Folks get 'round in the sunshine

Everybody does, even when it only goes up as high as your eyes like it does here in November.

Waiting out the winter was a little too much for him

Brrr. What is this?

Well, we will just have to deal with winter in November. And dream of sunlight in May.

But the sun is still in the sky and shining above you

Nope, didn't learn about this from Three Billboards, but rather from my Grandad's copy of Voulez-Vous that he gave to me probably not long after it came out. Maybe he didn't care for it, maybe he expected it to line up more with the less disco-y Arrival. What I do know for sure is that I was, even at 10 or 11, pretty floored that he even bought himself an ABBA album.

Strength and solidarity. Or a message you can send to/hear from yourself.

Doesn't seem like reality but it's here right in front of me

A recent good find, thanks to friendly and beneficent--and, ultimately, human-originated--web algorithms.



Also, some sun would be nice right about now.

Low sun.

Been thinking about this one quite often over the last week, on the sunny days. It shines, and it's even warm in the rays, but its path is low, almost like the sun is a marble rolling around the side of a bowl, instead of arcing high (I didn't study physics in school).



The light, though, is still golden, and lovely, even if it's shining across, not down.

You are the light.

I've become sort of obsessed with this 1977 live/studio hybrid album from Santana, Moonflower. It's a cornucopia of what made pre-"Smooth" Santana great, including his cover of the Zombies' "She's Not There," a live version of "Black Magic Woman," and a veritable shit-ton of timbales. And Carlos' outsized solos grinding to almost-ear-splitting peaks.

This track brought me to the album -- well, good ol' Internet radio did, actually, as usual.



This one--the whole album, really--fit with the lower-angled, late summer light of the afternoon. I washed a formidable stack of dishes, swept and mopped, too, probably, while listening to this album, windows wide open. The house smells a certain way when it's a certain temperature, and feels a certain way when the sun is where it is. The homeness of home is verdant in those moments.

I catalogued this with the lifetime of other of sublime late afternoon sun-angle smells and feelings I've collected.

With a thousand smiles she gives to me free

This was the first music I heard today, so it struck me full-force how much I love it. Even when sitting in that legs-dangling middle seat at the back of the bus.

In fact, it's even better from there, because you can see the steam rising from all the tall peaks of your city, and the sun filtering through that, and geese arcing through both that steam and sunshine, and the river winks a thousand times at you, there in your seat, legs dangling, on the 72 bus.




And, for the record, I will never, ever care that Sting is not what he once was. Or is allegedly not what he once was. I have seem him perform three times in two different decades, and the man will music your face off. I don't care that his recent and current output is primarily heard in TJ Maxx and that he seems to perform only in Italian castles or has been adopted by PBS pledge drives as pledge-driving programming.

And I have to add this album to my still-as-yet-unplayed-but-growing vinyl collection.

I was thinking that the gypsy wasn't lyin'

Good god.

Why in the world are we here?

"Every year, let’s make December 8th the day to ask for forgiveness from those who suffered the insufferable. Let’s wish strongly that one day we will be able to say that we healed ourselves, and by healing ourselves, we healed the world."

It's Up to You. Yeah, You.