A New Day Has Begun

And you can’t keep life from moving on
So roll along ‘til there’s nowhere to go
And you can’t get back from moving on
So roll along ‘til there’s nowhere to go
Nowhere to go
--Roddy Woomble, “Roll Along”[1]

I used to drive endlessly in circles.

I think I was searching for peace.  Or answers.  I’d head west from home and drive a specific circuit.  Sometimes I’d add to that circuit.  But it was always a variation on a theme of driving alone out west, then heading back.

It was so ingrained that I took the circuit a couple times when I was visiting from Dallas.

I’ve started to take it a couple times since I moved back.  Both times I got bored, took a left when I should have taken a right, then headed back.  The whole thing just wasn’t worth the effort.

But you keep asking the same questions
About the nature of time
But they take far too long to answer
Why don’t we just go outside?
--Roddy Woomble, “Roll Along”

I suppose it was inevitable.  I moved back from being a thousand miles away, after all.  Not only that, but I moved back in with my parents whilst searching for a house.

I knew it was only a matter of time before one of my ghosts caught up.

I was standing in line at the grocery store, waiting for the guy to ring me up.  Across the way I saw a woman who looked vaguely familiar.  For the life of me I could not figure out who it was or why I thought I should know her.

I gave up trying to figure that one out.  My eyes scanned to my left and I saw another, younger woman standing behind her.  She looked familiar, too.  She was also looking directly at me.  So I did what I do in that situation and gave her a brief nod of acknowledgment.  She immediately looked down at the floor and took a half step back, as if to take cover behind a display of granola bars and chocolate-covered pretzels.

That was when I realized two things.  First, the second woman was none other than Her.  Second, I’d totally forgotten what she looked like.

With that, I paid for my groceries, walked out to my car, and drove home.  It occurred to me that my ghosts can’t really scare me anymore, not if I’ve forgotten what they look like.  It further occurred to me that at least one of those ghosts is more scared of me than I of her.

I think that in the past such a moment would have driven me to drive my old route.

Today I went home and took my dog for a walk.[2]

Abandon your traditions
Watch them disappear one by one
And follow their direction
Between the moon and the sun
A new day has begun
--Roddy Woomble, “A New Day Has Begun”

I guess there’s no real point to this story.  I want to say something profound, spin it off in to a tale of growing past and moving on.  But there is no real tale as such.

There’s just a single moment.

On one side of that moment I’m still trapped by my past.  On the other side of that moment I’m not.  I think that’s really where the old idea that time heals all wounds comes in.  One day it still hurts.  The next day you’re wondering if you can make it.  The next day you realize that it just doesn’t matter anymore.

And I might be down in Georgia
Driving down an old dirt road
Or southern California driving up the coast
Well I don’t know exactly where I’ll be
When you turn in to a memory
--Jessi Lynn, “Someday Soon”

Maybe, though, there is something more to it.

I think all those years that I drove in circles I was attempting to run away and always finding myself right back where I started.  Even the Dallas move couldn’t necessarily help.  I’ve always said that all the unresolved issues you want to escape by leaving are the first thing that goes in the suitcase (which, I guess, is why they call it “baggage”).

I mean, I suppose the fact that I haven’t really thought about her much over the last year or so probably counts for a lot.  But I don’t think I could have known what that meant until that moment when I realized she was standing right there, looking at me, and I didn’t actually know who she was.  In the grand scheme of things it doesn’t mean much, I guess.  The only real difference between the moment before and the moment after was that before I suspected and after I knew.

But, really, that seems like a good thing.

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[1]This is off of Roddy Woomble’s new solo effort, The Impossible Song and Other Songs.  As an avowed fan of all things Idlewild, his previous solo effort, and most of the side project he did a couple years ago, I can say this: it’s bloody brilliant.  At this point my 1-2-3 for 2011 seems to be holding at Roddy Woomble, Matt Nathanson, and Flogging Molly.  And this is a year where Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers (my one-syllable review: meh) and Over the Rhine (my three word review: solid but pedestrian) released albums.  Oh, yeah, and some guy named Paul Simon did, too.

Actually, 2011 is an embarrassment of riches for music in the same way that 2010 was an embarrassment.  My 2011 list thus far:

1.  Roddy Woomble, The Impossible Song and Other Songs
2.  Matt Nathanson, Modern Love
3.  Flogging Molly, Speed of Darkness
4.  The Wheeler Brothers, Portraits
5.  Social Distortion, Hard Times and Nursery Rhymes
6.  Over the Rhine, The Long Surrender
7.  Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers, Unida Cantina
8.  Paul Simon, So Beautiful or So What
9.  Foo Fighters, Wasting Light (provisional, I just got it, will climb, possibly on “Dear Rosemary” alone)
10.  Blue October, Any Man In America (will most likely not make the top 10)

So, here’s the thing: this is a hell of a list.  The OtR and RCPM offerings are weak, but they’re legitimately worthwhile (of course, that’s “worthwhile compared to other things.  Both bands have at least three albums I’d rather listen to before their 2011 offerings.  Same with Paul Simon) and I love the Top 5 (also, if you get the chance go see the Wheeler Brothers.  They’re a hell of a live band.  I first saw them with Sons of Bill at Moon Bar in Ft Worth, then they had their first-ever Chicago show right after I moved back.  Portraits is one of those albums that’s actually kinda meh in album form, but everything on it kicks ass live).  But 2011 is far from over.  I just discovered that Cody Canada (as in, the Canadian in Cross Canadian Ragweed) & the Departed released their debut album, This is Indian Land, in June.  As we speak an autographed copy of the new Mike Doughty album, Yes and Also Yes is making its way towards me through the mail.  The new Micky & the Motorcars, Raise My Glass is decent.  I’ve got a pre-order on the new Waterboys.  I have it on good authority that James Dunning is in the studio right now with whoever the hell else is in the Lost Immigrants these days.  There’s still the promise of a new Local H album.  It’s also still somewhere between possible and likely there will be new Sons of Bill and Seneca.

And…I feel like I’m forgetting one other promised new album…

Oh, yeah, there’s one super-forgettable band that’s said there will be a 2011 release.

Soundgarden.

[2]In the interests of full disclosure, I also have a goal of not buying gas during the month of August.  That might have messed up my plans…

Also, I feel like telling Daisy stories.

One of the neighbors up the street left a couch out on the curb yesterday.  Last night I was walking Daisy and she started wagging her tail pretty hard at the couch and sniffing around it.  Finally, she jumped up on it and was all, “Yeah, check it out, a new toy for me to play on!”  I found this somewhere between amusing and amusing as all hell.

Also, while I was walking her this afternoon we walked past a white dog that was about twice the size of Daisy.  Said other dog had a leash, but no one was holding it.  As soon as the owner saw me and Daisy he ran over and grabbed the leash.  Daisy ignored the other dog, but it barked away at her.  On the way back I saw the same dog, again being ignored by its people.  It was also walking around with a tree branch in its mouth that was about four or five feet long and probably at least six inches around.  Daisy, once again, did not do anything to piss that dog off.  She’s a smart puppy.

Comments

[The Everlasting Dave]

Wasting Light. So hot right now, and still my #1. I put it on your jump drive, but now I guess I can take it off. But I did manage to get good and stoned this past week, and it opened my mind to the Laser Lotusness of Robby Woomble and his solo work. Considering I'm already pretty much married to "Make Another World" I guess that's not too much of a shocker.

What's the deal with RCPM, anyway? Is it just you and me, or did the band themselves wake up one day this year and decide to be mediocre?

[Geds]

Fuck. So you mean I didn't have to give Dave Grohl ten dollars? I'm so pissed.

And Big A is totally on board with our mutual opinion of the new RCPM. I'm not sure what happened on this one, really. I think they were trying to make a political statement album without realizing that they're really not a political statement band and it fell apart. The first time I listened to Speed of Darkness I thought, "This is the album that RCPM was trying to make."

But Roger can't do angry. And right now if you want to make a statement about the state of the world, you need to be able to do angry. That's why the Flog could do it. That's why I strongly suspect the new Local H will be awesome. No one does angry like Scott Lucas.

[The Everlasting Dave]

Yeah. The best albums for me are the ones that merge relationship anger with political/social anger. Off the top of my head, "Blaze" by Lagwagon and "American Idiot" are prime examples- the latter you have and the former is already on your jump drive. I could see Local H doing something incredible along those lines. But I'm so used to the good-time tequila drinkin' music from RCPM I didn't even notice he was singing about, you know, stuff that isn't tequila. Maybe I should listen to it again and pretend it's a different band.

Oh, but now I can give you "Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace", which rivals "Wasting Light" on the awesomeness scale.

[firefall]

Awesome post

(except for the shite music recommendations, but hey! in 30 years you'll know -exactly- the same feeling)