Word Salad

Sitting here in Peg's chair on the patio listening to the bay lap against the riprap. A little breeze blows steady out of the south, with buildups out there to the southwest offshore.

I'm trying to recover from the morning run through the Cove, not so much from the heat as the oppressive humidity. After an exchange of texts with photos between me and Peg yesterday afternoon, I absolutely can't complain about the Florida heat.

This image came from the dashboard of her car, somewhere between Elmira and Corning on her way home from work.

Here's mine at the same time, at the corner of Jenks and 19th in Panama City.

In fairness, we had torrential downpours in patches all around that part of town. But still.

This morning during my trudge down Bunker's Cove Drive, Spotify dialed up an old Yes song I hadn't heard in years, Total Mass Retain.

Yes was one of my favorite bands from about the eighth through the tenth grade; in fact, one of my last acts as a rising junior before being banned from Plano, Texas was attending a Yes concert in the round at the Reunion Arena in Dallas.

Among folks who are familiar with their music, it's hard to find someone who doesn't either love or loathe them. They were pioneers of the progressive rock movement of the late 1960s, blending rock, jazz, and classical influences in pieces that might last most of an album side. None of it was really toe-tapping stuff--the rhythms were complicated, the arrangements often a little jerky to an ear raised on groups like the Beatles.

And the lyrics were sort of what the hell.

Take this morning's offering, Total Mass Retain, for a taste of how most of these songs flowed:

Down at the end, round by the corner

Close to the edge, just by the river

Seasons will pass you by

I get up, I get down

Now that it's all over and done

Now that you find, now that you're whole

My eyes convinced, eclipsed with the younger moon attained with love

It changed as almost strained amidst clear manna from above

I crucified my hate and held the word within my hand

There's you, the time, the logic, or the reasons we don't understand

Sad courage claimed the victims standing still for all to see

As armoured movers took approached to overlook the sea

There since the cord, the license, or the reasons we understood will be

Down at the edge, close by a river

Close to the edge, round by the corner

Close to the end, down by the corner

Down at the edge, round by the river

Sudden problems shouldn't take away the startled memory

All in all, the journey takes you all the way

As apart from any reality that you've ever seen and known

Guessing problems only to deceive the mention

Passing paths that climb halfway into the void

As we cross from side to side, we hear the total mass retain

Down at the edge, round by the corner

Close to the end, down by a river

Seasons will pass you by

I get up, I get down

Go ahead. Tell me what that song was about. I'll wait.

I'm pretty sure LSD played a role in all that.

And yet, it sort of worked. The thing about the lyrics is, in my untrained opinion, that they weren't trying to paint a picture, or convey feelings through some blunt expression of love or lust. The words create a feel, an image without an image. You see something, but it's indirect and abstract. The whole thing has sort of a Zen feel.

The lyrics also perfectly slid into the music that carried them along. Here's the same song on YouTube, for the curious with excess free time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGEztInKTAA

Thinking about the jumble of words brought my mind back to the Orange Messiah, who's drawn the attention of folks lately who wonder if his dementia has finally slipped free of whatever control his handlers ever had over him. Take this gem from a couple days ago:

“But when I look at Chicago and I look at LA, if we didn’t go to LA three months ago, LA would be burning like the part that didn’t burn. If you would’ve allowed the water to come down, which I told them about in my first term, I said, ‘You’re going to have problems, let it come down’. We actually sent in our military to have the water come down into LA. They still didn’t want it to come down after the fires. But that was it, we have it coming down. But hopefully LA is watching. That mayor also, the city is burning, they lost like 25,000 homes. I went there the day after the fire, you were there, and I saw people standing in front of a burned-down home. Their homes were incinerated, they weren’t like, even the steel, literally it was all warped, literally disintegrated because of the winds and the flames like a blow torch. They were standing on this beautiful day, maybe a couple of days after, we gave it a little time because of what they had suffered. Almost 25,000 homes. And you see what’s happening now, they didn’t give their permits. I went to a town hall meeting I said we’re going to get you the federal permit, which are much harder.”

How did this man get elected? And there's no challenging music one can set to this word salad to redeem it.

I think it's actually cooling off a little as this line of showers inches toward shore. I have a pile of work here in the next little bit, then mediating as the mediator in my new-ish office over on 5th. I have to say that, besides the overwhelming workload this week, things here wouldn't be so bad if Peg were here to share it. But's she's not. So they are.

Selah.