August 2013 – Lola's Curmudgeonly Musings

“There’t nothing more to it, I just get through it.” ~ First Aid Kit, from “To a Poet”

Published on August 31, 2013September 2, 2013 by PoietesLeave a comment

New Discovery: First Aid Kit

Lyrics:

And you said, “Don’t give me nothing
you don’t want to lose”
I said, “Darling, I’ll give you everything I got
if I want them to choose”

Then I got on a plane and flew
far away from you
Though unwillingly I left
and it was so, so hard to do

The streets here at home had rapidly filled up
with the whitest of snow
And they don’t make no excuse for themselves
and there’s no need, I know

Now I miss you more than I can take
and I will surely break
And every morning that I wake
god, it’s the same
There’s nothing more to it,
I just get through it
Oh, there’s nothing more to it
I just get through it

It always takes me by surprise
how dark it gets this time of the year
And how apparent it all becomes
that you’re not close, not even near

No matter how many times I tell myself
I have to be sincere
I have a hard time standing up
and facing those fears

But Frank put it best when he said
“You can’t plan on the heart”
Those words keep me on my feet
when I think I might just fall apart

And so I ask where are you now
just when I needed you
I won’t ask again
Because I know there’s nothing we can do
Not now, darling, you know it’s true

Since my Hogwarts letter still hasn’t arrived . . .

Published on August 30, 2013September 2, 2013 by PoietesLeave a comment

Reblogged from Curious History:

Abandoned Cottages in the Woods Overtaken by Animals

In a series titled Once Upon a Home, photographer Kai Fagerström captured the new residents of abandoned cottages in the woods. After residents had passed away or relocated, a group of feral animals took over the spaces. In a story published for National Geographic, Fagerström captured the “wild squatters” in a handful of derelict dwellings near his family’s summer home in rural Suomusjärvi, Finland.

sources 1, 2

“Sometimes it seems that fate, in more than random measure, aims its arrows at what matters to people most.” ~ Mary Schmich, from the Chicago Tribune

Published on August 29, 2013August 30, 2013 by Poietes4 Comments

Linda Ronstadt will never sing again. She has Parkinson’s. This is the end of an era. Sites are filled with videos and images of the singer. I chose one that I remember from my youth.

A guy who I dated casually was absolutely in love with Ronstadt; I sometimes thought that he may have dated me just for my long dark hair. Who knows. But we shared a deep admiration for a woman with an incredible gift.

From Mary Schmich’s article in the Chicago Tribune:

But Ronstadt’s situation seems to have struck an especially tender spot in the collective psyche and triggered a response that goes beyond lament for the fading of a star and an era.

The deeper reason that the news resonates so deeply is that her loss comes with an extra twist of the knife: She hasn’t just lost her singing voice. She has lost her essential expressive gift.

A singer can lose an arm and still sing, can lose a leg or an eye. But her voice?

Ronstadt isn’t the first person to be robbed of her primary expressive gift.

Beethoven, the great composer, went deaf. Monet, the great painter, developed cataracts. Paul Wittgenstein was a concert pianist whose right arm was amputated.

More recently and closer to home, the renowned chef Grant Achatz got tongue cancer, now in remission, though the treatments temporarily took away his ability to taste. In the bombing at the Boston Marathon, runners and dancers lost their legs.

Sometimes it seems that fate, in more than random measure, aims its arrows at what matters to people most.

A musician who can’t hear. An artist who can’t see. A chef who can’t taste. A singer who can’t sing.

Fate seems to strike with a cannily precise cruelty.

I floated that theory past a friend the other day. He pooh-poohed it.

“We just notice more in those cases.”

Could be. And in some cases, people overcome the loss of their primary mode of expression by figuring out new ways to express themselves.

It wouldn’t be surprising if Ronstadt does. Through her long career, she has also shown a gift for tenacity.

And even if she never sings again, which she says she never will, the songs she leaves behind will stay in the minds and hearts of millions of people who through the years have sung along with her.

My favorite Ronstadt song? So hard. I loved “Desperado,” “Blue Bayou,” and “You’re No Good,” but my all-time favorite is “Long, Long Time”