6/21/12

Something about 12-hour days ending with hot, sticky summer nights makes me want to hear this song over and over again.

The lush and steady rhythm guitar part reminds me of thick, heavy trees in the dark; that slide after the chorus reminds me of driving down the lake to that hard-to-find-in-the-night cabin; the words make me wish I was holding someone's hand who understood the meaning the same way I do.

We're all tired, worn, beat, afraid of one thing or another. It's not easy to "make it" these days, even in the eyes of yourself, much less the world. The former, to me, is the much  more important standard, when it comes to what matters.

But it's hard to walk by a row of mirrored windows without glancing at yourself at least once.

For whatever reason, I am beating myself up less tonight than normal, and failing to fight the tired. Instead, I listen, drink and dream. It's true, I am this sentimental. At the least, I've stopped apologizing for it. At the most, it's making all the difference.

If only it wasn't so often interpreted as weakness.

"Oh this earthquake is shaking our hands
Free at the wrists just as we started a dance
The hardest thing next to diamond rings
Is the coats we have to wear just to make ends meet
I got this year and fifty more to beat
It's enough to make you give up, she says
I know, I know, I know...so let go

As we sleep in this broken Cadillac
We watch the world leave

It doesn’t look back
I gotta say that, when my heart attacks
Don’t return it, it will fire right back
So let’s just lie here as they paint us black

The nervous ticks only the holy get
The country treats as the cities get sick
The lunatics and the Harlem tricks
The country treats as we all get sick…"
~American Low

Cassino, Sounds of Salvation