Intermezzo

intermezzo--a usually brief musical interlude or diversion.

coda--the concluding passage of a piece or movement, typically forming an addition to the basic structure.

I enjoy music. I used to enjoy making music as a church and school music director, and as a vocalist. Those days are behind me. So now I enjoy listening to music.  I listen to a wide variety of music including Classical, choral music, Christian music and popular music, especially from the  60s and 70s (my formative  years). At home I use Spotify as my medium.  Besides the many playlists I have created, I make good use of the search box to find any song or composer I care to listen to. I employ the Spotify "radio stations" as well. Spotify is a wellspring of unending musical pleasure. On the road I listen to Sirius/XM radio. The ability to drive across the country (hypothetically) while listening to the same station is quite phenomenal. The only time I lose the signal is while driving slowly under an overpass or through a tunnel. Other than that, XM plays an uninterrupted stream of my favorite music.

Listening to music as often as I do, I have come to notice things about certain types of music and certain songs. Most popular music lasts about three to three and a half minutes. Some songs, however, last much longer. Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven, for example, lasts over eight minutes. The Eagle's Hotel California lasts nearly seven minutes.  The Beatles' Hey Jude lasts over seven minutes. There is something else that Hotel California and Hey Jude share in common. They each have an extended  coda.  Listening to my favorite songs over the years, I've noticed that I tend to tune out the interludes while waiting for the song (the vocals) to start again.  And then it gradually got in my head that the introduction, interludes and codas are just as important as the vocals. But I noticed something else. In Hotel California as soon as Don Henley finishes the line, "You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave", the guitar solo starts. To my ear it sounds like an intermezzo, an interlude. Musically, it sounds like the vocals are "to be continued".But then I realized the song ends with that guitar solo. As soon as that solo begins, the vocals are done.  That two minute guitar coda has been named as the best guitar solo in all of music. It's not just tacked on to fill time; it's important music.  And then listening to Hey Jude for the nth time I thought "that 'nah nah nah nah, hey Jude' part goes on a long time". So I timed it.  It goes on nearly four minutes. Four minutes!  Most popular songs don't last four minutes. The Beatles must have thought it was important. And they were right.

In our lives we tend to think that some parts of the day are better than others, are more important than others. During some parts of the day we are marking time until we can get on with the things that really matter. There's nothing wrong with feeling that way. No doubt, most of us treasure the time with family and friends over time we spend on the clock.  On the other hand, unless we're fully retired or independently wealthy, even if we don't particularly enjoy our job,  that time on the clock is, at least, a means to an end. It facilitates that time with those special people, which makes the time at work just as important as the time at home. Another thing, how many more office shootings will it take for us to realize that we don't have any control over when and where we will draw our last breath. That coffee break may end up being that long "coda" of life after death. When we walked away from our desk, we never walked back. It wasn't just a "break" after all;  it was the grand finale!

Maybe you don't listen to as much music intentionally as I do, and maybe you don't want to. But when you find yourself listening at home, at work or in the car, instead of it just being a distraction, tune into the song and you may be surprised what all you find. And if you don't find all you want to know by listening, use Google and Wikipedia like I do. "Nah nah nah nah, nah nah nah nah hey Jude". The end.

The Speed of Music

When I listen to music, I feel like the music is moving toward some unknown destination. I don't mean just that it makes me want to move, I mean that the music itself is moving.  Like you, I read a page left to right and top to bottom. If I'm reading a novel or the daily newspaper, I read left to right and top to bottom.  It's the same with music. I read a sheet of music left to right and top to bottom. Because of that, when I'm listening to music, I'm hearing the music moving left to right from its beginning to end.  If I imagine I'm facing north, then the music is moving west to east.

As I hand the young lady at the desk my key tag at the gym, I chuckle to myself when she says, "I hope you enjoy your workout."  "Workout" to me involves great effort and lots of sweat. I intend to do neither. I spend 40 minutes or so walking on a  treadmill at a brisk pace and then another fifteen minutes lifting and pulling weights. No sweat. I'm "keeping the mass in motion" as my wife puts it. Like many people at the gym,  I listen to music while I "work out." Unlike most people who use the beat of the music to rev them up, my playlists consist of my favorite music.  Some of the songs have a steady beat, but many of them do not. I just enjoy the music while I'm walking and using the gym equipment.

Although I am not looking for some specific beat, or "workout" music, many times I realize that the beat of the music is very close to my pace. When that happens I adjust my speed and my step so that I'm walking in time with the music. A few days ago when this happened, I was walking at 3 mph, or a 20 minute mile. That's when it occurred to me that the music was moving at 3 mph. As the playlist continued song by song, I paid attention to the speed of the music.  I learned that most music that  I listen to moves west to east between 2.5 mph and 4 mph. There are outliers such as "Desperado" on the slow side and "Boys of Summer" on the fast, but they are the exception and not the rule.

I know of no practical use for this information. There is benefit to walking on a treadmill. There is benefit to listening to music you enjoy. There's benefit for doing them simultaneously.  I'm not sure there's any benefit for assigning a speed to that music. A recent study suggests that there is benefit for even 10 minutes of exercise per week. That's good to know. At 3 miles per hour, I don't have to go back to the gym for a month.

I like where we're at.

If you Google "I like where we're at right now", one of the hits is Gus Malzahn, the head coach of the Auburn Tigers football team. Good grammar notwithstanding, there is a world of truth in his words. First of all, the words are a bit redundant.  How can you be "where you're at" (sic) at any other time than "right now"? You are always where you are at a given time.

On the other hand "where you are" is a moving target. Where you sit is moving several hundred thousand, if not millions of miles per hour. Any point on the equator is moving at about 1,000mph on Earth's axis.  The earth is traveling around the sun at about 67,000mph.  Our sun and its solar system is traveling through the Milky Way at around 515,000mph. The Milky Way is revolving around some distant system, etc. through the universe. And where you sit, you don't feel a thing.

But let's get back to earthly matters of location. Here on Earth, relative to the Earth, "where we are" is always "right now."  I get tickled with these huge RVs, these bus sized traveling homes. Here these folks are in a two bedroom luxury home on wheels and they blow past me on the interstate at 80mph. Where are they going in such a hurry if they're already home?  They could pull into any rest area at any time and sleep  for a while or play cards or anything.  Is "there" that much better than "here"?  Why is getting "there" important enough to break the law and endanger motorists to get there?  They need to listen  to Gus and say, "I like where we're at", even if it's on I-75 south headed to Florida.

The thing about Gus Malzahn is that he says "I like where we're at" throughout the season no matter what's happening on the field.  He says it during spring training. He says it at summer camp.. He says it the week leading up to the first game.  Win or lose he says it  after the games.  Can it get any better than liking where you are no matter what's going on around you?  We could all learn from what he's saying.

But it's not football that started all this. It's basketball. For Auburn fans everywhere for their team to reach the Final Four is too exciting to describe. I have watched as many games as possible all season including the SEC Tournament and the NCAA Tournament (the Dance). My heart is still racing and my fingernails are bitten to the nub, but it's been fun. Between games I read articles by Auburn beat writers and national sports figures. They are all surprised and amazed at what Pearl and his Tigers have accomplished. Bruce Pearl said this in a recent interview, "We don't all have to be Bryce Brown, we can't all be Jared Harper, but without Malik Dunbar, we're not  here." When he said, "we're not here" I considered the words of that other coach, "I like where we're at." We are here.

My point is that no matter what, you're always where you are. You may not like where you are, but there you  are anyway.  You can't be anywhere else. The trick then is to move toward where you'd rather be, but meanwhile to be content with where you are. A GPS is an amazing piece of technology. When activated, those tracking satellites know exactly where you are and exactly where you want to be. And then it gives constantly updated directions on how to get there. What's most amazing is that you not  only follow your GPS but the GPS is following you, If you take a wrong turn it simply recalculates and again tells you how to get "there" from  "here".I may never get to where I'd like to go, but "I like where I'm at". And I like "right now." 

The Bible says that "contentment... is great gain."  If you're contented where you are, think long and hard before you go somewhere else.

Just Walk Away...

A good friend of mine suggested that I watch the movie Christopher Robin. So I did. At first I was put off by the talking stuffed animals. But as the movie progressed, they became less stuffed animals and more  living, breathing  creatures. As I listened to their dialogue, I was deeply affected by their opinions and philosophy of life. Pooh told Christopher Robin several times that he was a "bear of small brain," but he had plenty enough brain to offer rich concepts of abundant living.

I didn't write down or memorize these statements or these truths. If I watch the movie again  I'll stop and write down some of the quotes.  Pooh said something though that has stayed with me: "When I want to get somewhere, I walk away from where I've been."

If you're in a soul-numbing, dead end job, just walk away.
If you're addicted to narcotics or alcohol, just walk away.
If you're in a destructive relationship, just walk away.
If you're prone to worry and anxiety, just walk away.
If you're hanging onto anger and resentment, just walk away.
If you're hanging onto guilt and remorse, just walk away.
(add your troubling issue), just walk away.

"Walking away" also involves "walking toward." You may need to stay in your job until you find a new one or are financially able to move on. You may need more education to become qualified for that dream job. You may need to walk toward a counselor who can provide therapy and help. You may need to walk toward a psychiatrist who can prescribe medicine and counsel to guide you through withdrawal and chemical dependence. You may need to find a shelter for battered women to provide temporary protection and relief from physical and emotional harm. You may need to confide in and lean on a friend who can offer love and support as you find your way. You may need to find a church where caring people can help ground you in eternal truths. You may need to walk away from a church that offers easy answers for every problem. Finally, like Pooh, you may need to reach inside yourself and re-discover your center, become reacquainted with yourself, your own priorities, principles, and hopes and dreams.

In one dramatic scene, Christopher Robin woke up, realized that he had overslept and said, "Oh no! It's tomorrow!" to which Pooh replied, "It's usually today." And if a journey of 1,000 miles begins with a single step, today is as good a day as any to take it.  Now you have to figure out which way to go. Pooh used Christopher Robin's compass to go north. If you're not quite sure which direction to go, north is as good as any. Better yet, take inventory of your options and choose the one that you think is best. Pooh, "What day is it Christopher Robin?"  "It's today."  "Ah, today. My favorite day."

Ordinary Wonder

transcendent--"beyond or above the range of normal or merely physical human experience;surpassing the ordinary; existing apart from and not subject to the limitations of the material universe".  Synonyms:supernatural, otherworldly, mystical, spiritual, sublime, ethereal.  Antonyms: ordinary, mundane

I have had my share of encounters with the "transcendent."  None of these happenings were drug or alcohol induced. I was not "on" anything. It's just that several different times in my life something has broken through the fabric of the ordinary, the mundane into some other dimension. What happened  can only be described as "mystical"  or "transcendent."  These experiences left me dazed and somewhat bewildered.  The upside of these experiences has been to put me in touch with a dimension of life that's beyond the ordinary.  The downside of these experiences is that the ordinary in comparison feels mundane. If you remove the "extra" from "extraordinary" then the "ordinary" feels rather empty.

One of my transcendent experiences happened while driving on Highway 78 east from Jasper to Birmingham, Alabama. It involved beautiful music on the radio and a church I was passing along the way. There was no danger to me or other motorists as the whole incident only lasted a matter of seconds. But "transcendence" seems to happen out of time. The most powerful transcendent experience of my life came in a dream in 1982. When I woke up from the dream I knew that my dream self was a part of a transformational experience.  My dream self then transformed my waking self into something new. Thinking about the dream even now, thirty seven years later, I am touched with its beauty, its power and its purpose. Another transcendent experience was on a sailboat in the late 1980s. This experience temporarily  filled me to overflowing with a sensation of buoyancy and wonder.  Although I was very much in the body through the entire experience, my psyche seemed to float to somewhere else.  From a passing of time perspective, this experience lasted about twenty minutes. This was considerably longer in duration than all my other transcendental experiences combined. Another thing that separates this experience with the others is that something very similar happened at about the same time to my best friend; so for the first time I was able to talk to someone who understood what I was saying. Unfortunately, my friend got killed before we could talk about it again. Other mystical experiences have touched me and changed me over the years.

With this said, the secret to abundant living is not to rack up as many transcendent experiences as possible, but to find the extraordinary in the ordinary.  This phenomenon is perhaps best illustrated in Thornton Wilder's play Our Town when the events of one ordinary day in one ordinary town are transformed to the extraordinary. But we do not need to watch a play or sit under a Bodhi tree to see the extraordinary at work. Extraordinary things happen all around us every single day. The sun, which is 93 million miles away, has a surface temperature of about 6,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Yet after the heat and light have traveled their eight minutes to earth and have punctured Earth's atmosphere, the average temperature at the equator is only 88 degrees. With a little sunscreen the heat of the sun is quite bearable to humans. Green living things on Earth use the light of the sun in a process called photosynthesis. This process synthesizes foods from carbon dioxide and water. Of all things, oxygen is a byproduct of this chemical interaction. Ninety nine percent of the gases in our atmosphere are oxygen and nitrogen. A human being dies if deprived of oxygen for about five minutes. In the time you've spent reading this, your life has been spared because of your breathing. Amazing. That the Earth synthesizes enough oxygen every day for all 7 billion of Earth's inhabitants is quite extraordinary.

UNICEF estimates that about 350,000 babies are born every day. That's 14,500 babies born every hour. Or that's 243 living, breathing human beings born in the world every single minute of every day. After nine months suspended in amniotic fluid, these tiny earthlings are now surviving on their own, breathing oxygen from the air like all of us.  Isn't  that extraordinary? ! The world could not contain the books about the extraordinary things  that happen to us every second of every day.

It has been quite some time since I have had a bona fide "transcendental experience". Do I miss them? Of course I do. Do I need them?  I must not or I would have them.  The thing I miss the most about "mystical experiences" is the sense of existential arrival and departure that they provide.  It's as though the experiences provide a cosmic signpost that reads "You are here."  So without some otherworldly guide to point the way, the Universe leaves that up to me. So what do I want to do with my life?   Where do I go from here? I think I'll go to the kitchen and brew a cup of coffee. My Keurig is quite extraordinary. 

Resting Glitch Face

I had an  interesting experience a couple of days ago. It was about 10:30 am and I was on my way to a doctor's office. I had been up over two hours.  I called the office en route and a woman I didn't know answered the phone. After a brief exchange I said "good bye", only she didn't hang up the phone. I could hear what she was being said in the office. The woman I had spoken to said "He sounded like he was about half asleep." And another responded "He always sounds that way."

I don't have a resting smile face. Unfortunately it's closer to a frown.  I am not an unhappy person it's just how my mouth and face settles in when I'm not thinking about anything in particular. It's something that I am aware of and that I work on. I had a boss once, a boss I eventually fired, who constantly commented on my facial expression.  Publicly and privately he would look at me with a forced smile and say, "Smile David!!" And I would flash a smile for his entertainment.  I was not smiling the morning I told him where to get off and then drove away in the car that I had already packed with my stuff.  Smiles aren't always necessary.  Smiles aren't always appropriate.

So the woman said that I "sounded half asleep."  I wasn't asleep and I wasn't even sleepy. I just have a rather low monotone voice until I get excited about something.  A "resting monotone" I guess you'd say. And I wasn't offended by what she said and have made no plans to talk to anyone about it.  I ask for and deserve the observation.

Boost, a cellular phone network, has a commercial that includes a husband referring to his wife's "resting glitch face."  I did a double take the first time I heard it. The next time I  understood what he was saying. I think mine is more like a "resting solemn face."  I catch that face in the mirror or another reflection from time to time and it scares me a bit, too.  But in spite of my best efforts, I'm stuck with my face! And you are too. Feel free to look away.

When I got to my doctor's office, the woman who made the comment wasn't even there and like I said, I was not compelled to say anything to anyone else about it.  I need to bring the tone of my voice up a notch or two and I need to smile more. But one reason I'm not that concerned about it is that children like me.  Children I know like me and children I don't know like me.  If my voice and face was too scary, I don't think children would hang around me.

So what's my take away from all this?   What is a lesson I can learn from it?  What I learned is to make sure I hang up the phone at the end of a conversation and in the meantime to be careful what I say about the person I was talking to. By the way, I didn't say how long I eavesdropped on those office ladies.  It was actually several minutes, but they stopped talking about me and I lost interest in their conversation. A "resting self-centered streak."

Just charge it !

charge account--"An existing line of credit at the business that issued it.

My best friend growing up was Billy Jones.  I met Billy the very first day of the first grade at the College Street Elementary School in Enterprise, Alabama.   To say that we “hit it off” would be a gross understatement.  We became friends before we knew just how easy our friendship would be.  Billy was seventeen days older than me.  I was born on the 19^th and he was born on the second.  His house was within walking distance of our school in one direction as my house was within walking distance from the other. This is to say that our houses were within walking distance of each other. And bicycles bisected  the distance at light speed.  From the first grade through the fourth grade when he had his accident, we were inseparable.  On Friday nights either I spent the night at his house or he spent the night at mine. And most afternoons we were playing at either house or in the ball field behind the school.

About halfway between our houses was a business known as “the dairy.”  It wasn’t an actual dairy because there were no cows.  No milk was produced at that location.  It could best be described as a milk distribution center.  For me it was a place to buy chocolate milk.  For a nickel I could buy one of those school lunchroom size cartons of chocolate milk.  Billy and I stopped there quite often on our coming and going to our houses.  One day though Billy said the magic words.  He had never used these words before and I had never heard them.  When she handed my carton to me, I gave her a nickel, but when she handed Billy his, he said, “Just charge it.”  And I was completely amazed by what happened next. Billy didn’t hand her any money.   I thought “charging it is the way to go.” A few days later we stopped at the dairy again and the same thing happened. When she handed the chocolate milk to Billy he said “Just charge it.”  So when she handed mine to  me, I said “Just charge mine too.”  She said, “Ok, David. Will do.”   This new system was working really well and we continued to charge our milk for several weeks.

One afternoon when I got home after school my mother asked me, “Are you charging milk at the dairy?” Now how in the world would she know that !?  I said, “Yes I am.”  She said, “David, we don’t even have a charge account at the dairy.  The milk man stopped by today to collect the money.”  Of course I had no idea what a charge account was or how the milk man found us, but I did know that my mother wasn’t happy with me.  My only punishment that I recall was having to listen to  a lengthy explanation of what a charge account entailed. And she made me promise not to ever charge anything without talking to her first. And I promised.  And I didn’t.

A few weeks before his accident, Billy and I built a fully functional space ship in the closet of his attic bedroom. We flew together to the outer edges of the Milky Way. And we always got home in time for supper. What happened just happened. It wasn’t anybody’s fault.  Billy’s brother thought it was his fault. I thought it was mine. But now I understand that we were both wrong. It was just a horrible accident. I visited Billy once in the hospital but because of my guilt I never went back to his house after he went home.  The next year because of all the school he had missed,  Billy was ‘put back” to repeat the fourth grade and I went on to the fifth.  And that was that.

A few weeks ago my wife and I bought a new car. The finance officer at the Nissan dealership asked what sort of financing we intended to do.  I looked at him, smiled and said, “Just charge it.”