October Music and The Ocean

Those of you who read the blog know that I’m a huge music hound.  I love most types from pop to jazz to blues, heavy metal, classical and even classic country.  As long as I can remember, music has been my one refuge when things seem bad and I’ve even noticed (and commented to some of you reading) that my listening tastes tend to change with the seasons themselves.

Fall is upon us and with it comes my favorite time of year, Halloween.  My birthday is in October.  My daughter’s birthday is also in October and we just make the whole month one long party.  It’s around this time of year that my listening tastes become slanted more toward rockabilly, punk and metal.  Bands like The Cramps, Nekromantix, The Horrorpops, The Birthday Massacre and soundtracks from Suspiria (Goblin’s best work), John Carpenter’s The Thing and pseudo-soundtracks by The Midnight Syndicate will go into heavy rotation over the next few weeks.

That said, this week I found myself listening to a song that’s definitely not in that vein and realizing that I’d almost unconsciously mimicked the lyrics in my own life.  As most of you read, I lost my Dad about a month ago.  I spent a couple of weeks in Texas helping my mother get things sorted and then when I came back here, I realized that I hadn’t really dealt with it myself.  I spent the next couple of weeks kind of going through the motions of work and home.  Then something clicked and I asked Karen and Lil if they wouldn’t mind going down to Laguna Beach after work one night. 

We hit up Husky Burger on PCH and then crossed the street and headed down to Shaw’s Cove.  We wandered along the rocks and watched the waves crash.  There were some cool blow-hole effects happening in one spot and the high tide was just starting to subside.  We waited there and watched set after set roll in until the sun finally started creeping down enough that the air got a little too cold for us.  Once we got back to the car and started driving home, I realized I felt better.  A lot better.

The ocean has that effect on me.  I’m not sure why. 

A week later, I found myself throwing a Counting Crows disc into my car stereo.  “A Long December” (a song that I’ve liked for a long time despite it being overplayed) came on and the last verse struck me.  For the one or two people out there who may not know it, the lyrics are about a guy who's reflecting on the past year, realized it's kind of sucked and is looking forward to the new year in hopes that it'll be better.  The last verse goes like this:

And it’s one more day up in the Canyon

And it’s one more night in Hollywood

It’s been so long since I’ve seen the ocean

I guess I should

I’m not the biggest Counting Crows fan, but I don’t think I’ll be able to hear that song again without automatically thinking about the last few weeks and how good it felt to just sit and listen to the waves for a while.

Starting next week, we'll start posting about the Halloween movies being viewed this year (including a couple that Karen and Lil may or may not particularly like).  On Thursday, I'll post up the last Horror Histories for the time being.  It was supposed to go live a month ago but life got in the way.

Happy October, everyone!