Chicago

Chicago by Sufjan Stevens



2005--24th Birthday
I had been in D.C. for about three weeks, didn't have a job, and I bought an open ended train ticket from D.C. to New Haven. I wasn't in a rush to get back to D.C. from New Haven. In fact, I would end up spending five or six amazing days in and around the town. The weather was perfect, the vibe I got from New Haven was wonderful, and things were going very well with the Lou.

But I was also a lost soul at that point. I was naive and innocent. My life was, well, headed in a downward spiral. I didn't totally know this, I was over confident and life was about to blindside me, but I felt as if I close to really getting everything in place.

The reality was that New Haven was an escape for me. It was somewhere that I didn't have to face the reality of day to day life. Things with the Lou were, good, but they weren't great. I didn't realize any of this at that time. It would only come into focus over the next few months and then upon reflection years since I left D.C.

I was to leave New Haven on the 7th, my birthday. But the night before, The Lou took me to a pizza place. We would sit in this joint, Modern APizza, eating a pizza and sharing a pitcher of beer. A few months later, after the Lou and I broke up, I would write this:
"I am, after all, forever indebted to you since you have saved me on my birthday. Call it luck or something else that I can't think of at the moment, the point is, I shall never forget. Even though that night of pizza and a pitcher of beer wasn't on September 7th, it was close enough for me to remember probably until I pass on. It was a darn near perfect night for me less than a month into my move to DC where I was alone, lost, and lacking love. It was a very nice night, I think we can both agree to that."

I spent my 24th birthday, well at least six hours of it, on a train. I'd get home to my apartment and tell my roommate that it was my birthday, he would then tell me that I should have said something and he would have gone out and gotten a drink. I told him it was okay. There were presents some where mixed in and I would then go to bed, thinking about the previous night—the worst was to come.

All I Want Is You

All I Want Is You by Barry Louis Polisar



The scary thing about art are those times when you're looking for it to answer current life situations. When life is good or status quo this isn't much of a problem. You watch the movie, take in the song, read the book without much thought about how life is or isn't like whatever it is your consuming. When things are good, you can enjoy the art for what it is. This is why art imitates life.

But when things are bad, well... life starts to imitate art. Art becomes another answer or insight to one's current position. Underachieving? Flip on "Good Will Hunting" and suddenly you ARE Will Hunting. You identify with everything Will is going though, sure he's a math wiz, but that's not the point when you're underachieving. Only Will Hunting knows how you feel. When you snap out of whatever funk you're in, you realize that this is outrageous—you aren't Will Hunting because Will Hunting only exists in a movie.

Right now I'm in one of those, life imitates art stages. When I saw "Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind" I tried to find meaning in my own breakup with The Girl—why couldn't we be Joel and Clementine? (well maybe not those two, but the true loves who couldn't run from love and fate). And then I saw Juno last night... and well I couldn't help but think of about a few people.

Juno WAS The Lou.

The world sees The Girl as Vanessa, which is unfair and made me sad. I know better than that, I know about her complexities, passions, and how she's oh so much more interesting and real...

I could and may very well probably become Mark.

I even saw the Girl and my relationship in Mark and Vanessa. Mark gave up so much for her, everything really, and he discovered that he didn't like it. Mark's immaturity lead him to the alter with Vanessa (irony!). Personally, the Girl and I didn't break up for the same reason, I hadn't compromised everything, in fact I wouldn't allow her to censor me. And that's why we broke up (of course it's much more complicated, but you catch my drift). As much as it sucked then and now maybe it means I won't become Mark...

Anyway, as the post-breakup shit unfold it eventually led the Girl to tell me something that no one had ever told me: "I'm not the right woman for you, Bobby."

And now when I think about what The Girl said, Mac's words to his daughter seemingly are coming out of the Girl's mouth at that moment. The Girl had seen Juno about a week or two before.

Life imitates art.

She Moves in Secret Ways

She Moves in Secrete Ways by Polly Paulusma



I'm not sure where I found this song or even when I first heard it, but some how I ended up with this song on iTunes in the last few years. Now that I think about it, my best guess is that The Lou gave it to me on some mix CD three years ago...

Anyway, I have no clue who Polly Paulusma is or any of her other works, but she gets it done here. The song meanders and appears to be in no rush to get anywhere, just like a walk between two people who have known each other for a few weeks and are thinking about maybe, just maybe sticking around. Polly's pretty voice takes us though the lyrics, peaking whenever she sings "she moves in secret ways".

The romantic/pop culture fool in me pictures this song being played during some scene in a movie - a kiss and she walks away, just a few feet in front of the guy as he smiles sheepishly at first, but then grinning like luckiest man on Earth. You know, one of those moments that we all dream of and wish that could happen to us... and if they do it's always in a memory, often bittersweet, thinking back at a time when something similar to this happened...

Random thought: I sort of wish I could hear Jeff Buckley do this song.

11:11

11:11 by Andrew Bird

This song will forever be tied to the Lou, for better or for worse. It's a long story, but I can shorten it for the blog. I was dating the Lou and really liked her. She moved off to New Haven and I moved back to DC. So we were doing the long distance thing for a few months, she came down to visit me, I went up to visit her and so on. At the time I had very little going for me at the time - for two months I was unemployed. I was unsure about everything in life. I was scared to do much of anything. I had little clue of what I really wanted to do. In a way, the Lou was all I had. And she made me happy. I enjoyed visiting her and I fell for New Haven in the process and planned on going back up there in October over Columbus Day. In my mind, everything was fine and dandy. In reality, things were not. And the moment I got off the train on that fine Friday afternoon in New Haven, I knew something was up. We had an awkward lunch. We went back to her place. She broke up with me*. I was now faced with a problem... do I stay or do I go? We had planned on going up to Boston to see a BC football game. I couldn't go anywhere that night since it was going to be tough to get a train back to DC (plus I was going to try and give it once last shot, what the hell right?). So the Lou says, yeah stick around for the weekend. I say fine. On Saturday, we get up and since it's raining like the end of the world, we end up going to her home parents house in Farmington, CT. We spent that Saturday doing pretty much everything broken up couples do not do, in other words acting like a couple. This was probably not a good idea in the long run, but that's life. Sunday, we go back to New Haven, and Monday is my train back to DC. But in the process of all this driving, we listened to Andrew Bird a good five or six times. I am really enjoying him and 11:11 especially. So right before I leave for DC, the Lou gives me a CD of Andrew Bird's Swimming Hour. Of course, 11:11 became the song of that late fall of 2005. I listened to it all the time while I sat around doing nothing but watching Gilmore Girls reruns. I got a temp job, and eventually I would listen to it walking to and from the King Street Metro... singing along as I danced (figuratively) down Cameroon Ave. Wow... okay, there's also memories of sitting a top the hill that surrounds New Haven, looking out upon the town, and thoughts of Gilmore Girls, and milk... I love this song, even if the memory is pretty bittersweet (as far as the Lou... we pretty much never talked again after that weekend and needless to say it took me a few months to get over her; what a weird break up, oh well).

Listen:

Listen whole song now!
Andrew Bird "The Swimming Hour"— 11-11

*[NOTE: The White Sox were also playing the Red Sox as this was happening, but I won't get into that].

Suspicious Minds

Suspicious Minds by Elvis

I threw this on a mix for a now ex-girlfriend because I was on an Elvis kick. There we were driving from New Haven to Hartford on a fall afternoon enjoying Elvis in all his fantastic over the top Elvis glory yet still being able to pull it off (note: only Elvis and U2 have really been able to pull this off, this 'larger than life, this is absolutely ridiculously, but since it's Elvis/U2 this is still awesome' type music). But you know how the song fades out as if Elvis is leaving and you think that the song is ending... but then it comes back? Well I scared the absolute shit out of the then girlfriend by singing "Caught in a trap/I can't walk out/Because I love you too much baby" very loudly. We didn't almost get in a accident, but I scared the shit out of her. And other than some parachuting Elvis playing this song during Elvis Night at Comiskey, I really have nothing else to add about Elvis or this song.

We Can't Go On Together...