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The relief when you wake up from a bad dream and you realise it was a dream. It’s good if you get that relief even if the dream was real.
I’m on my way to be sitting in the afternoon sunshine with a salad pizza, a slow cold organic beer, and a whole bunch of laughs.
I hope your Sunday afternoon is just as good.
“I just saw that you posted your show. I hope you like this for my LiveJournal, I was AMAZED with your show on wednesday:
I am a believer.
I always write my little reviews of concerts I go to, but usually they’re for concerts of big signed acts. I was with some friends last night at the Dakota Lounge in Santa Monica to see a friend perform and hang out and have some drinks. We had a great time, and stuck around for a while longer just to catch up with friends I hadn’t seen in a while. About a half an hour after my friend was done performing Saint John and the Revelations took to the stage. I never knew and I never expected that I would see a show so good in my little local lounge. We all walked away talking about it. I’m sure if they keep it up they’ll go all the way.
At one point in the middle of a song St. John’s guitar broke and he just set it down and became a singing preacher there to deliver the gospel of rock and roll. The Revelations were all in white, except for St. John, who was humbly dressed. Somehow how I don’t think they’re really religious. He’s too sexy to be a Christian, and he’s too hot to be from anywhere but a wickedly good Hell. I think his girlfriend was there though. UGH!!!. His voice and songs and humor melted me. The band rocked. Nuff sed.
I came online and bought his music on iTunes and I am now wrapped in his music writing this. It makes me wish I had learned to play guitar and sing. Go see them live if you can, and let me know if you do, I’ll come with you:
http://myspace.com/saintjohnandtherevelations
I hope to see you live again very soon. Thanks for the music. Bye!”
I’ve been chatting online with a few folks about Khalil Gibran’s The Prophet, and a couple of them have asked me why it’s so good. So I have decided to post a quick excerpt of it. The book is about a wise man who is leaving his town that he has lived in for the past few years to move back to his homeland. The people of the town ask him for wisdom on a number of subjects before he leaves. Below is his response to somebody asking him about love:
And with a great voice he said:
When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind
lays waste the garden.
FOR even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you.
Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your tenderest branches
that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging
to the earth.
LIKE sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself.
He threshes you to make you naked.
He sifts you to free you from your husks.
He grinds you to whiteness.
He kneads you until you are pliant;
And then he assigns you to his sacred fire, that you may become
sacred bread for God’s sacred feast.
ALL these things shall love do unto you that you may know the secrets
of your heart, and in that knowledge become a fragment of Life’s heart.
BUT if in your fear you would seek only love’s peace and love’s pleasure,
Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness
and pass out of love’s threshing-floor,
Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all
of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears.
LOVE gives naught but itself and takes naught but from itself.
Love possesses not nor would it be possessed;
For love is sufficient unto love.
And think not you can direct the course of love, for love,
if it finds you worthy, directs your course.
LOVE has no other desire but to fulfill itself.
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day
of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love’s ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart
and a song of praise upon your lips.
It’s Sunday morning here in beautiful Venice Beach, California. After spending last night watching easy women rubbing themselves up against any guy that moved (and even some that didn’t) at one of my local pubs, I’m well-rested and turning the studio back on after a few days of rest. It’s a nice sunny morning, but there is music to be made and I have plans for the rest of the day, so it’s time to get to work.
Edit: I’m not condemning easy women. Half the losers in LA couldn’t get laid if it weren’t for easy women. It’s probably a good pairing.
Today I was reminded of peace, and hope, and bliss. When I was younger, I used to pick out a book from my mother’s bookshelf called The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran. The poetry and the beauty mesmerised me even when I was young. I would pick it up and read it every so often. I never really thought about how much it may have shaped my thinking, but today I was reminded that it must have. My mother called me a few months ago and we were talking about books and I asked her if she remembered that book, she did, and in fact it is still in her current collection. I asked her for it, but it actually has more of a family tie to my brother so I of course wouldn’t take it.
However today, on my birthday, and at the end of a week of focus of trying to understand ego and pride and loss and love and pain, that book arrived as a gift from my mother. My spirits were immediately lifted. I took the book right out into the sunshine and joyfully read it. Joyfully. It’s short, and beautiful, and reminded me of how I really am and what I really believe and it helped me forget a lot of torment and pain. Reading it elevated my spirit and freed my ego to forgive and allowed my pride to let go and allow me (at the risk of sounding too “sensitive”) to love. I wished I could share that same feeling with others, and one person in particular.
I have been reminded of how beautiful the world is, and have escaped a lot of my own ego and pride that trapped me and darkened my hope and happiness.
Fuck yeah. Happy fucking birthday.
Now I’m off to the pub.
