August 18th is a day

For the past four years, I have been using an App on my phone called Momento which bills itself as the "smart private journal for capturing your life story". It works like most social media apps (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc) however it is private. Consequently, it has the advantage of allowing the user to document anything without considering an audience -- other than one's future self.

A frequent criticism of social media is that users tend to create a "False Face" or "Ideal Self" as their online persona. I know this is true for me. My Twitter/Instagram feed is absolutely curated -- I tend only to show the best stuff going on around me. However, my Momento feed allows me to reflect on everything in my life -the banal, the somber, the pessimistic, the boastful, the tragic...the real.

The app also has a feature called "This Day" which highlights all the posts made on a calendar day. Now that I have been using it for several years, this is my favourite feature and I look forward to clicking my "This Day" button every morning over coffee. It is also interesting to see moments from your past strung together around the theme of a single calendar date. It's remarkable and often surprising how different Wednesday, June 10 in 2015 might be from Sunday, June 10 in 2018.

I have been fortunate, and most days I am delighted to see the pictures and text appear on my phone screen. Today was different.

Two years ago, on this date (August 18, 2016), I was standing on top of Mount Franny in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. A slightly challenging 2 kilometer trek puts the hiker at an elevation of 450 meters above sea level. Here, one is rewarded with a nearly 360 degree view of the Ingonish region of the Cabot Trail.  There is even a red, Muskoka/Adirondack chair intended to encourage a moment of mindful reflection.

It was about the time I snapped this picture of my wife that my phone rang. It was my good friend Bill and his typically buoyant voice sounded reserved and reed-thin. He let me know that our mutual friend Duncan had been diagnosed with an aggressive cancer. I paused and then immediately began to extol the achievements of the Canadian medical community. I recognize that this is my coping method -- I put faith into science and comfort myself with success stories I have experienced and the potential for healing that 21st Century medicine offers.

Last year, on this date (August 18, 2017), I was meeting my new fur-nephew at my cottage. An Irish Wolfhound with a wonderful disposition, he is a rescue dog from Texas who is featured in my avatar on multiple media platforms. He brought great joy to my sister one year after she said goodbye to "Merlot" a gentle and sweet dog who generously and effortlessly extolled warmth and elation to anyone he met.

Merlot in the Thames River, London, Ontario

This also marked the day I had returned to our cottage after spending time in London. I had gone to London to attend Duncan's celebration of life. An incredibly talented musician, composer and educator - he was well known and respected by many. The event was held in the outdoor music pavilion at Wonderland Gardens. His album of original jazz music Floating Point was played and his equally talented brother Cam, and Duncan's two daughters, performed. It was mournful -- but also beautifully uplifting.

Today, (August 18, 2018), I am drinking coffee and writing. I have yet to post a picture or text in my Momento App.  I suspect I will post a link to this blog. Tonight, my wife and I are going to meet good friends -- people who have chosen to travel to spend time with us. On Monday, we head for New York City -- to celebrate 32 years together and our 12th wedding anniversary (New York was the city in which we were married -- August 18, 2006).

We didn't go there for our 10th anniversary -- because of the exchange rate and the opportunity to go to Nova Scotia. I have been patiently waiting for the dollar to improve to make this trip more financially efficient. Secretly, my wife booked a flight, hotel and tickets to see Billy Joel at Madison Square Gardens. She surprised me on my birthday.

She was right.

She usually is.

Life is incredibly short and it can change quickly. Go out and make the most of every day -- including August 18th.

Influential Albums Day 5

Day 5

This is the fifth post in a series of ten documenting the albums I consider influential. My first post, found here, provides some insight into the rationale behind this journey. The first album I selected was the Soundtrack to "Oliver", which I discovered in 1973 at about age 8. My second choice can be found here and was The Cars Debut album. The third selection was "All the World's A Stage" from Canadian band Rush (found here). The fourth, Duran Duran's "Rio" is (here).

The story behind this album actually begins in the late 70’s when I was about 11 or 12 in the small, lakeside farming town of Kingsville, Ontario. I had made a friend with a guy named John who was a couple years older than I. He lived on a farm near Windsor, but often stayed at his grandparents’ place about a block from my home during the summer.

He was usually up to no good and I certainly made some dubious choices with him. One summer morning, he arrived at my house with $20 and suggested we walk into town to the pool hall - where we could play pinball, pool & video games, get ice cream and talk to girls. I was nowhere near the “talking to girls” stage of my life. Regardless, the other two options were entirely in my wheelhouse.

On the third day this happened, I asked him where he was getting the money.

“I stole it”, he said plaintively “my aunt is staying with my grandmother and she is rich - so she’ll never notice. I just take it out of her purse, she has lots.”

At this point in the story, I would like to say that I took a firm stand and refused to condone this nefarious act; but, video games and ice cream do something to the 12-year-old brain -- it’s like hypnosis.

By day 4, the jig was up. To his credit, he didn’t tell on me. His grandparents really liked me and I think he wanted to keep that relationship honest. Regardless of the reason, he took the fall and had to stay at home and do chores in order to begin his reparations. I volunteered to help him (once again, not out of honour or duty...but because I was bored and there was no one else to hang with).

That evening, we got permission to walk around the block. John wanted to go to this house where “The Bikers Lived”. In retrospect, it was a couple guys with long hair, handlebar moustaches and motorcycles. However, in my adolescent mind, they were Hard-Core Outlaws. I was always extra-intimidated when they weren’t outside because John always insisted on knocking on their door - which was exactly what he did on this hot summer evening.

They invited us in and John immediately began talking about motorcycles with them. Their living room looked exactly as you'd imagine if I said the words 

“Late 70’s, twenty-something, bachelor pad.” 

It was beanbags, bead curtains, shag carpet, empty beer cans and posters on the wall - mainly women in bikinis straddling Harley Davidson bikes and (likely) the ubiquitous Robert Crumb "Keep On Truckin" poster that adorned many walls of my youth.

However, there was one that I had never seen before - it had a shiny black background and a single shaft of white light thrust from the darkness on the left. It traveled upward and pierced a white triangle. The light disappeared, but re-emerged on the right of the triangle in fan of spectral colours. It was, of course, the album art for Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon.” I knew this at the time, because that was also printed on the poster in glossy, bold lettering.

For the next few years, I would identify Pink Floyd as being: “Music that biker’s liked”, and I would give it a wide berth. I was content with my Supertramp, ELO, Rush and Cars records, thank you very much.

It was a few years later. I was in my room doing homework and listening to late night rock radio.

At first, there was silence, like dead air… and then I heard something primitive, but absolutely beautiful in its simplicity begin to radiate from my tiny transistor speaker. Almost imperceptible at first, a rich synthetic, but also orchestral, hum grew slowly - like electronic vines creeping through my synapses. It was simple, but also seemed to be complexly layered - with the sound of fragile chimes whispering like dusty windswept glass in the distance...there, then gone.

The first time you truly “hear” a song, time seems to move more slowly. This was one of those times. It was like floating comfortably through a warm pool toward a distant, pleasant light. I stopped everything and was entranced.

The notes would modulate ever so subtly, but always find their way to a perfect, albeit temporary, resolution...and then a guitar, playing a simple series of four notes that seemed to ring out and fade at the same time. I don't think I did anything but breathe for the next 15 minutes.

It was the opening to “Shine on You Crazy Diamond” from “Wish You Were Here” by, that "famous biker band", Pink Floyd. My world was shaken and I was forever changed by this album (as well as everything else by The Floyd). I wore out at least two cassettes of this on countless bus trips around the city in my early teens. I have purchased it on vinyl and CD and I have been fortunate enough to see both Roger Waters & David Gilmore in concert on a number of occasions. Sadly, the line-up that recorded this record disbanded in the early 80’s and I did not seem them all play together. Pink Floyd have a stellar catalogue - but this was, for me, the high water mark.

So, thanks John. Despite your troubled ways -- which eventually forced us to part company permanently, you were a pivotal part of my youth and an important part of my taste in music. And, thank you anonymous biker guys (who are probably pot-bellied grandfathers in their mid-sixties now). Thank you for introducing me to Pink Floyd.

Influential Albums Day 4

Day 4

This is the fourth post in a series of ten documenting the albums I consider influential. My first post, found here, provides some insight into the rationale behind this journey. The first album I selected was the Soundtrack to "Oliver", which I discovered in 1973 at about age 8. My second choice can be found here and was The Cars Debut album. The third selection was "All the World's A Stage" from Canadian band Rush (found here). I am moving chronologically and this post lands us in the first few years of my most formative decade - The 80's - in which was I was 14-25 years old.

Duran Duran exploded on the scene in early 1983. Their video for “Hungry Like the Wolf” was in constant rotation on every network that showed videos. The band was composed of singers who weren’t handsome - they were "pretty". Resplendent in pastel-coloured, linen suits while sporting make-up and impossible hairstyles - teased and "Ice-Misted" into ridiculous coifs. We were immediately critical - however, we would soon begin emulating these fashionable Brits - desperately hoping to garner some of the same attention and affection that high-school girls were heaping upon them. 

My group of friends and I were confirmed rockers - Rush, Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Judas Priest … pretty much anything that wasn’t the British New Romantic. Duran Duran was a band for girls … or guys whom we stereotyped in a way that I am ashamed to recall.

However, I ended up getting a copy on cassette. A group of teenage ne’er-do-wells had a small industry set-up in the smoking-pit (Yes, those existed in 80's high school) where they would sell cassettes pilfered from the record store (Mister Sound). It wasn’t a sustainable business model, and they would eventually be banned from the mall. However, while it was up and running, I was a regular client. I had a job and a little extra scratch for music purchases. I also had a Walkman...actually, a Sanyo Personal Music Player. So a constant stream of music at all hours (except in class and when I slept) was a vital part of my life.

One day, they were selling 4 cassettes, for a bargain, and Duran Duran's "Rio" was in the mix. I think I probably justified it as a potential gift for a girl...or maybe my sister. However, I gave it a listen.

The opening track hooked me right away. It began with this odd cacophony of sound before exploding with a crunchy, rock-inspired guitar laid over this hypnotic keyboard arpeggio...and then there was this great sax solo in the middle. I was immediately hooked and the cassette remained in my player for weeks.

Needless to say, I kept this information to myself - revealing it to a few close friends and never suggesting that it be played at a basement party. There was this part of my teenage brain that was convinced that this album was important. The writing was fantastic and I think it transcended the dance/boy band category to which I had mistakenly pigeon-holed it.

A quick check on Wikipedia validates me.

• In 2000, Rio was ranked #98 in Q magazine's "100 Greatest British Albums". 
• In 2003, it was listed at #65 in the NME "100 Greatest Albums of All Time". 
• In 2004, CMJ ranked it as #1 in their "Top 20 Most-Played Albums of 1982". 
• In 2008 it was ranked 24th best British album of all time and is included in the list 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. 
• In April 2013 Rio was voted number 3 in BBC Radio 2's Top 100 Favourite Albums of all time.

Hey 17 year old me!… high five … nice call!