Sunday Stealing

Unusual Music

1. A song that gives you goosebumps. "Tears Dry on Their Own" by Amy Winehouse. Damn, she was good.

2. A song you hated once but now love. "Rocket Man." I used to think it was oblique and over played. Now it reminds me of the olden days.

3. Do you remember your first CD? I'd already purchased it twice, and scratched it twice, on vinyl.

4. Has your music taste changed much since childhood? I'm more open now. I used to dismiss Sinatra as a relic, like white gloves and rotary dial phones. Now I appreciate him as a singer (and actor). The man was a genius.

5. Favorite genre? Pop

6. What’s a genre or style of music that you just don’t understand? Classical. It alternately bores and annoys me.

7. Do you have a process for listening to music, such as listening to the instruments more than words? I love the sound of the vocals.

8. What’s your favorite thing about your favorite song? "September" never fails to lift my spirits.

9. Do you have a favorite decade for music? The 1960s.

10. Can you play any instruments? No.

11. Do you remember your first favorite song? It was a Halloween/witch song from Kindergarten. "Stirring and stirring and stirring my brew. Woo woo, woo, woo. Tip toe. Tip toe. Tip toe. BOO!"

12. What was the first concert you ever attended? Bobby Sherman. I was still in grade school. He had fabulous hair and good teeth. Don't judge me.



I'm doing something wrong

Had an ugly exchange with my fellow condo board member on Thursday night. Literally yelling at one another in the parking lot before we each turned on our heels (me going in the front door and he through the back).

I can't stop thinking about it. It continues to bedevil me. It's disturbed my sleep. I've begun taking Valerian again, to calm down and relax and perhaps sleep better.

I don't know why I'm letting this disturb me so much. I have no doubts -- zero, zip, zilch -- that I was correct on both substance and style. I have no regrets about what I did or how I behaved.

So why do I keep replaying the exchange on a continuous loop? Why do I let this asshole have so much space in my head?

Something is wrong with me these days. Things get me down and keep me down longer than they used to.

I think perhaps it's gravity. What my friends are dealing with, what I'm dealing with, is more serious than the problems of days gone by. Where once we talked about being passed over for a promotion, we're talking about being forced into retirement because we're too old to hire. We used to worry about weight or acne or fertility, now we talk about heart disease, diabetes, brain injury and stroke.

Thinking of strokes ... after visiting his once vital, suddenly incapacitated father in the hospital, John F. Kennedy said to friends, "Old age is a shipwreck." He was so right. And, since none of us is getting any younger, I better buckle up, toughen up and figure out how to deal with this.