I had been listening to nothing but Pearl Jam and WMMR for a long time now but I had a favorite band before Pearl Jam formed. I'm connected to Facebook and had been checking my "likes" to see how many things snuck their way in. That's when I remembered that I had the Spotify app on my page and, ridiculous name aside, it's free music including a band's entire history. One of these days, I had planned to listen to some of Phil's earliest work as lead singer of Genesis. It's awfully good. I had assumed that "Squonk" was some of that Peter Gabriel crap but it's on "Trick of the Tail" with Phil singing lead. "Entangled" is on this first album as well as "Ripples" which Melissa and I fell in love with seeing them in concert.
That was an amazing show. We had seats in the second level, front row centered on the stage. I got dazzled a lot but this was the show where I devised a lot of concert survival tactics. We had already seen Pearl Jam once but outdoors where we couldn't see a thing. This show was a revelation because I hadn't even bothered to purchase the previous album or two from Phil solo. He had let me down with one album utterly devoid of the life that always filled his voice. I was pleased to see him back with Genesis for one last tour but his voice sounded pretty bad on TV and I decided to sink back into memories of better days. Then I saw them performing "I Can't Dance" live somewhere and all the old life was back. They were coming to the Wells Fargo Center and I wasn't going to die without ever seeing my first favorite band play live.
I know. How can I go from Genesis to Pearl Jam? At the time, Pearl Jam was a force of nature with driving guitars and lyrics about bad things happening to good people. They were exactly what I needed because I needed to learn how to get angry without taking it out on myself. Along the way, I discovered that Eddie Vedder and Phil Collins had something surprising in common. They will be singing along in fairly different registers and then both of them soar to something transcendent. Listen to "Ripples" from Genesis and then "Given to Fly" from Pearl Jam if you're not sure what I mean. I'm pretty sure you can manage both from my Facebook page. Just beware of Eddie's ability to be most eloquent when dropping the f-bomb.
Then I saw Genesis live and realized just how alike the two bands really were. Phil sang lyrics that never would have made it past the record companies of the day. He took songs that fluttered and floated on the radio and made them rage right before my eyes. Mike Rutherford might not play as fast as Mike McCready but he is very good at what he does. Phil used drum machines as some of my friends would tell me with sneers in their voices but he used them with his drumming. He liked to say that the machines could handle the boring parts while he did the rest. I had been afraid that Phil would take it easy and avoid too many highs and lows but he soared right there before my eyes. It was wonderful.
There are so many things that I have been fortunate enough to see and do. My life may seem like a non-stop whirlwind of hellish torment and I see it that way all too often. It helps to remember those times of pure joy in as much detail as possible. I remember exactly the way Phil sounded when he told the crowd that Genesis wouldn't be back. They were retiring at the end of this tour. I realized that I had done it and had come so close to failing. Sweet success was mine at last. I remember the thrill I felt when I realized that Eddie was singing one of my favorite songs, "Porch," while swinging from a light fixture. I remember thinking the second Pearl Jam show was over and they broke into "Yellow Ledbetter." I remember the thrill of realizing that Genesis was going straight from "Home by the Sea" to "Second Home by the Sea" the way I thought it should have gone on the album. It sounded as if Phil was singing to Melissa and me when he sang "It's Gonna Get Better." I needed to hear that more than I even knew.
By the standards of our earliest days when we couldn't afford food, things sure have gotten better. My house may look like a bomb went off in it and I'm only talking about the structural damage from flooding but it's mine. I have the comfy chair I needed since our reclining love seat came apart. I know that my house is getting fixed partially anyway and that I'm going to spend the time while the job is being done in a more comfortable place. I'm going to win the important fights in spite of the pain. More precisely, to spite the pain.
The ordeal of not seeing Melissa for days at a time starts this Wednesday instead of last Wednesday. My week long reprieve is nearly over. It seems that I've already started my first physical reaction to missing her. It seems that I've lost the ability to sleep again. Climbing the stairs with sleep meds in me plus total exhaustion was exciting. There just doesn't seem to be much point in doing anything. I'm too tired to concentrate on anything already and my meds will not function under these circumstances. I don't want to sleep today because there will be plenty of time for sleep on those days when she's not coming home.
Not coming home. I try to tell myself that it's not really all that different from most days. She goes to work early for day shifts like today and stays late. I told her recently that her night shifts are as bad as not seeing her from midnight to midnight. She goes to sleep around midnight the night before, doesn't get up until the absolute last minute before going to work and then doesn't get home from the night shift until midnight or later. Even then, I know she's coming home at some point in that 24 hour period. That's not the case this time. I don't want to eat or sleep and she hasn't even left yet. I lose today because of whatever she does after work, tomorrow because it's a night shift and then she leaves on Wednesday.
All I can do is freaking endure again.
When I posted this, I had a sudden feeling of remorse. I don't edit my blog/journal work. These are my thoughts as I felt them at the time. At the time, I was freaking out in what I thought was a big way. It turns out that I'm getting a lot better at enduring as I get older. I was feeling the emotionally bruising sense that I have no local family other than Melissa in a big way. I've cast my parents out of my life for what I intend to be the final time. They were very big about adults sleeping in the beds they made as I grew up. This was always right before they fixed the immediate problem and left me with a bigger but longer term one. As I liked to put it, I was Wile E. Coyote and they were the big boulder that landed on me after I fell off the cliff.
The cliffs have been getting higher as I have gotten older but I made one decision while shockingly young. So long as it was only my life that was affected, I would die before seeking their help. At first, it was an easy decision because they simply imposed their "help" on me and I took it with bad grace. It's a Thomas Covenant sort of compromise from the early books before he learned better. As I got older, my life has gotten more interconnected which is both the problem and its solution. The problem is easier to discuss before the solution. My life always involves others now so the dying to preserve my principles option is out. It's not a last resort somewhere in my bag of tricks but it is completely out. I will die someday and plan on kicking and screaming the entire way there. That's the only way I go.
The solution is that there are others connected with me. Problems are unique to the people facing them. Truth is that I've found most problems will unravel if I ask for a small favor from someone. Once you add in the possibility of several someones who may or may not even know of each other, there is a solution for most problems that will hardly inconvenience anyone. I can't tell you what it is only because it is unique to each problem. It's subtle, it takes very little effort and it's how all of my best work has been done. The hard part is building up a network over the course of a lifetime. They are slippery and like to fall apart if you don't manage them. The best ones are the ones you can manage by doing things you'd do anyway. Social media helps the way Christmas cards did for previous generations. Just a little touch to let you know I haven't forgotten you. It sounds cynical but it isn't because it's always something I was going to do anyway.
I will miss Melissa while she is away but she won't really even be gone. There are these odd inventions called cell phones that I resist because they are annoying but this is a useful time to have one. Melissa will not be out of touch and she has her own networks that might even surpass mine. I will probably catch up on some writing I've been meaning to do unless the pain is too much. I love saying that because writing projects breed like cuddly rats. Every time I'm working on one, I think of half a dozen others. I will never catch up unless I run out of inspiration. I'll probably spend a lot more time online with the tablet like I did when I was in pain in the hotel. There are a few people to whom I'd like to reach out (see above about networks) but I haven't made the time yet.
I will endure but I'm not one of those pansy statues or buildings that waste away after a few thousand years. I will endure smiling or snarling but never passive.
Now I can risk putting this out there for others to see.
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