Hide In Your Shell

 Mr. Hodgson, I presume?

For a few years before the Pandemic, Roger Hodgson would schedule two dates a year in St. Louis. They would sell out immediately. He did two dates a year for three years straight and I saw five of the six shows. To say he was great would be an understatement. When he walked out on stage, he would get a standing ovation. When he would finish each song, he would get a standing ovation. His band was sooo tight and his Supertramp songs were performed note for note. Even he would be surprised at the response to each tune he played. I think that's why he loved playing in St. Louis. KSHE sure helped fill those seat as they were very early believers in Supertramp. "Sister Moonshine," one of the "throwaway" songs of Supertramp was played regularly here. He was a very charming chap when I met him. Great conversationalist and a really good guy. This was taken November 13, 2016.

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

“There is no question that when they broke up, Paul missed John and John missed Paul. I actually think Paul would like to write material today like he used to write. But there is no one alive now that can give him that spur.... Yet, don't forget, as a twosome they wrote nearly 300 great songs. That's more than Cole Porter or Irving Berlin or Jerome Kern ever did. That's certainly more than enough for one lifetime.'' – George Martin

Fortress of Solitude

When I was a young man and things troubled me, I would head to the comfort and security of my bedroom. Growing up as the son of an alcoholic left a number of scars. 

One of them was the feeling of abandonment.

My mother was a special person. She was kind, sweet, very giving and very funny. The McNew side of the family has always tried to "outfunny" each other. My uncles had great senses of humor and by DNA or whatever that trait was passed on to my mom.

She was also an alcoholic. I remember being in Kansas City, calling home and when she picked up the phone, I knew she was hammered. I threatened to never come home until she quit drinking. She hung up on me. It got worse as life went on. She started with Miller High Life and graduated to whiskey. She would drive like that. This was the time when an officer caught you drinking, you were given a ride home. She would be embarrassed but it would not stop her. More than a few time, the police would knock on the door and one of us had to ride with the cop and bring the car home.

I adored her. I still do and admire her knowing what kind of life she was exposed to as a child. I know she was physically abused and probably sexually abused, too. She had demons from her youth she just couldn't overcome. Smoking and drinking killed her at 62. I'm surprised she lasted that long. A very flawed but wonderful woman.

Growing up, she was there as much as possible, but coming home from school and trying to discuss my day, she would look at me and she just wasn't there. It just got to the point where I could tell whether I should talk to her that day or not right away. If not, I'd swallow whatever I had to say and head to my bedroom. It was at that time, my fortress of solitude. A place where I could go and find solace in music. I'd close the door and play DJ on my little cassette recorder or just listen to the radio while doing my homework, reading comic books or just listening to music. I'd burn some incense. At first, mom thought it was pot :)

It was comfortable and reassuring. I know then I would dream my bedroom was my house and no one could get me there. I was safe from the outside world. Sometimes, the outside world was cold and mean and unforgiving to a lonely high school kid.

Not in my bedroom. It was safe.

I have the same set up now. The house is the Fortress of Solitude, but in my room now, I'm safe and secure. No one can hurt me here. I have the same brand of incense and I'm even listening to the same music. It's comforting and soothing.

So, here I am, with Poutchuli and Musk incense, listening to Elton John and knowing for now, I'm alright. I can't say how 'll be when I leave here, but for right now, I'm safe.

 

Our House is a very fine house

Joni Mitchell and Graham Nash at Peter Tork's house on August 7th 1969 less than 2 weeks before Woodstock. Joni was supposed to go to Woodstock but didn't on the advice of her manger David Geffen because she had to appear on the Dick Cavett Show.

While in NYC she watched it on TV and ended up writing the song of her generation called "Woodstock". Tork who had been a member of 'The Monkees', left the group in 1969 and later moved to Marin County, California. David Crosby and Stephen Stills were also there at Tork's house that same day that this picture was taken. Joni was painting a watercolor portrait of Graham Nash outside on the terrace. Peter Tork didn't live in Laurel Canyon per se' but just north of the Canyon in Studio City.

Black and White

 At one time, I was mediocre at taking pictures.

Good Times

 

There's No Substitute For Red

The way we played yesterday will not get us past Buffalo.

Four sacks, no D line rushing, gotta be better than this, boys, but still undefeated

Electric Blue

What would I like for people to say after I'm dead?

"He was a good man."

I have many miles to go. Or maube not, 69 is coming soon.

Carl Sagan was a good man. It's his birthday.

He wrote our mission statement on this pale blue dot.

Today is the the anniversary of Carl Sagan's birth in 1934 and the day we celebrate his life, teachings and wisdom.

The image mentioned is The Pale Blue Dot. It is a photograph of Earth taken Feb. 14, 1990, by NASA’s Voyager 1 at a distance of 3.7 billion miles. Mr. Sagan shared his thoughts about this image in his book, The Pale Blue Dot. His words are timeless but also seem particularly relevant at this point in time.

“Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. 𝙏𝙤 𝙢𝙚, 𝙞𝙩 𝙪𝙣𝙙𝙚𝙧𝙨𝙘𝙤𝙧𝙚𝙨 𝙤𝙪𝙧 𝙧𝙚𝙨𝙥𝙤𝙣𝙨𝙞𝙗𝙞𝙡𝙞𝙩𝙮 𝙩𝙤 𝙙𝙚𝙖𝙡 𝙢𝙤𝙧𝙚 𝙠𝙞𝙣𝙙𝙡𝙮 𝙬𝙞𝙩𝙝 𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙖𝙣𝙤𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙧, 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙩𝙤 𝙥𝙧𝙚𝙨𝙚𝙧𝙫𝙚 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙘𝙝𝙚𝙧𝙞𝙨𝙝 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙥𝙖𝙡𝙚 𝙗𝙡𝙪𝙚 𝙙𝙤𝙩, 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙤𝙣𝙡𝙮 𝙝𝙤𝙢𝙚 𝙬𝙚'𝙫𝙚 𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙧 𝙠𝙣𝙤𝙬𝙣.”

― Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space

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