paul Simon)

"Shadows are falling and I'm running out of breath
If I leave you it doesn't mean I love you any less
When you get up in the morning and you see that crazy sun
There's a train leaving nightly called when all is said and done
Keep me in your heart for awhile
Sometimes when you're doing simple things around the house
Maybe you'll think of me and smile
You know I'm tied to you like the buttons on your blouse
Hold me in your thoughts, take me to your dreams
Touch me as I fall into view
When the winter comes keep the fires lit
And I will be right next to you
Engine driver's headed north to Pleasant Stream
These wheels keep turning but they're running out of steam
Keep me in your heart for awhile"
(Warren Zevon)

Plus lots more ... maybe a "Part II" in the future.

GREGG ALLMAN AND HIS LEGACY

I have written several entries when artists have passed away over the years.  Every one of them have been important to me in different ways.  Shaping my philosophy, making me think, while at the same time providing my life with beautiful music that sticks in my mind.  There have been a lot of them but some stand a head over the majority of them.  John Lennon, David Bowie, Leonard Cohen,  Warren Zevon and Ray Charles along with John Coltrane and Johnny Cash.

Gregg Allman with his brother Duane took the old rock/blues sound to a whole different level and different direction.  You can tell if it is an Allman Brothers song or a Gregg Allman song with in the first few notes, the sound was that distinctive.  Duane died after the release of the classic album "Live At The Fillmore East" and Gregg had a huge decision to make.  He decided to keep the band, and its music going.  As more of the country discovered Gregg Allman and the boys there came from the country the definition of a new music genre which they called southern rock.  Southern rock took the basics of rock, blues, jazz and country and melded them into a brand new sound.  More southern rock bands would crop up to follow the Allman Brothers but none ever matched them.

Gregg Allman was an innovator.  He was one of the few acts around that were better live than they were in the studio.  They seemed to step it up a notch when playing for a crowd that were totally drawn into their music.  Gregg Allman played the organ for the most part but it was his arrangement of songs and the voice he put to those arrangements that made him so great. As an example of this was a song written by Jackson Browne called "These Days".  It was a good song by Browne, a rock ballad that seemed to be Browne's best work.  Gregg Allman arranged the song into a heavy sad blues number that with his distinct voice made it a favorite on the play lists at concerts.

There are many good blues singers but the number of great blues singers and blues voices are few and far between.  Gregg Allman was a great blues singer.  He put his very soul into every song he sang and the songs he sang of were of life.  His life.  All of our lives.  He had a way of connecting to those who came to hear him.  I saw Gregg Allman perform but once, and let me tell you, his performance would grab your heart, your soul and you would be mesmerized until the number was finished.  Sometimes you would swear you forgot how to breathe while he was singing his songs.

Gregg Allman passed away this week at the age of 69.  A lot of the greats seem to be dying rather young.  It has been suggested to me that, well, they had lived a life, a hard life filled with drugs and alcohol, abusing their bodies at a young age and sometimes those things catch u to you.  This was certainly the case for Gregg Allman.

Gregg Allman is gone and so the Allman Brothers Band is gone and without the Allman Brothers, there can be no more southern rock.  Gregg Allman so defined the genre that it died with him.  There are plenty of southern rock bands that followed Gregg and Duane, but they are living in the past, not creating anything new.  Gregg Allman was still putting out new music.  Some of it was his and some were long forgotten blues numbers that he touched with his special magic of soul and blues.

Gregg Allman is gone.  His last album he released was last year.  It was a live recording of a performance in Macon, Georgia which was the base for the band for all these years.  With the history of the Allman Brothers Band and Gregg Allman as a solo artist, it seems somehow fitting that his last album would be a live album.

That is the way it should be and the way he should be remembered.  A singer of the people, for the people live, not shacked up in a studio.  It was at those times when he was at his best.

Gregg Allman will always be included at the top of my list as one of the pure greats.

MY MUSICAL INFLUENCES WHO HAVE PASSED

This is a lit of musicians who had a direct influence over my love of music so far during my lifetime and have passed on.  The list is by no means complete.  The names listed in all uppercase are the big guns, the ones that I felt their loss to the world was huge.  The ones who not only influenced me and the world, but influenced the direction of music.  These are the greats.

DUANE ALLMAN, Lynn Anderson, Louis Armstrong, Eddy Arnold, CHET ATKINS, Hoyt Axton, John Baldry, Mike Bloomfield, Marc Bolan, Tommy Bolin, John Bonham, Sonny Bono, Mike Botts, DAVID BOWIE, Delany Bramlett, Eric Braunn, James Brown, Jack Bruce, DAVE BRUBECK, Paul Butterfield, David Byron, Tommy Caldwell, Troy Caldwell, J.J.CALE, Jim Capaldi, Karen Carpenter, JOHNNY CASH, HARRY CHAPIN, RAY CHARLES, Clarence Clemons, Patsy Cline, Joe Cocker, Nat King Cole, Allen Collins, John Coltrane, SAM COOKE, Floyd Cramer, Papa John Creach, Jim Croce, King Curtis, Rick Danko, Bobby Darin, Hal David, Miles Davis, Jimmy Dean, John Denver, Bo Diddley, Lee Dorman, Donald Dunn, Jerry Edmonton, Duke Ellington, Cass Elliot, John Entwistle, Brian Epstein, Danny Federici, Freddy Fender, Dan Fogelberg, Tom Fogerty, Glenn Frey, Rory Gallagher, JERRY GARCIA, Marvin Gaye, Maurice Gibb, Robin Gibb, Gerry Goffin, Andrew Gold, Leslie Gore, Bill Graham, Dobi Gray, Rick Grech, Jimmy Greenspoon, James Griffin, James Gurley, Marvin Hamlisch, GEORGE HARRISON, Richie Havens, Isaac Hayes, LEVON HELM, JIMI HENDRIX, BUDDY HOLLY, JOHN LEE HOOKER, NICKY HOPKINS, Michael Jackson, WAYLON JENNINGS, Brian Jones, Davy Jones, JANIS JOPLIN, Paul Kantner, Terry Kath, Albert King, B.B. KING, Don Kirshner, Larry Knetchel, Ronnie Lane, Nicolette Larson, Peggy Lee, JOHN LENNON, Jon Lord, Richard Manuel, Ray Manzarek, BOB MARLEY, Steve Marriott, Dean Martin, Curtis Mayfield, Bob Mayo, Ian McLagan, Freddy Mercury, Mitch Mitchell, Keith Moon, JIM MORRISON, Dee Murray, Rick Nelson, HARRY NILSSON, LAURA NYRO, Berry Oakley, ROY ORBISON, Patti Page, Robert Palmer, Gram Parsons, LES PAUL, Dan Peek, Carl Perkins, John Phillips, Wilson Pickett, ELVIS PRESLEY, Billy Preston, Ray Price, Eddie Rabbit, Gerry Rafferty, Lou Rawls, Otis Redding, Jerry Reed, LOU REED, Jim Reeves, Paul Revere, Charlie Rich, Marty Robbins, Billy Joe Royal, David Ruffin, Dan Seals, PETE SEEGER, Joe Shermie, Del Shannon, FRANK SINATRA, Percy Sledge, Phoebe Snow, Joe South, Dusty Springfield, Chris Squire, B.W. Stevenson, Ian Stewart, Joe Tex, Mary Travers, Ronnie Van Zant, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Muddy Waters, Bob Welch, Cory Wells, HANK WILLIAMS, Johnny Winter, Bobby Womack, FRANK ZAPPA, WARREN ZEVON ........................

Like I said, not a complete list but for me, this list brings about a mish mash of styles in music that has shaped my wide appreciation of music.

The web site http://www.classicbands.com/heaven.html was a big help in constructing this list.  There is no way I could have remembered all of these influences over my lifetime.

MY FUNERAL

We wake up each day and go about our business and chores without giving a thought about how it will end one day.  In reality, I don't even know if I will be alive before I finish this entry.  It seems as though at least a few times a week I read about a celebrity or famous person who dies unexpectedly.

My Uncle was diagnosed with cancer a few years ago.  When it became obvious that the disease would take his life, he began planning his funeral.  He had plenty of time to decide what he wanted to be included in his funeral and who he wanted to talk.  We spent many hours going over music that he would want at his funeral.  We would listen to different artists singing their versions of the same song and he would decide which version he wanted at his memorial service.  He was able to talk about is life and his beliefs, his philosophy and desires before he got to the point where he would not be able to.  It turned out to be a good memorial service because all of us were not sitting around wondering what he would have wanted.  We knew exactly what he wanted and that was what he got.

With the knowledge that I could leave this earth at any moment, I decided to at least make an outline of what I would like for my funeral to be like.  This way no one will have to worry about things.  I already have everything else prepared for my death.  I have a plot bought, a grave marker, a casket, virtually everything is set except for the service.  I don't imagine many people will come to it, but for those who do come, they will receive a service in which I had input and was what I would want.

The first thing I would want would be no pictures of me lying around or being displayed on a screen.  People who come probably know what I look like.  I think most of the pictures of me have fake smiles on my face anyway and do not really represent who I am on the inside.  If any pictures are to be anywhere, I would want the pictures of people who influenced me in life in my little program that they give out at the door as people arrive.    They don't have to be large pictures but just a little nod to the people who I think formed my life as I worked through it all.  I would like a picture of my father Belden H. Clark,  my grandparents Oscar L. Hill and Verna Hill, my grandmother Jean Clark, Dr. Loren S. Goings,  Dr. Melvin M. Hill, Buster Hill, Jack Hill, Danial Hill,  Duane Knierim, Jay Allard, and Noel Shepard.  Okay, that may be a lot of pictures, so just have a list of these people who shaped my life.

As people arrive I would like to have Bach's Brandenburg Concerto's playing, particularly Concerto Number 3.  I love that work of music.  It can either be someone playing it or a recording.  If it is a recording I would prefer Wendy Carlos' recording of the concertos.  (If you have trouble finding a copy, you might look under the name Walter Carlos, which she was known as before her sex change operation).  It is stunningly beautiful and is played on electronic keyboards which I have had a fascination with since I was young.

Not a lot of people know me very well, as matter of fact very few people really know me enough to speak about me at the service.  If I am survived by them, I would like I think for Gregg Carder to say a few words.  After Gregg speaks, I would like to have a recording of "My Way" by Frank Sinatra played.

Then I would think that Ronald Mullins or Dennis Purduski would have a few good memories to share and they would be good at it.  Ronnie and I spent a lot of time together growing up.  Dennis and I worked together and traveled together a lot. Following Dennis or Ronnie's remembrances I think that I would like a member of the family to sing the old hymn "It Is Well".  That has always been a great song to me.  A song that I would get lost in every time I heard it.

Finally, my cousin Pete would be the right person to give the eulogy.  If Pete is not available, then Keith Gibson should give it.  I have known Keith since he was a little boy and I have great respect for him to be able to do a very good job.  I would like them to open with a Scripture reading before going into the eulogy.
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Romans 6:3 though 9

Are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were indeed buried with him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might live in newness of life. For if we have grown into union with him through a death like his, we shall also be united with him in the resurrection. We know that our old self was crucified with him, so that our sinful body might be done away with, that we might no longer be in slavery to sin. For a dead person has been absolved from sin. If, then, we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. We know that Christ, raised from the dead, dies no more; death no longer has power over him.
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After Pete or Keith has finished the eulogy a recording of Warren Zevon's "Keep Me In Your Heart" will be played as people sit and listen.  I think the words to this song should be printed in the little program as well.

When all is done, when Zevon finishes his song, the people will be dismissed and as they are leaving, "Amazing Grace" should be playing softly.

And that is it.  People can leave and go about their lives.  I will be done with and I can slide into people's memories and then begin to fade away from those memories.  Before long, I will be forgotten and it will be as though I never existed, which in a way I haven't really.

Of course, I won't be here to make sure it is done as I have requested and that's okay.  As my Uncle Dan use to say. "Funerals and stones are for the living, not the dead" so if the people who are planning my funeral do not like what I have laid out here, fine, change it.  Really won't bother me any.  I won't know the difference.

Well that about covers everything now I guess.  Everything is paid for and ready for me to leave this life.  Things should go pretty smooth for whoever is left to dispose of my body.

JUST FACTS, NOT A "WOE IS ME" ENTRY

I don’t push people away …. I have got to be the most misunderstood person around.  Misunderstood or not known.  People don’t me.  Not the real me, the me that is deep inside, the me that they hurt without realizing it, the me that is taken advantage of constantly, the real me.

Sometimes, a lot of times, I just want to disappear.  I don’t like people.  I don’t like noise.  I don’t like being told what to do by ungrateful people.  I don’t like being ignored until it is convenient not to ignore me for a few minutes.

But it is ME that is at fault.  I don’t get it.  I do whatever I am asked and more.  “It is what it is”.  Things are what they are.  I didn’t see things evolving with people the way they have turned out to be.  It isn’t my fault that things are the way they are.  It isn’t my fault but I pay the price as though it were.

But I push people away.  I am there at the snap of a finger whenever anyone snaps their finger at me.  Is the fact that I really don’t ask anyone for anything mean I am pushing them away?  No.  It means I want to live and die on my own.  On my own conditions, time table, and where I want to.

“I ain’t asking nobody for nothing if I can get it on my own.  If you don’t like the way that I’m living, you just leave this long haired country boy alone.” (Charlie Daniels)  What is wrong with not enjoying getting my hair cut?  I have ALWAYS hated to get my hair cut.  Not because I want it long or am trying to make a statement, I just do not like the feeling of getting my hair cut.  It means nothing more than that.  I don’t like to shave.  Does that make me a mountain man or something because I don’t like to shave?  It simply means I do not like to shave.  Hate it.

Who am I kidding, they won’t miss me one bit.  No one will. And I don’t care if they do or not.

“From now on all my friends are gonna be strangers.  I'm all through, ever trusting anyone.  The only thing I can count on now is my fingers,  I was a fool …” (Haggard)

Is it strange that I use music to do a lot of my talking for me?  Probably is, but I don’t care.  I can relate to some of these songwriters, philosophers …. They say some pretty honest things in their songs.  Brutally honest.  So honest it makes you think … “wow .. oh man … he knows me …”  The people that seem to know me best are people that don’t know I exist, and I mean they actually don’t know I am around, not like those that know I am around but until they need something, don’t know I exist.   The people that know me best … let’s see… Hank of course, Haggard, Willie, Paul Simon, Dylan, Lennon, Seger, Chapin, Kristofferson, Kooper,  the boss, Levon Helm and Robbie Robertson,  David Gates and James Griffin,  Billy Joel to a degree, Cat Stevens, Neil Young,  McLean, Don Henly, Greg Lake, Clapton,  Jackson Browne,  Mellencamp, Leon, Zevon … list could go on forever.

This sounds like a “Woe is me..” thing.  It isn’t.  It is fact.  Pure logical fact.

The time that I feel I can be truly me, without judgment from others, when I can find that solace that I crave, is late at night by myself either reading, watching a documentary or a movie, or lying in my little bed with the earbuds on.  Most times I listen to music, but a lot of times I listen to Supreme Court Arguments, or Kevin and Mosh, or TESD.  I love documentaries and I love movies and something by Charlyne Yi or an episode of House or one of the Law and Orders.  It is sad to think that Bruce, Carlin and Hicks are gone.  They were able to use fact, logic, and tell the truth about how crazy this world, or life can be.  A lot of the things that those three said are funny on the surface, but if you really break it down to what they are saying, it is kind of sad in a way.  The truth seems to always be sad.

My grandfather.  Oscar Laclede Hill.  The closest thing to perfect as a man can be, right?  We all look up to him and his life and what we knew about him and his wisdom.  He was far from the picture that we paint of him in our memories.  He once told me that even as much as we talked, there were things in his life he was ashamed of.  Things he would never tell another human being.  There were a lot of things that I would never know about him and that was just the way it was going to be.  I often wonder about the afternoon he told me that.  Why he told me that and what some of those things could be.  I don’t have a clue, and that was how he wanted it.  Doesn’t mean he was a fake or lived a lie, he still was a very good man, but there was that part of the REAL Oscar Hill that nobody knew, or would ever know.  I wonder if his wife even knew.

As I get older, there seems to be less and less people to look up to.  When I was a young boy, I looked up to my grandfather and my dad and a host of baseball players that I knew only from watching them on the field.  They were classy men, these ball players.  Dick Green, Campy Campanaris, Carl Yastrzemski, Brooks and Frank Robison, Hank Aaron, Noland Ryan, Roger Maris, Curt Flood and Bob Gibson, Al Kaline and Bill Freehan, Rick Monday and again, the list could go on and on.  I don’t look up to sport figures anymore.  I admire their ability and talent and the way they act on the field, but over the years the reality that they are just ordinary people that has a part of them hidden away that no one knows, has come to be reality for me.

Now who do I look up to … well, my grandfather and my father.  Some those song writers mentioned earlier who had the guts to post about reality as they saw it.  I don’t look up to politicians and especially Presidents.  Everyone is hiding something.  Nobody is fully themselves.  Nobody really knows anybody.  I suppose that is one way we all get along.  Hide a lot of ourselves so people only see the best we can put out there.  Sometimes, for some of us, even the best we can put out there is pretty bad.

I’ll tell you who I look up to.  One person I look up to is Rachel Gibson.  A fine young lady who left this world far before the world was ready for her to leave.  She was brave.  She was strong.  She kept her faith. And she comforted those who she was preparing to leave behind.  I admired that young lady long before she entered into the last phase of her life here on earth.   Now I am sure that Rachel had her faults just as all of us do, she was human after all.  But her being human was surpassed by her ability to be humane.

Another person I look up to is Caleb Hill.  Caleb is my cousin’s son.  Caleb was born with Down Syndrome which is what makes Caleb even more of a person to look up to then he would have been if he had not been born with the syndrome.  Caleb is intelligent.  Caleb is caring and loving.  Caleb is honest.  Caleb looks at life with thankfulness and lives life the way life should probably be lived by all of us.  Caleb has found inner strength to bypass the syndrome as best as he can and he does a great job of it.  Honesty like Caleb’s is something all of us could strive for, but we don’t and we won’t.

I look up to my niece Kimberly Porter, her husband Shawne and two wonderful kids that they adopted from China, Joshua and Mei.  The challenges that happen on a daily basis for Kimberly and especially Mei, would wear the normal person out and have an urge to just give up.  Not Kim though.  She is unbeatable when it comes to raising her kids and helping them face each day on a day to day basis.  Shawne is just as strong as Kim and just as dedicated to those two kids.  I admire both of them.  All four of them.

There are other people out there that I could say I look up to for various reasons.  One thing they all have in common though is that there is a part of them the world will never ever see.

Okay.  Stop and re-read what I have written so I know how I got to where I am in this thing.  Took a HUGE left turn back there somewhere.

Well, it turned into a bunch of rambling.  People do not understand why I feel or think the way I do.  I don’t either.  I try to be a good person, I try to live up to the ideals I see as making a person good, but I fall short.  We all do.  We all will.   I am not a happy person.  I find less joy in life than most people and I don’t understand it.  When something bad or not so good does happen to me, it seems to affect me a lot harder than it would other people.  I don’t understand it.  I feel it.  I know it is there.  But I don’t understand it.

There are times, many times, when I just want to go to my bed and just sleep.  Sleep more, and more and more.  Just sleep so I don’t have to deal with anything or anyone. Just sleep and let time flow by without me being aware of it passing.  Forever.

'NIGHT MOTHER

Not sure what the exact quote is but in this film the daughter tries to explain her decision to take her own life to her mother.  It goes something like "I am hurt, tired, alone, frustrated and done."  She had been thinking about it and planning it for a while and decided that instead of just leaving a note, decided to spend one last evening with her mother.  It is a great film.  It gives her a chance to explain why she is doing what she is and looking at it from afar, it seems a cruel way to get ready to leave this world.  A note would be much better.

I do identify with this film so much though.  The pain. The feeling of uselessness and being a problem for everyone around.  To be honest, it isn't like anyone really cares.  The daughter's brother could care less if she were around or not.  A note would suffice for the most part.  I am sure there would be questions for awhile, but soon it would fade with time and slowly become a family story that might be handed down every once in a while to later generations.

In today's day and age, the truly proper note would be a mass email to whoever you wanted to leave it for.  Write out the note saying what you feel you need to say, press the "send" button and then leave.

If I were to decide to leave this world on my schedule, that is what I would do.  Wouldn't want to send it to too many people though .... ten at the most.  Wife and kid would be sent one of course.  A couple of close friends, a cousin or two and a niece and a nephew.  None to my siblings though.  No, they would have to find out through the grapevine.

I would have to be careful not to make it a note that sounds like whining.  I would have to keep it classy.  My decision, why my decision was made, and make sure that no one takes any guilt or blame as people tend to do.  No, it has to be understood that I thought things out, came to a decision on my own, and once the decision was made carry it on through.

There would have to be a song lyric or quote included because that would be expected from me.  The tough part is choosing what lyric I would use.  There are so many songs that would fit the way I feel and help explain why I made the decision I did.

IN my early years I use to think that "My Way" by Paul Anka would be PERFECT.

"And now ... the end is near .. and so I face ... the final curtain ...."  After thinking about though, that song would not fit with me.  I have not done it my way, life that is.  I lived my life everybody else's way.  Tried my whole life to do what was right, to please people and failed miserably at every turn of a corner.  Nope, "My Way" would not make the cut.

Don McLean's "Crossroads" or "Vincent" would be good nominees.  I am sure a Paul Simon could be found to fit or a Warren Zevon ... that's it.  Warren Zevon's "Keep me in your heart".  that's the one.  That whole song would be included in my note.
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Shadows are falling and I'm running out of breath
Keep me in your heart for awhile

If I leave you it doesn't mean I love you any less
Keep me in your heart for awhile

When you get up in the morning and you see that crazy sun
Keep me in your heart for awhile

There's a train leaving nightly called when all is said and done
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sometimes when you're doing simple things
around the house
Maybe you'll think of me and smile

You know I'm tied to you like the buttons on
your blouse
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Hold me in your thoughts, take me to your dreams
Touch me as I fall into view
When the winter comes keep the fires lit
And I will be right next to you

Engine driver's headed north to Pleasant Stream
Keep me in your heart for awhile

These wheels keep turning but they're running out
of steam
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Keep me in your heart for awhile
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That's my good bye song.  The fact that I LOVE that song makes it even better.  I would hope they would play that at my funeral, if they decide to have one for me.

You know, I wouldn't even have to write anything else.  No more explanation needed.  Just read those master words from Mr. Zevon.  That should be enough, and make things a lot easier for me as well as those who receive my note.

Still have some thinking to do on this.  But as an overview, I think this serves what I wanted it to.  Got me thinking about the proper way things should be done.

I like it.

EXPLANATION OF "RETIREMENT"

Just before I began writing this piece, I re-posted an entry from October of 2010 titled "Retirement".  The message of "Retirement" is one that takes us into the thinking of a person who feels they have lived their life to where it is supposed to end.  It takes us into the mind of a person who feels that there is nothing left for them to do in life and so life is without purpose and they retire from life.

The reason I posted "Retirement" again was to give me a point to start from in explaining to those of you who are interested who I see myself as being.  When I wrote "Retirement" I was not suicidal and had no plans in actually retiring from life myself.  The thought of being able to retire from life though visited my brain and my mind on almost a daily basis.  sometimes I am able to shake the feeling off while at other times that feeling of retiring from life sits and simmers in my mind changing form and direction and taking me away from what I would normally be thinking about.  There are times when I am watching a good baseball game or a historical documentary and suddenly I discover that I have missed the show and my mind had traveled to darker places than National Geographic could ever take it.  I miss out on a lot of life in this manner.  One of the reasons this blog exists  is to record events that I do remember once in a while because I know they won't be in my mind forever.  Another reason for writing here is to let people know me now and in the future after I am gone.

There are a few things I need to make clear before you read any further.  It is important to know that I do not expect anyone to have a clear understanding of what goes on in my mind.  I cannot understand what a couple of my friends have felt because they lost a child nor can I understand the pain they continue to carry inside of them years after losing that child.  I have never been in that situation and I hope I never am.  The pain must be unbearable to them.  I know the pain they feel is unbearable because they have told me.  they have tried to explain it to me, but there is absolutely no way I can begin to understand the pain they feel.  It is much the same with the feelings that go on in my mind.  I can try to explain it but will come up short and if you have not been where I am, there is no way you can understand what my mind feels like as it moves in and out of those dark places it wanders into almost on a daily basis.  I don't expect you to understand and it would be best if you didn't try.  you won't get there and if you did, you would wish you hadn't.

I am not looking for anything from anybody.  I am not looking for people to feel sorry for me or to pity me or to try to make changes in the way they relate to me.  What I am writing is just a part of me so that if I do appear strange to you or appear to be quiet and standoffish, you might take a second thought and not pass judgement on me too quickly.  I am not looking or asking for anything.  I am just putting down a record of who I am and how I feel as I work my way through life.

I think I must have been this way since I was born, but out of the natural feeling of surviving I ignored it and went on with life as I saw it around me.  I watched how people related to each other and I believe I tried to mimic that action.  I learned not to be the real me but rather put up a front that society would accept.  Walls went up around me and I only let people see the part of me that I thought they wanted to see.  I developed a fairly good wit and learned how to smile on the outside while on the inside I was feeling anything but the way people were seeing me.

There came a time several years ago when I was not able to hold it all in anymore.  Sitting at my desk eating lunch one day the main event happened.  I refer to it as the day my mind broke.  It was a major panic/anxiety attack that ripped my thinking apart from that day forward.  Never again would I feel like I really knew myself and I damn sure knew that nobody else knew me even if they thought they did since the day they met me or all the way back to 1956 when I entered this world.

From the day that my mind broke up to today  I became aware of the walls that I had built around me.  No one had been inside these walls my entire life.  There was a Bill that ventured outside the walls and the Bill that stayed hidden within the walls.  As each day goes by, I feel more uncomfortable every time I venture outside the walls.  I find myself trying to put on that facade that family and friends have come to know over the years with more difficulty as each day passes.  Perhaps it is because I am getting older and it is easier for me to tire of trying to keep that facade up.

Very few people recognize the fact that I am a fake when outside those tall dark moss covered walls.  I am aware that at times I feel myself slipping back behind the walls when out but quickly gather strength to put the fake Bill up again.  Nobody notices when I slip back inside.  It happens and I go back out again before they notice.  When I get home though, I am exhausted from being outside the walls and am grateful to get off by myself and crawl back into the darkness of the room that walls surround.

So what is it like inside the walls?  It is dark and it is lonely.  It is quiet and sometimes calm.  At the same time it can be a horrible scary place.  Thoughts of my past wash over me and remind me of all the mistakes I have made in life.  Mistakes in dealing with people.  Mistakes in acting proper in society.  Mistakes of losing my temper when I could not hold myself in check while outside the walls.  I had and still do have a terrible temper.  Sometimes when I lose track of keeping myself in check in public, it lashes out.  I have not only surprised but have also hurt a lot of people with my temper.  When I hurt someone when I lose my temper, there is no making it right.  There is no way to explain why I did whatever I did to hurt them.  After losing my temper and hurting myself during the day, I crawl back behind my walls at night and beat myself up for letting it happen.  I feel like I deserve to be hurt as payment for hurting them and I do my best to inflict pain on my mind within the walls that trap me.

Inside these walls my mind feels like it is under attack.  Thoughts that I do not want to have seem to always find their way to me.  Under what seems and feels like a constant hitting in my mind, I have found a few ways to try to control it.  Music is a huge tool that I use to quiet the noise in my head.  Music is magic almost.  Music can take some of my feelings and put a different spin on how I feel.  Some of the most depressing songs that I know are the songs that are able to bring quiet inside the walls.  I feel like these songs written by people such as John Lennon, Paul Simon, Warren Zevon and Bob Dylan fight back my own thoughts with their thoughts and things seem to balance out sometimes.

And so we come to "Retirement".  I am getting old.  I am getting tired.  I have been venturing outside my walls far too long putting that mask on so people will see the Bill they expect to see.  I focus on everything that is said so I don't get lost in what is going on in a situation with people where they might notice something is wrong.  I am just too tired at times.

There comes a time in life when it is time to lay down your tools, stop your labor and go into retirement.  That is what that piece is about.  Recognizing that the time has come and it is time to simply retire.  We retire when our labors are done.  We are retired when we have done what has been expected of us over the years and now it is done.  We retire when we finally finish the job that we have set out to do.

The man in "Retirement" has come to this realization.  He has done everything that he can do in life.  His life is no longer moving forward, but rather has leveled out.  He has nothing left to do in life and so he decides to retire.

As I sit inside my musky damp walls alone with my thoughts in the dark, my mind goes over my life.  It recalls to me what has been accomplished and what hasn't.  It tries to balance things that have been my life over the last 57 years in a meaningful way.  My mind has a dark spin to all of the events over all the years, especially the years since that day that my mind broke.

It tries to talk me into retirement.  Sometimes I feel like my dark mind is right in what it is telling me.  Sometimes it feels like it is time to retire even though deep down in my soul, I know it isn't.

Numb As A Statue - Warren Zevon & Jorge Calderon

I'm numb as a statue
I may have to beg, borrow or steal
Some feelings from you
So I can have some feelings too

I'm pale as a ghost
You know what I love about you
That's what I need the most
I'm gonna beg, borrow or steal
Some feelings from you
I'm gonna beg, borrow or steal
So I can have some feelings too

I don't care if it's superficial
You don't have to dig down deep
Just bring enough for the ritual
Get here before I fall asleep
I'm gonna beg, borrow or steal
Some feelings from you
I'm gonna beg, borrow or steal
So I can have some feelings too

Ain't nothing special
When the present meets the past
I've always taken care of business
I've paid my first and last
I'm gonna beg, borrow or steal
Some feelings from you
I'm gonna beg, borrow or steal
So I can have some feelings too

Disorder In The House - Warren Zevon

Disorder in the house
The tub runneth over
Plaster's falling down in pieces by the couch of pain

Disorder in the house
Time to duck and cover
Helicopters hover over rough terrain

Disorder in the house
Reptile wisdom
Zombies on the lawn staggering around

Disorder in the house
There's a flaw in the system
And the fly in the ointment's gonna bring the whole thing down

The floodgates are open
We've let the demons loose
The big guns have spoken
And we've fallen for the ruse

Disorder in the house
It's a fate worse than fame
Even the Lhasa Apso seems to be ashamed

Disorder in the house
The doors are coming off the hinges
Yeah the earth will open and swallow up the real estate

I just got my paycheck
I'm gonna paint the whole town grey
Whether it's a night in Paris or a Fresno matinee

It's the home of the brave and the land of the free
Where the less you know the better off you'll be

Disorder in the house
All bets are off
I'm sprawled across the davenport of despair

Disorder in the house
I'll live with the losses
And watch the sundown through the portiere

Video of Warren Zevon singing "Disorder In The House"
Video of Warren Zevon's ex-wife on writing his biography

Keep Me In Your Heart - Warren Zevon

After being diagnosed with lung cancer in 2002, Warren Zevon began work on his last album entitled "The Wind".  The album is a reflective look back by Zevon on life and how he dealt with it.
Warren Zevon died on September 7, 2003.  This song was the last one on "The Wind".

I encourage the reader to follow the link at the bottom of this post to the youtube video of this song.

Keep Me In Your Heart by Warren Zevon

Shadows are falling and I'm running out of breath
Keep me in your heart for awhile
If I leave you it doesn't mean I love you any less
Keep me in your heart for awhile

When you get up in the morning and you see that crazy sun
Keep me in your heart for awhile
There's a train leaving nightly called "when all is said and done"
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile
Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sometimes when you're doing simple things around the house
Maybe you'll think of me and smile
You know I'm tied to you like the buttons on your blouse
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Hold me in your thoughts, take me to your dreams
Touch me as I fall into view
When the winter comes keep the fires lit
And I will be right next to you

Engine driver's headed north to Pleasant Stream
Keep me in your heart for awhile
These wheels keep turning but they're running out of steam
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile
Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-li-li-lo
Keep me in your heart for awhile

Keep me in your heart for awhile

Keep Me In Your Heart Video