last night was a good night. today was one of those days. tonight was that night.
my dad is in town for the first time in five years, for one week, so i'm feeling especially giving and loving. this morning upon waking i played and replayed a song i've been updating and revising since i improvised it whilst thinking deeply of the coworker who inspired it. it feels good to play it in a way that i can't fully even comprehend except that while the music goes my heart races like a jackalope being chased by a chupacabras in broad daylight. it's an ultra-hyper-intense, verbally inexplicable, musical thing.
afterward, i repaired a piece of glass for cody and bumped noses with kitty exraordinaire, elvis T. belvis. i used the glass afterward and my insides opened up after being functional and performing a mutually beneficial service for a very much loved one. there was little traffic on the way to work and a
new mix with various, notable songs of late playing in the car (
this will be available soon). i arrived at amoeba slightly early, decompressed in my car for a hot minute, and walked to work in the somewhat searing sunshine.
this decompression phase is also somewhat of a compression phase. all my thoughts are of amoeba and the day ahead of me, and it's not dissimilar in many ways at all from walking to school (college, not high). to know that, on any given day, i'll interact with someone who has impressed me personally for years without even knowing it is like being able to blossom for the person who planted the seed and witnessing their joyous little reaction. this is true of my fellow amoebites, whose
musical recommendations i latched onto for several years before contributing my own material, and here are a few of the more memorable, ephemeral, chance encounters i have had with "celebrities," as they are known, in the past nine months of employment at amoeba music.
the first big wig i ever met was stephen soderbergh, and i have helped him several times at this point. at a glance, he is the most mundane person in the world and is even less enthralled and imposing than his slight cameo in waking life. realizing whose driver's license and credit card i was holding, i lost myself and complimented his shirt immediately. he laughed. it was a reese's pieces t-shirt that could easily have been from wal-mart. "weak on a few levels," thought my brain. the next time i met him we talked about new-old jimi hendrix and the tami show. (as a result of the supreme lack of emotional thrills i get from this guy, he is still the only person of such status whose purchases i can actually remember.) he is not thoroughly enjoyed by the amoeba staff, from what i've gathered, and this amuses me richly.
two days ago i summoned quentin tarantino to my register and conversed with him while he called me sweetheart several times. i told him about
the vader project, and he told me about
the krasnals group (who, on their website, also link to
wooster collective). i will never forget that meeting.
lt. aldo raine: so you're "the jew hunter."
col. hans landa: [giddy] that's a bingo!
[lt. aldo and pfc. utivich stare at him in confusion]
col. hans landa: is that the way you say it: "that's a bingo?"
lt. aldo Raine: you just say "bingo."about a week ago, michel gondry walked up to me, though i did not call him over from the line. he was the line. he is much, much more handsome in person than i have ever thought him to be on screen, and the eencey weencey "why" details are incommunicable. i think that is the ultimate ace up his sleeve: having the wherewithal to make everyone else around him on camera look better than he does but commandeering the position of impetus and catalyst for the magic that surrounds him. when the words came out of my mouth that i saw eternal sunshine six times in theaters, he balked with disbelief. i MADE HIM believe me, explaining why and how, and he did. i empathized with michel gondry over reading
charlie kaufmann's transcript of eternal sunshine of the spotless mind for the first time. in life, as a fundamental practice, i will not veer far from that plane of deeply connective, sometimes ephermeral, communication.
one day at amoeba, sometime in the couple weeks before coachella in april, rosemary dawson and
aziz ansari patronized
The Record Store. the former has beautiful eyes and giggled at my stupid quips; the latter shared my joy from the glory of bonnaroo and the joanna newsom 3xlp he was buying. i told him i dug the
piece in fader magazine he did with animal collective, and he told me it was a lot of fun to do. that was a nice connection. later in the day, ron jeremy and flea both shopped around, and i told the latter how excited i was to see him at coachella in a couple weeks. he has two smiles: blue from the nose up, and divine from the nose down. that was a memorable day.
there have been still more encounters with fictional characters from my life up until now that have become non-fictional occurrences with people i respect, admire, and from whom i draw countless, unconscious metaphors, analogies, and meaning in my life because of how their work has inspired and spoken to me. on the flipside, customers are the wild cards of the influential music sphere. i have been schooled to no end by people bringing me their favorite music (for which they actually
pay. they've got me beat there.) and gracefully educated by so many people who are so inordinately passionate about the tunes that tune them up. today i befriended a man from texas who plays multiple instruments and resembles, for me, a young britt daniel. whoa.
my coworkers are the bunch of peeps that are truly enriching my life from the inside out. everybody i work with is a musically apt ferris bueller. if downsides have faces, amoeba requires that they enter the store dressed in very silly masks indeed. of the three hundred or so hollywood amoeba staff, i work closely with about fifty of them on a typical day, catching up on the lives of about half of them as the day goes on. one of my favorite coworkers makes it a habit to show me
totally obscure british comedy tv shows; frozen yogurt buffets are involved, too. another coworker reads my poetry and gave me a little pin with an image of calvin and hobbes dancing. yet another coworker introduced me to guitar mastermusicians
glenn jones and
robbie basho, and i introduced him to
kaki king and
davey graham. friendship abounds because music abounds. or at least that is how things work with me.
today, i called over a fellow with dark brown hair and eyes so blue that i don't remember seeing them--only being seen by them. he was courteous, kind, attentive, and shy. when he opted to pay with credit, i asked for his id, and saw ryan adams printed beside ryan adams' face (i didn't know his face well enough to pick him out of a crowd). the first thought that came to mind: jackie luskey.
i had talked with this lovely creature last night, after probably a year of radio silence through the loud statics of our lives, because i missed her input to the breaking point. we made it a new point to keep in touch more often and reiterated our mutual feelings of separate togetherness; in short, we caught up on all kindza shit. to reconnect is to plug the speaker cable back in.
this is what i conveyed to mr. adams, very concisely and specifically. i told him about jackie's upcoming mfa excursion in oregon this summer and how fulfilling it is to see someone pursue an intrinsically bold passion. in retrospect, he was almost unwarrantably interested and understanding of the situation. when i handed him his cds, dvds, and wax, none of which i remember, he stuck out his hand and shook mine. we implored of each other beautiful moments ahead in life, and i went back to my register to ring up another fellow desiring stravinsky, wagner, and a young chopin enthusiast, all on disc.
in the middle of that transaction, the voice of god (intercom) paged me for a phone call. a couple minutes later, as i was still talking with the classically inclined gentleman, the VOG (intercom) paged me again for a held call. when i finally answered the phone, a voice said,
"hi, this is ryan adams, you just sold me some stuff. [me: oh, hi!] i'm sorry to bother you at work, but, your friend, is she published? [me: she is, but not as huge as she will be.] what is her name? i don't usually do this, but what you were saying about serendipity, i just feel like she may be this great unsung writer that's totally undiscovered and i'd be missing out."
and i replied,
"she is, and you would be. i'm not sure where to find her formal publications, but if you go to her blog you can read plenty of written snacks that will hold you over until you do."
then,
RA: thread, butter, and jam?
me: yeah, like what you put on toast.
RA: thread, like what you put through a needle?
me: ah, no, but that's a nice play on words. it slides off the tongue. it's bread, butter, and jam, like the toast and...what you put on it.
RA: oh, that makes more sense.
me: ya.
RA: and where is that?
me: dot blogspot.
breadbutterandjam.blogspot.com.
RA: bread, butter, and jam. okay cool, thank you so much!
me: oh no problem, have fun!
RA: [bye]
me: [bye]
i already know the three of us have inspired new stories and journeys, long and short, in each of our lives. it moves me to know that ryan-adams-the-guy has been an essential link in connecting with a good friend again, and that even a little effort can manifest itself so hugely, and in the most unexpectedly positive ways, when tended to. it took a contemplative year to pick up a phone; a day to bring that simple sentiment to fruition.
shyness is not a factor in my life anymore. if someone is moderately approachable and worth talking to, i will attend to both notions. the worst that happens is bugging someone who doesn't want to be bugged, but that doesn't last long. there are too many fleeting shoulda/coulda/wouldas in life not to capitalize on a should be/could be/will be moment of life, but this is only a thoughtful meandering. the real issue is what to make of these moments and how to make them uniquely grand in the largest sense of the word. life is a series of short interviews with everyone you meet, and if you do well, you get to go on more interviews until the day you die. if you do poorly, you get to go on more interviews until the day you die. it does not matter who is paying whose bills along the way; there will always be bills, and they will always be paid or unpaid. who do you want to interview? who interviews you? what do you see when you look at strangers? who do you want to affect, and who do you allow to affect you? and how, and why? then, do. life does.
