This is the song I was alluding to the other day -- the original "Holding Back the Years" by the Frantic Elevators (who?) -- the punk band Simply Red singer Mike Hucknall was in before attaining Blue-Eyed Soul superstardom with his syrupy remake...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-L8hlgkGmo
I love this original. It is beautiful and forlorn and wistful, and has more than a trace of a Bowie vibe to it. It's funny to me, because I've mocked the Simply Red tune for almost as long as I've paid attention to music (as symptomatic of what, exactly? I don't know what -- Spandau Ballet's "True" conjures up almost the same kind of loathing in me -- is it sentimentality? Faux-new romanticism? I don't know), but the original is a very impressive song.
It is striking to me, just how a slightly different arrangement can lead to such a rich reward, how a slight change can create such monumental improvements in something. Of course, Hucknall ladled on the soulful treacle on this beautifully barren original and parlayed into a massive hit for him, but the original is amazing.
So, I put this song up as the last tune of my 30s, to show how the same song can yield such amazing results (and improvements) with just a little tweaking. It'll be that way with my life from now on. I don't regret my past -- so much of what makes me who I am comes from that past, but I'd be lying if I didn't think that while I experienced great things in my 30s (largely centered around fatherhood and my two wonderful sons, and also finally, truly getting serious about my writing), I feel that my life has only just begun. It's a cliché, the whole "life begins at 40" idea, but maybe there's some truth to it.
A chapter of my youth is closing, and a chapter in my adulthood is beginning. I've felt some amazing, life-changing things in the past decade, and feel that, for the first time in my life, I'm being truly who I am, for better or worse! Onward toward 40. I face it without regret or fear or sorrow. I'm hopeful and I'm happy.
Anyway, enjoy the tune. I know I sure did.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Meteorology and Public Anomie
Apparently a meteor shot over the Midwest last night, roughly around the time I went to bed. I missed it, but the pix of it over Madison, WI looked impressive...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36559622/ns/technology_and_science-space/
I'm kinda peevish that I missed it. I was pretty tired, though, and guess I conked when this sucker flew over! I think meteors are maybe good omens, contrasted with comets, which are, historically, seen as bad omens. So, there you go.
Today's my last day of being a 30-something! Woo hoo! I thought of that at the Mission of Burma show Saturday, like "Wow, this is my last show as a 30-something." (I think Guided By Voices in 2001 was my first show as a 30-something).
Tomorrow, I'm taking a day off of work, and going to get my hair cut, gonna take care of the boys, gonna get groceries, gonna make myself a birthday cake (DIY! DIY!) and will catch "Kick-Ass" and maybe go out for a round of drinks in the evening. Nothing fancy. Low-key, compared with my 39th birthday celebration bash at the tiki bar last year, but for me, that seems right -- like the last 30-something birthday should have more weight than the first 40-something birthday, I dunno. Just feels intuitively right.
This weekend, I'm taking B1 to his soccer game Saturday (with B2 in tow), and am going to finish transcribing the screenplay (and then the odious task of noting the plot and ensuring that the plot points flow smoothly, all of that -- screenwriting leaves you no wiggle room on that -- every plot point must matter, so I need to map that all out and get it right. I may tape it to the wall or something, so I can see it all in one place -- index cards, that kinda thing. My boys'll love that, I'm sure, and'll start taping things to the walls. I just know it. Oh, and I'll get the boys' and my bikes spruced up and ready for biking season. I'm looking forward to that.
I think I may represent a kind of retrograde conception of manhood to the younger set. It's kind of funny with me, at work. I'm a strongly progressive soul, and am definitely more of a libertine than many of the people I work with (although I think maybe they don't realize it, because I'm "old") -- but it's funny, too. Most of the people I work with on a peer-to-peer basis are 20-somethings, not Gen Xers, and I think I'm very different from them. Like socially, and normatively, they speak a different language than I do. I think I'm harder-edged, more cynical, more sarcastic than they are. They are more pack-oriented, less comfortable going it alone. It's kind of weird. It reminds me of how, say, a Brat Packer or a Mod might've seemed to a group of hippies -- like retro and strange. I think that's the case.
I think the advent of texting and other technological means of corresponding has adversely impacted communication -- the younger folks are less adroit conversationalists -- less to say, and less interesting things to say. It's kind of curious to observe in action. Easily distractable, short attention spans, not much patience, and other things that I think result from changes in the way people communicate. Not only do I not really talk to them; I kind of find myself not wanting to, either. And it's not even anything personal -- it's just a kind of odd emptiness in human interactions I see that wasn't quite there before. Maybe X was the last conversational generation -- the last generation where you actually had to talk to people around you, versus relying on texting and other media to do the talking for you.
It's not necessarily a value judgment -- it's just a reflection on how things have changed. And I think conceptions of masculinity have changed, too. I think perhaps in the 90s, classic conceptions of masculinity were subverted (I think unintentionally), and many guys went "emo" because appearing too strongly masculine was perhaps seen as threatening. It's funny, because I'm not a macho guy by any means -- I'm quietly masculine, strongly sexual, but not overbearing in that regard -- but, compared with the 20-something guys I work with, I'm like a bull (haha, or a woolly ram, perhaps), snorting and stomping. At some point in our culture, being masculine was somehow seen as a bad thing. Being very alert and socially aware, I'm conscious of that, not wanting to stomp on coworkers' toes. Maybe it's part of being a Big Guy(tm) -- like there is an implicit threat in being a Big Buy that can appear threatening to people in general, I'm not sure. But I feel like where it never came up with my Gen X peers, I kind of see that vibe with the Gen Y people I work with. Being a strong individual in a pack-oriented culture, too, might be part of it.
Maybe it's because of the gradual outing of gay culture in the 90s and the rise of Emo or something, younger guys weren't really left with any workable model of manhood to put to use, and so they either stay permaboys, or else just kind of flounder. Like I notice in the parlance, the 20-something women habitually refer to guys as "boys" and themselves as "girls" -- there is almost a pejorative connotation with "man" and "woman" in language these days. Like a self-consciousness, where the women are girls and the men are boys -- or maybe it's simply a side effect of an infantilized culture where nobody really has to grow up.
I'm not entirely sure. It's just something I've observed. Almost none of the 20-somethings I work with are in long-term relationships, almost none of them have had kids -- while they claim to want a proper relationship, the idea of parenting seems horrifying and alien to them, the idea of a relationship seems to strike them as too much work for too little payoff, quite beyond their expectations of life. It's a curious thing to observe, from my vantage point of a Gen X parent of two who's getting divorced, surrounded by Gen Y people who likely haven't even given a stray thought to even marrying anybody, let alone raising kids or divorcing somebody.
How is a future built in a world like that, full of alienated people who just randomly bounce off one another like pinballs? Where seemingly obvious ideas like "conversation" and "dating" and "relationship" and even "love" seem quaint and unfamiliar and alien and perhaps even threatening? In a bizarre way, it feels like the final triumph of the consumerist culture, to the final detriment of mankind as a social animal. I just wonder where these people will be in another five years, what they will do, and what that'll mean for the larger culture.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36559622/ns/technology_and_science-space/
I'm kinda peevish that I missed it. I was pretty tired, though, and guess I conked when this sucker flew over! I think meteors are maybe good omens, contrasted with comets, which are, historically, seen as bad omens. So, there you go.
Today's my last day of being a 30-something! Woo hoo! I thought of that at the Mission of Burma show Saturday, like "Wow, this is my last show as a 30-something." (I think Guided By Voices in 2001 was my first show as a 30-something).
Tomorrow, I'm taking a day off of work, and going to get my hair cut, gonna take care of the boys, gonna get groceries, gonna make myself a birthday cake (DIY! DIY!) and will catch "Kick-Ass" and maybe go out for a round of drinks in the evening. Nothing fancy. Low-key, compared with my 39th birthday celebration bash at the tiki bar last year, but for me, that seems right -- like the last 30-something birthday should have more weight than the first 40-something birthday, I dunno. Just feels intuitively right.
This weekend, I'm taking B1 to his soccer game Saturday (with B2 in tow), and am going to finish transcribing the screenplay (and then the odious task of noting the plot and ensuring that the plot points flow smoothly, all of that -- screenwriting leaves you no wiggle room on that -- every plot point must matter, so I need to map that all out and get it right. I may tape it to the wall or something, so I can see it all in one place -- index cards, that kinda thing. My boys'll love that, I'm sure, and'll start taping things to the walls. I just know it. Oh, and I'll get the boys' and my bikes spruced up and ready for biking season. I'm looking forward to that.
I think I may represent a kind of retrograde conception of manhood to the younger set. It's kind of funny with me, at work. I'm a strongly progressive soul, and am definitely more of a libertine than many of the people I work with (although I think maybe they don't realize it, because I'm "old") -- but it's funny, too. Most of the people I work with on a peer-to-peer basis are 20-somethings, not Gen Xers, and I think I'm very different from them. Like socially, and normatively, they speak a different language than I do. I think I'm harder-edged, more cynical, more sarcastic than they are. They are more pack-oriented, less comfortable going it alone. It's kind of weird. It reminds me of how, say, a Brat Packer or a Mod might've seemed to a group of hippies -- like retro and strange. I think that's the case.
I think the advent of texting and other technological means of corresponding has adversely impacted communication -- the younger folks are less adroit conversationalists -- less to say, and less interesting things to say. It's kind of curious to observe in action. Easily distractable, short attention spans, not much patience, and other things that I think result from changes in the way people communicate. Not only do I not really talk to them; I kind of find myself not wanting to, either. And it's not even anything personal -- it's just a kind of odd emptiness in human interactions I see that wasn't quite there before. Maybe X was the last conversational generation -- the last generation where you actually had to talk to people around you, versus relying on texting and other media to do the talking for you.
It's not necessarily a value judgment -- it's just a reflection on how things have changed. And I think conceptions of masculinity have changed, too. I think perhaps in the 90s, classic conceptions of masculinity were subverted (I think unintentionally), and many guys went "emo" because appearing too strongly masculine was perhaps seen as threatening. It's funny, because I'm not a macho guy by any means -- I'm quietly masculine, strongly sexual, but not overbearing in that regard -- but, compared with the 20-something guys I work with, I'm like a bull (haha, or a woolly ram, perhaps), snorting and stomping. At some point in our culture, being masculine was somehow seen as a bad thing. Being very alert and socially aware, I'm conscious of that, not wanting to stomp on coworkers' toes. Maybe it's part of being a Big Guy(tm) -- like there is an implicit threat in being a Big Buy that can appear threatening to people in general, I'm not sure. But I feel like where it never came up with my Gen X peers, I kind of see that vibe with the Gen Y people I work with. Being a strong individual in a pack-oriented culture, too, might be part of it.
Maybe it's because of the gradual outing of gay culture in the 90s and the rise of Emo or something, younger guys weren't really left with any workable model of manhood to put to use, and so they either stay permaboys, or else just kind of flounder. Like I notice in the parlance, the 20-something women habitually refer to guys as "boys" and themselves as "girls" -- there is almost a pejorative connotation with "man" and "woman" in language these days. Like a self-consciousness, where the women are girls and the men are boys -- or maybe it's simply a side effect of an infantilized culture where nobody really has to grow up.
I'm not entirely sure. It's just something I've observed. Almost none of the 20-somethings I work with are in long-term relationships, almost none of them have had kids -- while they claim to want a proper relationship, the idea of parenting seems horrifying and alien to them, the idea of a relationship seems to strike them as too much work for too little payoff, quite beyond their expectations of life. It's a curious thing to observe, from my vantage point of a Gen X parent of two who's getting divorced, surrounded by Gen Y people who likely haven't even given a stray thought to even marrying anybody, let alone raising kids or divorcing somebody.
How is a future built in a world like that, full of alienated people who just randomly bounce off one another like pinballs? Where seemingly obvious ideas like "conversation" and "dating" and "relationship" and even "love" seem quaint and unfamiliar and alien and perhaps even threatening? In a bizarre way, it feels like the final triumph of the consumerist culture, to the final detriment of mankind as a social animal. I just wonder where these people will be in another five years, what they will do, and what that'll mean for the larger culture.
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