Muzak Lessons: Sometimes You're The Windshield

Muzak Lessons; Sometimes You're the Windshield

The premise of this feature is to take music I overhear on the PA system at my grocery store and  try to dispense some wisdom from it.   At my grocery store they tend to play the same songs over and over on a regular basis.  Some songs are on a heavier rotation than other songs.  There are 2 songs that get played twice seemingly every 8 hours shift.  There are other songs like this one that has a lighter rotation.  I hear it about once every week.  

The Bug - Mary Chapin Carpenter 1992

Now before I try to teach some life lessons from this song, I need to set a couple facts straight.

 1) I am not the first blogger to mention this song and wax poetic about it. Patricia J Finley had this to say about the song back in 2015.

2) While the Mary Chapin Carpenter version is the version they play at my grocery store , and the only version I had heard before starting to work on this article (in fact I didn't hear this song at all until I started working at the grocery store this Spring), her version is just a cover.  The song was written by Mark Knopfler and was originally released by Dire Straits.  You can find the lyric in their entirety here.

The Bug - Dire Straits 1991

I like both versions of the song.  The lyrics are a little easier to understand in the Chapin version. Although I think I do prefer the Dire Straits version a little better. 

The key lyrics to either version are found in the chorus ...

Sometimes you're the windshield
Sometimes you're the bug
Sometimes it all comes together baby
Sometimes you're a fool in love
Sometimes you're the louisville slugger
Sometimes you're the ball
Sometimes it all comes together baby
Sometimes you're going to lose it all

2020 has seemed more like a bug and ball year than a windshield or Louisville Slugger year .  But the truth as usual  is a little more simple and a little more complex than the lyrics of a song. It's true, life has it's mountains and it's valleys.  It's victories and it's defeats.  

Life sometimes seem like a flip of a coin determines the outcome.  I believe that God is in control of this universe.  God brings us out of difficulties that were beyond our  control and also delivers us from the folly that we authored ourselves.  

In Psalm 40 David  wrote a song of deliverance.  He did not know what a windshield or a Louisville Slugger but he certainly had his troubles (like ours many were self inflicted).  To end this post I am sharing Psalm 40 and put highlighted some of the verses that spoke to me.  

40 I waited patiently for the Lord;
    he inclined to me and heard my cry.
2 He drew me up from the pit of destruction,
    out of the miry bog,
and set my feet upon a rock,
    making my steps secure.
3 He put a new song in my mouth,
    a song of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear,
    and put their trust in the Lord.

4 Blessed is the man who makes
    the Lord his trust,
who does not turn to the proud,
    to those who go astray after a lie!
5 You have multiplied, O Lord my God,
    your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us;
    none can compare with you!
I will proclaim and tell of them,
    yet they are more than can be told.

6 In sacrifice and offering you have not delighted,
    but you have given me an open ear.[a]
Burnt offering and sin offering
    you have not required.
7 Then I said, “Behold, I have come;
    in the scroll of the book it is written of me:
8 I delight to do your will, O my God;
    your law is within my heart.”

9 I have told the glad news of deliverance[b]
    in the great congregation;
behold, I have not restrained my lips,
    as you know, O Lord.
10 I have not hidden your deliverance within my heart;
    I have spoken of your faithfulness and your salvation;
I have not concealed your steadfast love and your faithfulness
    from the great congregation.

11 As for you, O Lord, you will not restrain
    your mercy from me;
your steadfast love and your faithfulness will
    ever preserve me!
12 For evils have encompassed me
    beyond number;
my iniquities have overtaken me,
    and I cannot see;
they are more than the hairs of my head;
    my heart fails me.

13 Be pleased, O Lord, to deliver me!
    O Lord, make haste to help me!
14 Let those be put to shame and disappointed altogether
    who seek to snatch away my life;
let those be turned back and brought to dishonor
    who delight in my hurt!
15 Let those be appalled because of their shame
    who say to me, “Aha, Aha!”

16 But may all who seek you
    rejoice and be glad in you;
may those who love your salvation
    say continually, “Great is the Lord!”
17 As for me, I am poor and needy,
    but the Lord takes thought for me.
You are my help and my deliverer;
    do not delay, O my God!

 

Ben Cross & Jackson Scholz 1984 American Express commercial

There were no olympic games this year. I missed them this summer and became nostalgic about all things olympics. This was compounded when I heard that actor Ben Cross passed away on August 18th of this year.  He was best known for portraying Olympic runner Harold Abrahams in the 1981 movie Chariots of Fire.  

I came upon this commercial for American Express that ran during the 1984 Olympic games. It featured Cross and Jackson Scholz. Scholz like Abrahams ran in the 1924 Olympic Games in Paris, France. 

Keith for 50

Today is my brother Keith's birthday.  He would have turned 50 today. He died in April of 2009 at the age of 38.  Over the years I have written a lot about his life  and death many of those posts can be found by clicking here.

Over the years I have also written about a musician friend of mine Allen Levi.  He also lost a brother and chronicled their story in an excellent memoir called The Last Sweet Mile. I mislaid my copy a few years ago when we moved into our current house.  It is probably in a box in the basement some where.

I found 2 posts I wrote about Keith that I wanted to share.  One was written on 11/11/11 which was a birthday he has been looking forward to as it resonated firmly in his mathematical mind. The other was written a year earlier than that when he would have turned 40.  I will reprint it here as it is also features the aforementioned Allen Levi.

Big 40 minus the birthday boy

My brother Keith would have turned 40 today. He died 18 months ago so he never quite made the milestone. When My Mom turned 40, my Dad put a banner across our garage that read "Jeanne's 40 today. But don't tell anyone!". We lived across from the local library at the time and man people people became aware of the event. When I turned 40, Amy had a surprise party for me and had one of my favorite musicians, Allen Levi, fly in from Alabama and sing at my party. He performed the following song among others...

 

 When Amy turned 40, relatives teamed with me so I could give her 40 rolls of quarters. (Amy loves quarters) Keith died 18 months ago, so he never quite made the milestone. Keith was born on Veteran's day and loved that his birthday was celebrated by many people even though they might not be aware they were doing so. Today as you reflect on the men and women who served our country in the military. Reflect also on the men and women boys and girls who left the party before we had a chance to throw them one.

Meanwhile back in 2020

On occasions like this I really want to say something profound about Keith.  Instead I'll just say this...

There really has never been anyone exactly like him.  .  I find it fitting that Keith's 50th birthday falls on the heels of the death of Alex Trebek.  He loved Jeopardy and even auditioned for the show, easily making it to the 2nd part of the process.   Keith excelled in trivia but there wasn't anything trivial about him. Keith was Bi-polar but his mental illness did not define him.  What defined Keith was a world class mind, a kind and gentle spirit, a quirky and quick sense of humor, a simple but abundant faith, and a love for his family and friends.  

Keith visited me when I was living in Russia, teaching English as a Second Language and working as a Baptist Missionary.  One day Keith and I were on a bus on the way to visit a family I knew.  Keith heard someone speaking Spanish and started talking to them in Spanish.  I didn't realize how much Spanish Keith knew.  He studied it  a little in High School but picked it up mostly working at McDonalds.  The Person Keith was speaking to was a  Brazilian missionary who had only been in the Russia  for about 2 weeks.  He spoke very little Russian no English,  ,some Spanish but mostly Portuguese.   Keith invites him to visit this family with us. We get to the families house they have never met Keith or this guy before. The family consisted of a high school girl that I was tutoring in English, her college aged sister and their mother. Their English ranged between somewhat fluent and none at all. This family loved foreigners and were really interested in getting to know Keith and this Brazilian betters.   The guy from Brazil  would speak in Spanish, Keith would translate it into English and I would try to  translate it into Russian.  Then we would reverse the process.  Keith would get off on these crazy tangents and try to explain an idiom or a pun  and I would have no way to translate it with my limited Russian.  

Everybody had a wonderful time.  When I would see that family or that missionary after that they always commented on how much they enjoyed that evening. This is not surprising.  Keith made life an adventure. When I hear Spanish, I sometimes remember the day Keith turned a bus ride into a party.  He may have left the party early but he certainly made a lasting impression. 

All 27 Outs from Lucas Giolito's No-Hitter (August 25, 2020)

All 27 Outs of Alec Mills No-Hitter

Starting a good book

 I have read some exceptional books during my summer reading program thus far.    I will say this; many of the books I've enjoyed most this summer have been great from the first chapter, sometimes the first page and even the first sentence.  I am only about 10 pages into a new book and I am convinced it will be a wonderful experience.  The book is Emily of New Moon by Lucy Maud Montgomery.  Let me tell you why after only 10 pages I think it will be very good.

The first few reasons I had even before I started reading. One is I am familiar with the author's work.  I just finished listening to Anne of Green Gables, which I enjoyed immensely.  I have seen many t.v. and film versions of the Anne books and saw the musical version in Prince Edward Island a few years back.  

This leads me to another reason I think I will enjoy Emily of New Moon because I've been to Prince Edward Island where the story takes place.  I found that I have enjoyed the works of LM Montgomery more since my trip to PEI because it is easier for me to picture life on this island because of my experiences there.  

The third reason I thought I'd enjoy this book before I read it, is the reason I ordered the book from my library in the first place. I had read that Lucy Maud Montgomery had based Emily on her own experiences of growing up in Prince Edward Island.  I like fictional books based on authors' actual experiences.

I like how the cover of New Moon is evocative of Green Gables but seems to be setting a different tone for the book.

The first few pages of this book also have given me reasons to think I have happened upon a real masterpiece.  The first sentence drew me in and I related to it immediately. The chapter is entitled the House in the Hollow and begins  ...

The house in the hollow was "a mile from anywhere"- so Maywood people said.  

I really liked  this turn of  phrase; a mile from anywhere. It reminded me of how I used to say that I have lived in several Chicago suburbs that few had ever heard of but they were familiar with our neighbors.  I grew up in Elk Grove Village, and people were more familiar with Des Plaines, Arlington Heights and Schaumburg.  After I married Amy we lived in an apartment in Hickory Hills where I regularly had to tell people we were next to Oak Lawn and Bridgeview.  Our first house was in Carpentersville where Algonquin, East and West Dundee, and Elgin are better known outside of the area.  Now that we have moved to Elgin, I no longer need to give sister cities. So, from the first sentence I connected my experience to that of the novel.

I am a big fan of symmetry and also enjoy foreshadowing when it isn't obtrusive. In the 4th paragraph of the book Montgomery starts one and nails the other quite elegantly: "She remembered that walk very vividly all her life ... - more likely because of what happened after she came back from it." The symmetry comes into completion with a big reveal that's blurted out quite unexpectedly in the final sentence of the chapter. 

One of the things I liked instantly about the titular character of Anne of Green Gables is how she names things. For example calling people who understand her fully, kindred spirits, and changing the names of place names to better place names (ex. the Lake of Shining Waters). Emily does the same thing immediately with something called "the flash." I also like the pacing of the story, "the flash" is alluded to 3 times in the first page and not explained until page 7 but feels just right when it is explained.  In my own writing, I often struggle with the desire to "explain" things too quickly.  

Another enjoyable aspect of the first ten pages (about a chapter and a third) is that the second chapter takes place immediately after the first ends.  In fact chapter one stops with the reveal I mentioned, and chapter 2 begins in the same conversation. That may seem like an abrupt break chronologically, but ending the chapter on the reveal is an excellent choice.

I love quotations. I even have a space on the header of this blog for quotations I really enjoy.  If you are reading this on the computer version of this blog, you can look up and see the following quote (although you don't have to, as it follows the elipses) ... Aunt Nancy had once said to her 'The first time your husband calls you "Mother" the romance of life is over'.

I love this quote for multiple reasons: a) it's an excellent quote.  b) the quote itself is the narrator quoting Emily's father quoting Emily's mother attributing the quote to Emily's Aunt Nancy.  And as clumsily as I described, the quote is as breezily as Montgomery put it. c) the quote is a story of how Emily's father wanted to name her Juliet after Emily's mother.  The fact that he heeded his wife's advice, and they named her Emily, made me think that the romance between them was never over.  d) I related the naming story to my own experience. Before I got married, I had always wanted to name a son David, as this is not only my name but my Father's as well.  Amy, who knew me when I would stay at my parent's house between school years and other situations, saw firsthand what it was like with two Davids in one house and that name was off the table before we even married.  

I know I have mentioned twice already how I connected with the text on a personal level in the first ten pages of the book.  Some might say that's more about me than the author, but I say that good writing is written in a way that the reader can make connections to it.  Making connections to it early helped me feel great about the prospect of reading the rest.

The last thing I want to share about the way this book begins is another example of the delicious way Montgomery turns a phrase. Emily's dad is telling Emily about her mom and utters one of the best sentences I have ever read:

When she fell in love with me, a poor young journalist, with nothing in the world but his pen and his ambition, there was a family earthquake.

I mean that's more of a sentence I expect to hear from John Boy Walton. the boy poet of Virginia!

I can't believe how amazing this book has started! What I really can't believe is that I stopped reading it long enough to write this post.  If you'll excuse me, I'll go remedy that situation.