Feeble Attempts and Meager Returns

 

Me? I've no use for the big time. It's a good thing, I suppose, because the big time has never had any use for me. That mockingbird's not thinking about a record deal. Maybe saving the world was too big a task for a born-slacker. Besides, nobody's sure the world needs saving.

Sometimes I think that maybe there's enough love in the world. We just have a distribution problem.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

 

What If You Catch It?

 

Well, sir, I've chased money and I've chased fame. I've run after women and power and peace of mind. I've half-heartedly sought wisdom and single-mindedly pursued passion. I suppose I'm always looking for attention, even though I seldom leave the house. Socially awkward, you know.

Maybe I've caught just enough of everything I've wanted, to know that there's nothing I need.

My prizes are the memories of the love I've known along the way. In my naivete, I have thought that maybe I could manipulate who I am, what other folks thought of me. Turns out that I'm the same person who was scared to death and, thrilled as well, to start that first day of school. 

Every stray is just looking for love. Me, too.

Finding The Source

 

Maybe I should have kept a few secrets. You know, created a mystique. A little late to worry about it now, I suppose. Most folks grow up. They get tricked into believing that they have no choice. Oh, I've bought suits and I've bought ties. Nobody ever accused me of growing up.

If you ever lose a fascination with lightning bugs or ever lose your taste for ice cream, it's time to re-evaluate. Everything.

You learn math and you study science but you come with love right from the factory. Oh sure, chemistry complicates it at some point. You may never break your nose like I did, or your arm, like I did, but you're surely gonna have your heart broken at some point and that's a price you pay.

In fact, loss, in one form or another, finances all love. The glory of it all overwhelms me.

Please Hold For Aunt Jo

 

The German Zeppelin bombing of England began in 1915. Jess Willard knocked Jack Johnson out in the 26th round of a championship brawl in Havana, thrilling white folks around the globe. Babe Ruth hit his first home run. Henry Ford rolled his 1 millionth car off the assembly line in Detroit and my Aunt Jo was born.

One day last week I finally got to talk to her on the phone. First time since the pandemic began. Of course this isn't her first. 

She had lunch with Eleanor Roosevelt in the white house and she sat up with me all night in the emergency room on New Year's eve, 1966, in Birmingham. Same hospital I was born in. Pretty sure she knew I hadn't "walked into a door."

She says "I love you," a lot. Always did.

I Don't Mean To Intrude

 

Here we are. After nearly ten years and over twenty five hundred blogs, I feel like I have burdened you with this babble. Maybe I should have thought of that nine and a half years and twenty four hundred blogs back.

Of course I feel the same way about my music. I haven't been doing much writing because I feel like I have forced it on a defenseless public for fifty six years. Now, in fairness, it has been a pretty small public.

Surely self-promotion is the lowest form of communication. I've told you before of the nice folks who have decided to "manage" my career. To a person, they have all concluded, with time, that I can't be managed. I'm pretty sure that none of them meant it as a compliment.

Now, I don't worry about how I will pass time. I figure that time passes pretty well on its own. I may keep pasting my head on other bodies because I have found that an inexpensive, safe way to travel. I just didn't want you to think that I had forgotten about you. I love you.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

Can't Find My Rose-Colored Glasses

 

"Every ending is a beginning."

 Every time some hack types that, it's a new beginning. We're all just holding mirrors up to mirrors, aren't we? I seem to have run out of beginnings. Endings, too, for the most part. I was just sitting around waiting for an end to the pandemic or my life, whichever came first, until I realized I'm younger than both of those old white guys running for president. Well, one white and one more an apricot/tangerine, to be precise.

Somehow I seem to have avoided almost everything that scared me growing up. By growing up, I mean everything that happened to me up until yesterday. Yesterday at about 2:00 pm, again, to be precise.

Every heartbreak in my diary is loss.

Made Friends With The Ghosts

 

Never been one to visit the gravesites. Maybe if my memories were all in tiny, natural settings I would be more likely to connect with the ones I miss. I do find myself talking to the spirits more often these days. Oh, I don't expect them to answer. 

Now, I don't believe in luck but, if I did, I would describe myself as lucky. I've seen both ends of the rainbow and the green flash. Twice.

Learning to love is the easy part. Paying attention is the trick.

Love In The Ether

 

It occurs to me that I broadcast on a very limited frequency. Oh, my signal is loud. In fact, it can be annoying. It's not easy to tune me in though. 

Now, one thing I know is that a message preached to an audience that doesn't want it is breath wasted.

That sentence reads so smug. Good. Maybe I can let it serve as an example of what I'm trying to say. I have never felt like I know something that you don't. I've never thought of myself as the smartest person in the room. I've never cared.

What I offer you is what has been in front of you all your life. They told me in Sunday school and they told me in the first grade. I was lucky enough to have a family that showed me by example. Just allow love to be your default setting.

That's what all the major religions are based on before they get hijacked. That's what meditation is about. Maybe you're not as fortunate as I've been to have such examples everywhere at every turn. Rescue a dog. Mentor a kid.

Love and truth.

I'm an acquired taste.

The Boy Who Met Elvis

The whole thing was in her mind. I feigned a demure attitude- "Well, I never really met him. I mean, well, he knew my name and, of course I knew his. We shook hands. We talked. I was a kid. He was the King of Rock'n'Roll."

For some reason, my sweet friend knew me very well. She knew, absolutely, that meeting Elvis Presley made me the person that I am today. Oh, she knew about my family life and she was aware of my background. In fact, we were introduced by another woman who had worked on a documentary about me. I married that one for a short time.

Life's funny.

She rented the finest gear and hired technical wizards. She filmed and probed and cajoled. We laughed and cried. I sang and primped and posed. Visions of awards and accolades danced as she shot and she was more than happy to share them.

No Happy Endings

 

I have obsessed over the idea that I write the same song over and over since it first occurred to me. Now, suddenly, I realize that there are only a few stories. The joy is in the variations. 

The stories, I suppose, all begin with some form of, "Once upon a time...".

Eventually boy meets girl. Nobody lives happily ever after. Ever.

With that in mind, I hope you love and sing and dance. I hope you laugh often and cuddle when you can. Enjoy the company of children when you get the opportunity and pet every dog. Read the books that remind you of our connection and watch all the movies make you laugh or cry.

Try not to judge and love with all your might. Your only role in the balance of good and evil is to tip the scale in the right direction.

You're doing fine. Enjoy it all.

No Glory Days

 

So Mahatma drank urine and slept with nubile, young women. I'm feeling pretty good about myself, here. I didn't sleep with nubile young women when I was young! I certainly never touch the urine. Lips that touch urine will never touch mine.

Oh, I don't mean to judge. Gandhi remains at the tippy top of my list of heroes. It's a long list. It gets longer.

My problem, if I have a problem, is that I don't have glory days. I never sold many records, never made any money. I don't remember ever winning a trophy, and I'm pretty sure that I would be bragging shamelessly about it now if I had. 

I'll tell you this, boys- I've heard the prettiest music and laughed with the sweetest folks and held the best dogs in the world. I'm old but I'm not done. Keep an eye on me.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

Seeing Spots

 

"How much time does she have, Hansel?"

"Two months. At the most."

She made it exactly two months. Towards the end I would find myself counting her pain pills. I knew that when they were gone, it was over.

Now, a couple of years later, I'm always aware of how many B-12 lozenges are left in the container. I'm not really sure what I'm calculating. As I understand it, we all have obsessive compulsions. It's a disorder when they interfere with a normal life. 

I've never lived a normal life.

The Lobster's Revenge

 

Turns out I'm not a bad cook. Who knew? 

Not only have I never put my nose to any grindstone, I don't have a single regret about it. Bumbling through life has provided for every need and kept me considering all possibilities over a really long haul. Oh, I wish I had been more patient, more understanding. 

The real mystery, to me, is just how lucky I've been.

Hey, I ate mercury right from the thermometer and rode my bike in the DDT cloud behind the mosquito truck. 

Now cardinals bring me greetings from the ones I've lost and cicadas provide Om. It occurs to me, at last, that one person can't fight. It's not my job to convince anyone of anything. Nobody ever had to work at love. You just don't get in its way.

On Insignificance

 

As the road winds down, the world seems smaller. The universe seems grander. Love seems to be the only thing worthy of our attention. Once I saw my role from the perspective of the center of the universe. Even now, as I look around me, all that I can see radiates in concentric circles from any place that I stand.

The realization that I am merely a bubble in a vast foaming sea is somehow frightening and reassuring at the same time. I'm a small part of a ripple in a wave of a tide of humanity and humanity is a speck in one of the galaxies that we recognize but surely don't understand.

Don't fret that I'm feeling sorry for myself. I just know my place. There are no hotshots and there aren't many saints. Before I hurt your feelings, let me say, right here, that I think you're perfect. Oh, I am, too.

Love and nature shaped my first few years. Hormones ran the show for decades. I'm hoping that kindness and love can see me out.

                                       

Calling Dr. Hofmann

Nothing squelches desire like acquisition. If love is desire, then I suppose the meaning of life is Rosebud and we're all destined to blunder through possessions, relationships and careers. 

No wonder nobody will sit next to me at the dinner party.

Honestly, I'm a happy guy and a simple soul. I'm reminded that my mind is not my friend. We get along well enough, though, I suppose.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

All American Boy

What I lack in ambition, I make up for in,,,

Well, sir, I don't make up for it at all. What I see passing for success doesn't seem to hold much for me. 

Over a lifetime searching for truth I have learned that the most valuable resources are kindness and joy. Keep learning. You'll notice that it becomes more obvious how little you know. 

If I were so pompous as to offer any life advice, I suppose it would be to hang on to your innocence. Oh, I'm guessing that you have done wrong and I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't screw up some more. I've made a regular thing of it. I can tell you now that innocence is like a lizard's tail. It will probably come back.

Whatever else you're doing, love.

What Key?

"Ronny, would you be willing to consider that you're just more sentimental than she is?" the kind therapist asked.

That comic book light bulb lit up over my head and, for just a minute, the whole world made sense.

Lady, I'm more sentimental than everybody!

I didn't tell her that, of course. For one thing, I didn't need to. It's nothing to brag about.

I come to it honestly. My mom never got over anything. She grieved for pets that she had as a kid as an old lady. 

It's only a problem, I suppose, if you try to fit the world into your mold. By the time that I understood it, it was too late to change it. My attempts to change the rest of the world had never worked out, either.

Choose Your Weapon

John Lennon. The Kennedys, Bobby and Jack. Gandhi. Dr. King. Lincoln. Jesus.

Carry on about inequality, peace and love, and if you sell enough books or records or tickets, they'll kill you. Their big trick is to provoke your dark side so that there are two sides of bad guys fighting it out for power.

Fuck 'em.

They don't make the rules. We do.

Keep loving and try not to sell many records. That's my advice.

Firecracker Hill

Jet Fuel Romance, Retread Heart

Give your power to a buddha and you create a tyrant. Eventually you will find that what you have been seeking has been right here all along. The search makes your journey your journey. Is it a glorious moment when you discover that there is no secret, or is it a grand letdown of tragic proportions?

You tell me.

Dogs and children just love. There is no secret.

Terms of Engagement

The very idea of Rules of Love seems ridiculous to me. Kinda' like Rules of War, isn't it? The winners re-write what was there, clearing their side, and indicting the new bad guys with whatever means that they declare atrocities. War crimes.

Hey, fellas- it's all evil. Ain't no good wars. There wasn't a god on your side.

Same with romance. You love till you don't. You do the best you can. The Golden Rule is about all you have to cling to. Of course, I learned all I ever knew watching Rock Hudson canoodle with Doris Day.

How'd that work out for you, Ronny?

The loving part- I got that. In my world the science all rhymes and the poetry explains what can be explained. Love is the currency and I hate to brag, but I'm rich.

Manhattan Island and the Family Cow

Yeah, I suppose that I would always have traded Manhattan Island for red cloth and glass beads and I know, for sure, that I would have traded the family cow for some magic beads- as long as they would promise to be good to the cow.

Once I took the band's money and bought yards and yards of fuchsia velvet. Crushed velvet! My pals weren't all that happy with me but, boy, did those suits get good press!

Oh, I know that I have spent most of a long lifetime out of fashion and out of step, but that's okay. I just hope to have shared a little joy.

Forever

"Forever ain't what it used to be," widely attributed to Buddha, me and Yogi Berra.

She said she would love me forever.

Stars and Stripes Forever

Forever Yours. Always my favorite candy bar. One day, forty-some odd years ago, they just disappeared from the shelf in the convenience store. Oh, I understand they're back, but I can't seem to find one.

I was looking for true love, she just wanted to dance.

Good and Evil....

...Right and wrong. Rich and poor. Black and white. Rock'n'roll. The world, as I define it, only exists in my perception of the things around me. If I look through a telescope, it's entirely different than what I see through a microscope.

Mockingbirds sing me a song and it's different than the song that I hear from Elvis when the needle wiggles in the wax. The fact that Elvis died nearly forty three years ago doesn't stop me from hearing him sing.

As I watch suffering around me, I settle on the idea of looking at everything and listening to everything through a filter of love. Oh, I'm working on taste and feel and smell, too, but I'm having trouble with cabbage.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

Nice Guys Don't Finish

Being a good guy has never been a smart career move. I remember that early on in his career, Elvis made the decision not to smile for photographs. Based on Brando and James Dean, he was convinced that a surly look was what melted young girls' hearts. Seems funny now- all those iconic snapshots of that famous, crooked smirk. I'm thinking that in 1956 he was just having too much fun to scowl.

Well, sir, after fifty something years in the rock'n'roll racket, I'm still smiling. Oh, I'm a revolutionary. An anarchist. There aren't many organizations that I admire, any governments that I support or many country clubs that will let me in.

I still love the music. The music business? Not so much.

Do you suppose that I have failed because I smiled? Is it my lack of regard for the crooks in the industry?

Who cares?

I'm having too much fun to snarl.

Oh, yeah- I love the people. I don't like the war but I love the soldiers. I don't like the government but most of those jackasses are doing about the best they can. I despise Wall Street but I have plenty of pals who don't. Nobody needs to remind me that for every self-important sourpuss with a silver chalice, slinging smoke, babbling in a language that nobody understands- there is a country preacher who works without pay, trying to comfort his neighbors.

Now, pardon me- I'm gonna keep smiling. Failing, too, I imagine.

Whose Chains, What Chains?

It helps to understand that the ones in power believe that the disenfranchised merely want their stuff. Greed? Not the way most wealthy consumers see it. If wealth is your driving force, you should be looking for bootstraps. Or a sucker. You're probably wasting your time here.

Oh, it's not that I believe in magic. It's all magic. I don't have time to argue with you over semantics and, buddy, it's all semantics. 

There's nothing here but love, light and vibrations. If that's not magic to you, we've got nothing to talk about. 

Have a good one. Stay safe. Take care.

I don't trade in small talk. I love you.

Sweethearts and Ghosts

Lately they seem to be showing up with amazing regularity. If you talk too much about the spirits visiting, you'll just bore folks. Keep it up and they'll have you taken off.

It occurs to me now that I should have loved better and listened more. I think I'm pretty good at forgiving but I could have been quicker. 

My great gift from the universe has been low expectations. I've never had to live up to much and I have succeeded wildly.

Science Calling

If everybody's life is some kind of movie, mine is one of those B films of the '50's without much storyline. There's gonna be a big rock'n'roll show in town and the city fathers are determined to shut it down. I play me.

Hey, let's cut a rug. Well, musicians don't dance. Truth is, I was always afraid to ask anybody to dance. Time fills all potholes. I read that somewhere. 

Most of my luck has been good and I can't remember anything about the rest. 

I have never been so proud of what I see in this country right now. If you have a voice, speak up for the ones who don't. They can't outlaw love but they sure can try.

Sliding In To Shortstop

You're gonna think I'm making this up. I don't have the imagination for it.

An old friend was over a couple of weeks ago, digging up some plants for her yard. She noticed two plastic skulls placed very tastefully beside a fancy palm.

"Oh, I forgot that you collect skulls," she began. 

"Who don't?"was my obvious response.

"Do you want two more?"

Of course I told her that I did. I don't remember being very excited about it. The things are all over the house. It's not so much that I collect them as it is that they have accumulated. You know how some folks don't take down their Christmas lights? I'm more a halloween guy.

The next morning as I went out the side door, I stumbled over a grocery bag, folded over. I assumed that one of my kind neighbors was worried again that the old guy would starve with all the restaurants boarded up.

The clunk when I put the bag on the kitchen counter made me think that it was just canned goods.

No sir! When I opened the bag and peered in, there were two skulls looking up at me. Not plastic, halloween-variety skulls. Two skulls! Real, human skulls.

Last night, just as I was falling asleep, I hear a very odd, but very human voice from the the other bedroom, the room where one of the skulls now "rests".

Nobody. Nobody. Nobody.

More likely no body. No body. No body- right?

All night it went on. It seemed like every time I fell asleep, this weird, human voice would start. I finally convinced myself that it was some exotic tree frog just out the window. I had to!

Half way through pecking this out, it began again. I ran into the room, scared to death that I was confronting my Vincent Price nightmare and remembered the landline phone set that someone had just given me.

From the cardboard box, no battery. No battery. No battery.

Thank goodness. The skulls stay. Not sure about the phone.

Break, Broke, Broken

Nobody can lead everybody. I'm convinced of that. I'm an anarchist at heart but I certainly don't preach anarchy. I'm painfully aware that there are lots of people out there who don't care if someone else's baby goes hungry as long as they get to drive a Lexus. Sadly, there are even more folks who don't mind my house burning down if they end up with a new Rolex and a smart TV. 

Thankfully most of us fall well within those extremes.

We can't make up for all of the hate and evil of our ancestors. We can change everything that we can agree is unfair in our present culture. 

Since we're not going to agree on what is, and what is not fair, we're gonna have to find leaders who are willing to help us find compromise. Leaders who are capable of explaining those compromises to us. Leaders with the compassion to accept the barrage of criticism of all extremes.

The good ones, the kind ones, the smart ones- they are well aware of the image of Jesus on a cross. President Kennedy's brains splattered all over a pink suit. 

No bad cop thinks he's a bad cop. No looter doubts that he deserves what he can carry. No elected official thinks that trading stocks based on insider information is any different than taking home a few pens from the office.

Seems to me we have two choices. We can find and encourage the best folks who are willing to sacrifice to lead us in change or we can watch it all burn down.

Pray for peace. Search for truth. Settle for love.

Broken Hip

To my casual friends I'm a luddite. Truth is, I love technology. The technology that makes my life better. The idea of having all the music at my elbow, digitally, is wonderful. Lasik surgery may be the best thing that ever happened to me, at least where I kept my pants on. Not a day goes by without me cheering central heat & air conditioning.

Now, I'm not so big on texting. Okay, boomer. Seems to me that if texting had come first, we would have considered telephone conversation a miracle. Wouldn't that be the logical technological order?

Really! You can actually hear them speak! Brilliant!

As you can imagine I love FaceTime. Zoom.

Have I mentioned that I have little affection for nostalgia? I like good movies. Interesting literature. Passionate music. Dirty sex. Oh, sure, I like hot rods that are pretty. I don't want to be shifting any gears, though, and I surely don't want to go fast!

Yeah, I'll only wear Jack Purcells. That's because James Dean wore them. If somebody comes along with more class than James Dean, maybe I'll consider a change.

Another mis-conception, I suspect, at least among ex-wives, is my problem growing up. Again, I'll take the parts that I like- going to bed when I want, finding the funny parts, talking to animals and crying when I'm tired- and I'll have nothing to do with the rest. You know, wearing ties, nose to the grindstone, get ahead.

My goal, if I have a goal, is to have done more good than harm when the score is tallied. To have used all the love up.

What Sparkles

Maybe beauty is just fleeting because of my attention span. Turns out I'm an introvert. Wouldn't take much to push me over to hermit. 

Now, we don't organize. The other loners haven't authorized me to speak for us as a group. I do believe that I speak for all of us, or most of us, anyway, when I tell you that we don't want to be alone. We're just no good at the alternatives.

If I hadn't carried a guitar around for all these years, I would have had no life at all. Sometimes it's hard to tell if I'm bragging or complaining.

No club, lone wolf.

Humanity and Arrogance

Marching towards the inevitable void, I recognize my expertise. I know exactly as much on "what comes next" as some monk in robes who sells books on the subject. The secret, if I might refer to it as a secret, is an authoritative tone. Bluster, whisper- it really doesn't matter. Just tell 'em what they want to hear and paint a reassuring picture.

Of course I don't really march. Anywhere. Towards anything. I'm more a shuffler.

Having lived through the gas crisis, Y2K, disco and one other toilet paper shortage, I feel almost serene in the midst of this pandemic. I do stay awake worrying about the ones who are truly suffering. Like everyone else, I hope this ends soon.

Here's to a kinder, slower, more compassionate future. If you vote, vote for peace and love. If you pray, pray for understanding and kindness.

One For The Team

Once you've encountered truth, hokum is hard to swallow. I've tried to tell the truth, as I know it, for as long as I can remember. 

Has it paid off?

Well, not financially. Certainly not socially. Romantically? Are you new here?

I'm not bragging here. I just never got the hang of lying.

Trying To Get Back Home (The Last Obsession)

Pink walls and shiny pillows and a gardenia blooming right outside the front door.

All I've ever wanted is to get back home. Wherever that is. Whatever that is.

Between Birds and Stars

Have I ever given you a business card?

I didn't think so.

As nearly as I can recall, my first was our band calling card for The Raveons. My work experience up till then had consisted of bagging groceries and scooping mud out of the hulls of barges. Neither of those endeavors required much in the way of marketing. I was seventeen years old when we had these printed up. Maybe the fact that I still have some around will give you some idea of my self-promotional skills.

The next batch that I can find, poking through the treasures here, is from my next band, The Outsiders. Now we probably managed to hand out a few more of these. In fact, I'm not really sure that this is the first version of OS cards. Nevertheless, it's not time to re-order even though it's been about fifty five years since the last run.

After that there were occupations that demanded business cards, i.e. real estate, environmental protection, mortgage, and those that didn't- writer, hot sauce bottler and gadabout.

It occurs to me, finally, that my profession, if in fact I had a profession, is Ronny Elliott. I'm just no good at preparation, practice, rehearsal, posing, promoting. Others may simply refer to me as lazy. I don't really have the gumption to get up and argue with them.

Over the years I have been close to wealthy and it was fun. I've been poor more often. It wasn't too bad. If you talk enough, something's bound to rhyme. Voila! I'm a poet. I suppose I'm something of a philosopher, too. I seem to think a good bit as I sit around and, lord knows, I talk about it. I preach. You've probably noticed. Hasn't paid very well and I'm not sure I've comforted many folks, much less saved anyone.

Today, I serve as proof that some force will keep most fools from starving or freezing. It's up to us to help those others.