Discoveries, of things not here

Ralph Story, in the days of my callow youth, hosted a TV show titled "Ralph Story's Los Angeles." In more recent days, he has hosted a TV show titled "Things That Aren't Here Any More."

That has been pretty much the title of this morning's activities. Things that aren't here any more.

All of us, Disease-accessorized or not, live through this. The high-school letterman's jacket we find at the bottom of the box that's at the bottom of the pile of boxes. "Oh, that takes me back." And a smile. Or the picture of the old girlfriend/boyfriend that we thought we'd discarded but, it turns out, is still at the bottom of the box at the bottom of the pile of boxes. "Oh, that takes me back." A sigh... perhaps a sigh of relief, for a Road Not Taken, and good thing, too.

Today, I did some web-site maintenance. This time of year, if you're in a very liturgical church, it's still Advent, and will be until December 24 (or January 6, if you're Eastern Orthodox). But in the Muzak world, it's Christmas (in way too many stores, it has been Christmas since Halloween). My mother breaks out the Christmas CDs (records, in the Goode Olde Days) the day after Thanksgiving. So, I figure, it's a good time to break out the Christmas music on my music web site.

Back in the pre-Disease day, I was a very enthusiastic organist. (I might be again, if The Disease would just @$#@$ing back off and let my legs work again.) I even made a recording; because it was When it Was, I made a cassette, but then the Digital Era enabled me to convert it to a CD.

So, I start the day by walking face first into Things That Aren't Here Anymore. But actually, that was OK... it was more of a "discovered high-school jacket" moment, a pleasant memory of Bygone Times.

And then, there's the poking at the web site. And that's when The Inescapable and  Unconquerable Fatigue sets in... the fatigue that, nowadays, seems to pervade everything. Constantly. Things are a very subtly different since I negotiated (and started implementing) a herbal-dosage change, but oh yeah, the fatigue's still there.

Eventually, I got it done. You're welcome to check it out, at robertparkermusic.com. Time was, when there was new music going up on that site monthly. Sometimes more frequently. Not today... and "on paper," I want that to change, but somehow, even though I still have all my music writing tools, including the old standbys of pencil and paper, there just ain't any music, or anything, happening, even in my head. I don't even hear the "ohrwurm," the "ear worm," as the Germans call it, that I used to get all the time, of music demanding to be written down.

And this is what's currently really getting my goat about my experience with The Disease, nowadays... inability to manifest anything. And all the Lifehacker-provided Easy Answers in the world, including the ever popular "Oh, just do something, it doesn't have to be perfect, that'll get things started," doesn't help when even sitting up to "do something" takes too much energy.

So, here's the plan for the day: Just do "something," yes, but do things that don't cost so much that doing "something" stops me from doing anything else. Type this entry. Make and enjoy some tea. Maybe type something else that has been rattling in my head for a while, it's something that's hardly creative but for whatever reason It Wants To Be Written Down. Send a couple of e-mails. If all goes well, and there's energy to burn, go to the store for scallops, because we've got hatcho-miso broth left over from yesterday and my wife said (quite correctly) that it'd go great with scallops. And, of course, cook said scallops... another energy-expensive challenge, because it involves a lot of standing and catching myself from falling over, which happens way too much nowadays... sigh.

And maybe, watch some Adventure Time. Not my favorite cartoon of all time; but occasionally, there are some very sweet and dear, very heart-warming and heart-wrenching moments; moments when the characters discover something about themselves, about a truth deep within their hearts, that they didn't even know was there. "I didn't know that I felt that way" (or even could feel that way) moments. Discovered love; discovered sympathy; discovered truths of the heart.

Which, interestingly enough, is what I have always tried do discover with my own musical compositions; to rend the veil separating us from ourselves and The Truth.

Art imitates life, indeed.