Friday, April 26, 2013

He Stopped Loving Her Today



I've wept to this song so many times, one more time today for good ol' George who gave me my first sip of the intoxicating cocktail of old time country's pathos and cornpone that always makes my belly shake with laughing and sobbing in equal measure.

Oh, that tale of unrepentant endless love. Oh, that midpoint spoken soliliquy over the sweet coos of the background singers. And George's endless stare -- was it a result of all those bottles, all those pills, all those divorces, all those years missing Tammy?

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Spring Fever

That warmish, shivery, frenzied, discombobulated fever that the cruelest month gives you.

When you need to console yourself in the face of senatorial lunacy by believing that we will write AND PASS even better, stronger gun control legislation next time without the giant loophole of excluding background checks for sales to "friends."

When your neighbor's giant piles of black trashbags next to the curb remind you to peek down the basement stairs to see if water seeped in during the epic storm, then close the door slowly and back away.

When we feel celebratory over a bloody capture.

When taking solace in entertainment leaves you sitting on the couch mesmerized and terrified by the brutality of Top of the Lake, Jane Campion's spooky crime mini-series that is Twin Peaks meets Deliverance in breathtaking New Zealand.

When you get only a tiny laugh out of realizing Valley Girl, Say Anything and The Graduate are all the same movie. Boy meets Girl, Boy loses Girl, Boy goes to extremes to win back Girl, Boy and Girl sit side by side in the movie's final shot, lost in their own thoughts, traveling into an unsure future.