Tad's Acoustic Series Part Two - Out of My Mind

If there's one thing I've learned, it's that I'm definitely out of my mind (I've also learned that I judgmentally snicker when people misspell definitely as defiantly...but that's another story).  In fact, if you dig back into those parenthesis I may in all actuality be defiantly out of my mind as well, but I'm not sure any of that has to do with anything...which is sort of my life's view at this moment.  Now, for the lyrics:

I feel your heart beat next to mine

And I listen as it dances right in time

To the music in my head

Good God I think I'm fallen

I whisper something to you so sincere

In an instant all the clouds have turned to clear

And I know I’m not okay

Good Lord now I know I’ve fallen

Out of my mind and out of my head

My spectrum’s been shifted to green from red

And the color of your eyes leave nothing unsaid

And I know, I’m as good as dead

I watched the sunset yesterday

And I smiled as the rays blurred to a haze

And I thought ain't it beautiful

Good lord could I think I've fallen

My heart nearly stopped as you walked away

Then stopped for good when back you came

Now I know my mind has changed

Good god I know I’ve fallen

Looks like I’m fallen in love

I'm pretty sure this was written on my bedroom floor (as most of these songs were)...and I'm also fairly certain it's not about anyone in particular.  In fact, I think it was written at a time in my life where being "fallen" in love was just a hope...coming off another 2+ year "failed" relationship and feeling as I often did in those days as there was no one out there that would want me (boo-hoo I know...leave me alone, I was, and perhaps still am, a bit of a romantic pessimist).  

Lastly, this song came from a time when the "band" (my buddies Carl & Luke at the time) were starting to play open mics on a weekly basis and we felt (probably I felt most strongly) that we had to have a new song each week.  I taught them the chords and structure in the parking lot about 30 minutes before we went up...it was just how we did things.  Looking back on those times...knowing that I wanted a new song each week and was able to keep up w/ that "demand" for quite some time astounds me.  As I may have mentioned before, I have not written a meaningful full song in some time...if I had to put a number on it, my best guess would be at least eight years...so these songs defiantly came at the height of my creativity (FYI - the defiantly was on purpose).

Thanks all for checking it out, liking (hopefully), and commenting if you like.  This sort of exercise really gets me fired up...and I'm excited to find the time to record the rest and give insights as I can...as well as dig up old memories that keep the fire going (and may even stoke it to some degree).  A dear friend of mine recently asked me to write a song about where I'm at right now in life, w/ all the stresses, joys, and pains of Happily Ever After...well, she knows who she is...and my goal is to have that done by the time I get around to finishing this for her (and for me).

Thanks and love to y'all (I have a best friend and best friend-in-law in TX so I can use y'all w/ no hesitance).

Tad

Tad's Acoustic Series Part One - I Came to Play

So here we go...part one in a (insert number here) part series of songs I wrote many, many years ago and have recently decided to record one last time...just to share before I decide to give up the whole music thing all together.  

First of all, musically at least, this is probably my favorite of any song I've ever written (which is sort of like Nascar beginning their season w/ the biggest race of all).  I like the funky/fun vibe mixed w/ the usual depressing lyrics (my trade mark).  If memory serves, I wrote this in about an hour, sitting in my bedroom in my parents house.  Speaking of said lyrics, I suppose I should share them before we go any further:

I wanna feel this way forever how ‘bout you, you ready for something new?

I don’t expect things to get colder how ‘bout you, you ready to freeze right through?

You’ve got your reasons and I’ve got mine

And you won’t believe them but I don’t mind

Because I’ve felt this way forever it’s nothing new, are you ready to be abused?

   

Someone once told me things will always work for good if I only wait

I tried to believe them as I counted down the days and days and days…

Am I counting the right way?

What’s that look I don’t believe it, what’s it say, are things ready to go my way

I know I used to take for granted everything, just wish something would stay the same

You never were in it could things be worse

The way that you spin it I’m just not sure

Because I’ve felt this way forever, I came to play, and I wish you’d go away

Got time for a quick story how ‘bout something true

You may have jumped before me but I was ready before you

Don’t spout no explanation I’m careless either way

The day I lost you forever was the day my world was gained

This was one of my first lessons in the way that my songs could affect the ones who it was written about.  I flat out got called out on this one.  To me, it was a playful expression of my feelings, to her it was an indictment...and I've never forgotten that feeling of knowing how my "art" hurt someone's feelings.  In fact, it probably affected every song I wrote after it...in all actually it was the last truly "good" song I wrote...I put "good" in quotation marks b/c it's entirely subjective...but just my opinion.  

Song writing is a difficult animal...at least for me.  I have yet to learn how to write from a 3rd party observer perspective...everything I've ever written has been extremely personal...and maybe that's why it's been relatively good...not sure.  I'll be honest, I haven't written a decent song since I've been married w/ kids...b/c expressing your true feelings in such a vulnerable situation as that just seems to risky.  I love my wife, I love my kids...but to dive deep into the inner recesses of my dark soul honestly just seems like it leaves too much room for hurt for those I love.  Anyway, this is the first installment.  I can't promise any regular schedule or anything b/c that's just not how things work nowadays...but I am excited to record my "hits" and share them w/ you...and tell you a bit about what each of them mean, or at least meant to me at the time.  Please share, please enjoy...and please tell me what you think.

Love you all,

Tad

If you have any issues linking to the video, please visit my Facebook page, or let me know...I'll work out any kinks moving forward.

About: Sleep (or at least that's what they used to call it back in the day)

I wear many hats…I know we all do (but I’m talking literally…my bald head will lobsterize in a matter of moments if I don’t).  Full time husband, full time father, full time son, and full time night watchman.  Now, I don’t mean that I stand guard outside of the local Target in the middle of the night keeping thugs at bay with my flashlight (although there is a bit of romance in that thought for some reason)…I mean I am the keeper of the creatures of the night.  This takes many forms.  But lately, my night-time duties have included roaming the streets on foot pushing  a stroller, and driving aimlessly around the Temecula countryside (sidenote:  both of these activities include the addition of a small human…interesting enough, if there were no small human involved, one might pinpoint this as unsettling behavior…the line between father and social miscreant is more thin than I thought!). 

My daughter and I are locked in a battle of wills that has been going on since May 6^th, 2009 (or at least shortly thereafter).  We have opposing viewpoints on activities post 9pm.  My plans call for quiet, peace, relaxation, a little television perhaps…did I mention quiet?  Her plans call for more Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, more toys, more not being asleep in general.  As you can see, this can bring about conflict in a relationship when two people that are so different are trying to find common ground.  As I lie here in thought I can only imagine that Gorbachev would not close his eyes and lie down, and all Reagan wanted was to find out who killed J.R. (my time-line may be a bit off, but the point was made I believe). 

There have been many lessons on this journey along the way.  First and foremost…you can be guaranteed once you find a routine that works for you 100% of the time you’re about to discover that 100% does not exist in the two year old lexicon.  We’ve gone for weeks, even months with no incidents whatsoever and calm waters each evening…and then all of a sudden an iceberg pops out of nowhere and sinks the unsinkable ship!  WHY?!  WHHHHHHHHHHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  We had an agreement Emily!  You’ve been sleeping good, and going down with no problems for months…WHAT IS DIFFERENT ABOUT TONIGHT!!!!????  (note to child protective services, the use of capital letters is the extent of my abuse towards my children…and for the time being, they are unable to read, so we’re good). 

I’ve read to the child…I’ve lied down next to the child for hours…I’ve brought her back downstairs to watch another episode of Mickey…I’ve even tried slipping her a Mickey (the stuffed version c.p.s…please get off my back).    Nada…zippo…zilch…bubkis…screaming…wailing…vomiting…sobbing (and that’s just me).   We’re in that lovely stage where nothing seems to work all the time…and the closest thing we can find is movement.

So now…if it’s late, and you’re trying to track me down…start by searching the Temecula Valley.  You’ll see me pushing a stroller up and down the dark streets of my neighborhood…peering in windows as happy parents gather around their flat-screens for some adult time while their children are nestled all snug in their beds…mocking me in their contentment.  Or better yet switch your gaze to the I-15 as I drive up and down, back and forth, just waiting for those precious eyelids in the backseat to close ever so gently, hoping that I can quickly return to base, gently unlatch the car seat, and scamper upstairs without disturbing the golden slumber. 

This whole thing is hard.  I think in many ways it’s harder than I thought it would be.  But it’s also that much easier when you care that much about the cargo you’re hauling around.  As tired as I am, and as frustrated as I get…come find me in 10 years.  I’ll still be roaming the Temecula Valley on foot or by car on a nightly basis…just wishing the precious cargo from years before still needed hauling around in the middle of the night.

Frustration lasts but mere moments when it rears its ugly head…so own it…embrace it…then let it go as quick as you can.  The moments that cause the frustration last even shorter in the big picture…and God knows I will miss them desperately when they’re gone.

About: Beginnings (New and Old)

My first guitar came in the form of an “Airline” acoustic.  My grandma was visiting a place where people go to die and play chicken with hurricanes (I guess inanimate objects end up there as well) and decided that this hunk of wood would be something I might enjoy. 

I first was introduced to the musical world at the tender age of four (sidebar:  tender age?  Still pliable…able to be shaped and nurtured?  Juicy and delicious?  Just can’t quite wrap my head around this one).  My mom and dad decided to enroll me in piano lessons, because the incessant whining of a four year old boy echoing through the vast expanse of a 950 square foot house wasn’t nearly enough white noise for their liking.  I’m guessing here…I was only four, give me a break.  Apparently, I took to it right away, and went on to play constantly for the next 10 years.  For all you sports fans out there, I was the Allen Iverson of piano players (the disdain of practice thing, not the 6’0”, 165lb African American point guard thing).  I hated practice.  I hated learning the ins and outs of the “theory” as they call it…the structure of music.  I hated it with a passion.  I remember one year I went through a standardized musical test of some sort at San Diego State University and ended up passing the theory portion by one point…but knocking the judges socks off in the performance part (to be fair, when you played “Pop Goes the Weasel” like I did…it was hard for the suits not to take notice).  All this to say, I could play…I could feel the music.  I could take the music off the page, and make it what I thought it should be, structure be damned. 

Well, fast forward to the end of that 10 year period and you have a 14 year old young man tired of the whole thing.  I never allowed piano to really lead me anywhere.  I played recitals, I played for church, I played for school, but I just played because I was the piano guy, not because my heart was in it.  So I quit (in retrospect perhaps an all too recurring theme in my life).  But thanks to my grandma, my musical void would be filled ASAP.

I ended up teaching myself how to play the guitar (with the help of a chord book, time, Alice in Chains, Gregory Page, Live and Dave Matthews Band).  I would lock myself in my room for hours on end learning this chord and that chord, and eventually putting those chords together to sound like something familiar.  I never did learn how to read guitar sheet music or anything like that…but I did learn how to hear what was right, and what was not.  I owe that to the 10 years of piano for sure.  Guitar took me more places than piano ever did…but those are stories for another day. 

Looking back, the purpose of this post is just to introduce the reason I started this blog in the first place.  I’m a hopeless right-brained hack with a terminal case of “quit” who never really gave 100% of myself to anything…and I don’t want that to be on my tombstone.  I’m going to seek out friends to add posts of their own too…their memories…their stories…their honesty.  I would like this to become a place that people can go to either lose themselves in the ridiculousness of others, or maybe even learn something about themselves. 

This kind of got away from me at the end, but I’ll do better next time.  Please join me.  If you have any stories to share about anything at all (I love funny, I love dark, I love real), hit me up on the comments section, or at trad77@aol.com.  Let’s start something cool, for no other reason than it’s cool.  We can build a community of creative people searching for an outlet for that creativity.  We can share knowledge, we can share smiles, we can share tears…we can even share needles (for those that are into that whole sewing subculture)! 

Let’s do this.

About: The Story of Emily (a continuing journey)

Emily showed up on a Wednesday afternoon in May.  An unremarkable day from a cosmic perspective, but on a personal level?...unremarkable would definitely not be the word to use to describe it. 

The journey began the previous June.  My wife and I had been married for four or so months, when for some reason she decided our two bedroom apartment was way too big for only two people.  We needed to fill it up with something.  I thought perhaps some office furniture might be nice for the second bedroom, something that would complement the leopard print futon that served as our guest bed.  She, on the other hand, decided a small human would be a better accent.  I admit that I was initially hesitant to embrace her plans but after she explained to me the process of bringing about said human, I jumped on board.

I don’t know much about anything, and I’ll certainly not claim to be the smartest of men, but I was convinced this process would take months, if not years to produce a result.  So, if you consider a month and half to be “months” than I would have been correct.  I’ll never forget the night we found out.  My wife and I were having a discussion about our state of affairs, our future, etc.  For a reason that escapes me now, I remember being in an extremely stressed state of being (seeing as I’m this way 93.4% of the time, this would probably be a safe guess regardless).  Stressed about theoretical babies, stressed about finances, stressed about living arrangements, stressed about work, stressed about vacation planning…just stressed.  The only phrase I clearly remember uttering on that fateful night was, “finding out you’re pregnant now would be the LAST thing we need”.  Taking this as her cue to turn our lives into a bad rom-com, my wife journeyed into our room to reportedly change for bed.  Her scream a few minutes later was all I needed to know the Big Screenwriter in the Sky was laughing hysterically as the camera panned to my ashen face.  From that moment on, the capital ‘T’ in my first name begin it’s long arduous journey to a lower case ‘d’.  

About: Patience (Part Three)

At this point, it’s time to put up or shut up.  Be a man (or at least as much of a man as I can be considering  the powder blue Prius and intimate knowledge of Little Mermaid song lyrics), and finish the job.  I summon the elevator, pick up the container (at least 150 lbs at this point) and make my way yet again to the casino floor.  This second time around it’s definitely a bit more difficult to blend in to the crowd.  Sweat begins to pore from my brow.  Face is of a shade that Peter Pan and the lost boys would sing a song about.  Shirt is starting to look like the dryer neglected to do its job.  I’m not sure if I’ll ever get to the room, and the thought of a return trip to the cars is not something I can even entertain in this moment. 

For the next 15 minutes I can only imagine the surveillance crew’s discussion.  Is this guy carrying a Winnebago?  Is he extremely drunk?  Should we dispatch homeland security, or just sit back and laugh? 

I make my way through the casino and down the long hall towards the actual tower I seek.  The bad thing is, it seems like I’m only good for about 20 feet at a time before I have to set the package down.  And what’s worse, I’m positive if I set it down on the floor, I will never be able to hoist it again.  So I stagger and I sway.  I zig and I zag.  I find an empty chair here, and a bench over there.  A café table on this side, and a decorative wall on that side.  Up with the container, down with the container.  My breath is gone, my arms are dying, and with each new bead of sweat my grip becomes even less stable.  In this manner, I make my way down a crowded Caesar’s Palace shopping corridor about the equivalent of two city blocks. 

With hope nearly gone and strength all but cold in the morgue, I see the tower at last.  One final push and I will call it a day.  If they ask me to go back for another load at this point, I will offer them a quote from the great philosopher Eric Cartman, “Screw you guys, I’m going home!”  I stumble into the elevator, gingerly set down the wine, and tell myself I only have to pick it up one more time. 

The elevator doors open, and I make my lift.  A World’s Strongest Man competitor I am not, but you would never know it by the volume of my grunt.  “DDEEYYYAAAAY.”  I can finally see the room.  Five doors down.  Gonna make it.  Four doors down.  Almost there.    Three Doors Down.  I’m getting closer to pushing me off of life’s little edge.  Two doors down.  Everything stops.  Arms stop lifting.  Legs stop moving.  This is the end, my only friend, the end (wow, if you have any more musical doors references please let me know).  With the last fiber of strength I can muster I’m able to set down the container without destroying the contents.  But I can go no further. 

I wait a few moments outside the door collecting my breath and my thoughts.  As I enter the room I make eye contact with my best friend (I know he was right behind me initially, but he must not have taken my detour to the wrong tower…and he must of had a slightly lighter first trip than me) and he can see I’m at my wits end.  “Dude, where’ve you been?”, he says with genuine concern.  I ask him to come out in the hall with me.  I need help, I say…I just can’t go one more step with this anchor…can you carry it the rest of the way?  He follows me out and bends down to pick it up.  I’ll remember that laugh until they put me in my box.  Crazy laughter, as he instantly downloads a mental picture of what the last 40 minutes of my life must have been like.

 

We make it inside the room and he sets down the container.  The 30 feet he was forced to carry my burden has taken a toll on him as well.  Without missing a beat he turns to me and says, “So…would now be a bad time to tell you we had a bell-hop bring up all the stuff?”

It’s 6:30pm, and I’ve yet to eat a single bite all day.  

About: Patience (Part Two)

I make my way through the revolving doors, not yet aware of the predicament I’ve put myself in.  The weight is easy at this point…barely announcing its presence…not yet unleashing its fury.  Off in the distance shines a tower.  I’ve been told the room number I must find and the fact that it lies in a tower just around the bend, just past the elevators.  I see the bend…I see the elevators…I will see the tower soon.  But first I must navigate my parcel through the packed casino floor.  There is no other way to go.  Forward, backward, left, right, past the cars, onto the turtles, advance past the logs on the river, then safe to the lilly pad.  Midway to the tower and my parcel introduces itself to me.  I suddenly realize that a time-out might be in order.  I find the nearest empty chair…smack dab between two super seniors fresh from the buffet.  Pleasantries and quizzical faces are exchanged and I’m off again.  It appears that in the mere moments of rest I’ve lost a significant portion of my strength.  80lbs is no joke, and now it feels like 100. 

Only by the grace of God do I make it to the elevators.  I’m headed to floor five, and I decide it’s better to hang on to the container at this point as my journey is almost finished.  I’m afraid if I set this down again, it will rest in this elevator in perpetuity.  No wine for the party…no “job well done”…no joy in Mudville, for Casey has struck out.  I can’t let that happen.  I’ll hang on to it for just a few moments longer, make a run for the room, and perhaps crack a bottle all for myself.

As I exit the elevator for the final leg of the trip, the lack of streamers and weeping women disturbs me.  Where are the well-wishers encouraging me around the final bend?...Where are my congratulatory hugs?... Where are the babies I’m to kiss?...Wait a second…??...where’s the room? 

With no other options at this moment, I set down the container in the middle of the round room.  I know the room number I’m seeking…of this I’m sure.  I also know that it’s not here.  I grab my phone and start dialing like a telemarketer.  I call the groom-to-be.  Ring…ring…ring…ring.  Ring…ring…ring…ring.  Of course he’s not answering!  He’s probably in a similar predicament as me…stumbling  amidst the lights and noise, muscles straining at their capacity, just trying to get by.  I call the General.  Ring…ring…ring…ring.  Ring…ring…ring…ring.  Why would he answer either??!!  I’ll probably see him stepping out of the elevator behind me, bleary-eyed and as confused as I.  I call the Ghostbusters, hoping they’ll be in control…but alas, I’m left to my own devices.  In a last ditch effort, I call the room number and the bride-to-be answers.  Validation!  I DO know the right room number!  Her voice calms me…brings me back to focus.  She has the answers, she will fix this situation.  I was right about the room number, indeed, but I was wrong about the tower, says she.  Turns out there are more than one bends, and more than one elevators…and I’m as far off course as Columbus when he “discovered” America. 

My heart sinks.  My resolve disappears.  My body protests.  I’m in trouble.  It’s 5:29pm.