To thine own self be true

“I’ll be a long time sleepin’ when I’m gone.”

Typical of how my life goes these daze: I’m in the van listening to an old CD of Bob (when he was influenced by Dylan) Darin (one which nobody in the world would be listening to today or even familiar with), thinking how true the above line is. Get home, write it on the blog, decide to look up Darin online, says he died today/Dec. 20, 42 years ago. I guess he influenced me back then, too. I wanted to change my name to something ‘cooler’ when I was 15, like “Darrin”. I was 18 when my folk trio (bass and electric guitar) played his hip social protest song “Long Line Rider” at the Winnipeg YMHA.

a couple of dopes with a 13-year-old holding up two 24-7 convenience stores in the frozen North and killing two immigrants who escaped the hardships of their own countries to make a happy new life in Canada working for minimum wages at night in a greedy-for-profit Mac’s.

“Man’s inhumanity to man makes countless [millions] mourn!” –modified Burns

The Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky. A nice complete version with Sleeping Beauty highlights available on Philips 2 CDs. Enjoy joy to satisfy the heart and soul of any Inner Child.

(highly recommended video and series; available from Acorn Media and WLIW New York)

Always at this time of year, at the most frigid of times, I resort to imagination and healthful viewing to warm the cockles of mind, heart and soul. It is as simple as putting on my Visions of Italy, Sicily, and Greece DVDs. And there it all is–all that any frozen human could ever want–the regions of the beginnings of Western civilization in their warm sunny splendor gloriously from the air! The quaint red-roofed towns, the grey rocky coasts that spill into the sea, the warm sun-baked lands with vineyards, the deserted but often intact ruins and castles and churches, the green trees springing up from the sun-baked streets, the dark blue or green waters and the pale or brilliant blue skies.

The longer I live, the more I’m convinced that the main essence/raison d’etre remains consciousness, (especially that fostered and developed by imagination), the raising of spirits as simple as some will, some consciousness of what is most needed, and then the application of whatever resources. If this means spending $$$ for whatever, it hardly/never matters to me. One must finally minister to one’s self and be responsible for whatever attitudes, soul-moods, and freedom one wishes to have. Will logically follows (‘A man can do all things if he will.”–Alberti), then the availability and application of whatever resources, taking/making the time for such, and exercising those soul-nurturing choices.

-30 windchill Edmonton no longer exists for me as I now go outdoors today. Only Sicily–the inner warmth of that state of soul, that so-civilized climate, that sunny warm disposition and sensibility. It all begins with imagination and the conscious individual.

(previously published in Dec., 2013)

Gridlock. Madness.

“Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.”
–Dante, The Inferno, The Divine Comedy

(two-thumbs-way-up; Christmas listening nostalgia; Universal Music/MCA CD)

Every year at this time I break out my favorite Christmas CD–the diamond anniversary edition of Holiday Inn and White Christmas with songs by the great Irving Berlin. Warm memories of watching those movies annually with my parents on the old black and white through the ’50s and ’60s, remembering their enthusiasm for the vision of life and Christmas presented by those two classics. The big band sounds of another era–the ’40s and ’50s–and the best and happiest of what they remembered of their times–all come back with each song.

Listening to the CD, I remember my Dad singing along with Bing Crosby, the feeling I had while watching each song or dance number. Exquisite and exceedingly sweet or precious–all of it. It all comes back–those times, those memories, those deep connections, the feelings of those times–the ’40s and ”50s, magically communicated 71 years later (Holiday Inn, 1942) and 59 years later (White Christmas, 1954), the memories of war camaraderie in the latter movie, and the sorts of extremes one would go to, to honour those who had once been part of one’s (war) life. So special, remarkable, and now-thoroughly, but charmingly, passé.

I appreciate the places and memories I return to each year thanks to the following songs:
Happy Holiday
White Christmas
I’ll Capture Your Heart
You’re Easy to Dance With
Lazy
Abraham
Be Careful It’s My Heart
I Can’t Tell a Lie
Easter Parade
Song of Freedom
I’ve Got Plenty to Be Thankful For
Let’s Start the New Year Right
Snow
Count Your Blessings Instead of Sheep
What Can You Do with a General?
The Old Man/Gee I Wish I Was Back in the Army

Once one gets past the tragic darkness in/of It’s a Wonderful Life and A Christmas Carol, there are these two wonderful movie takes on Christmas, and if one ever needs more of a lift, one needs look no further than an old New Year’s tv favorite–the effervescent Singin’ in the Rain with the ever-sunniful Gene Kelly.

Romance, comedy, history, and making-your-own-fun-and dreams-come-true. All such large and wonderful seasonal worlds that lift any sagging year-end spirits–movies and music that have delightfully transcended time and our oh-so-limited/limiting, diminishing modern era.

(1st published here Dec. 2013

No contest. Walkers! Made since 1898 A.D.
Nothing like opening a large tin of “Our Premium Selection” Pure Butter Shortbread to enjoy with one’s afternoon holiday tea and into January.

6 Degrees of Separation–my daughter works at a desk adjacent to that of Fiona, baker-founder Joseph Walker’s great-great granddaughter.

(1st posted Dec. 2013)

A found picture and an unsent note from Dean McKenzie, The Legend, dated 1992.

Spiritus (a unique Edmonton performance poetry trio of senior high English teachers): Dean on right, Glen Kirkland in the middle, and me on the left).

Note: “Hail Spiritus! Its genesis takes on even more mythic qualities as our hejira toward truth and beauty continues.” Spiritus had a fabulous, wonderful run over two decades. And I have no doubt that Glen’s and Dean’s hejiras toward truth and beauty continue elsewhere as much as mine does here, likewise.

Very special thanks to Elana Hope Aaserud for finding and sharing this special moment of being–Dean’s gift of self beyond time. Trust Dean-o to speak to her, me, and us from another, transcendent, spiritual dimension. Remarkably, Daddio is still happy, intact and with us this Christmas–giving of himself as always.

(1st posted in Dec. 2013)

lead lives of quiet desperation.” One of Thoreau’s best quotes. And he was no more right about that than during the holiday season as Christmas gets closer. The movies, It’s a Wonderful Life and A Christmas Carol, reflect the fact of that desperation. You can see and feel out there if you’re out driving or Christmas shopping today. People frantic with anxiety-ridden rolodexes inside them, restless and half-crazy.