The Troubadour

The Troubadour
The other day, I wasn’t surprised when our youngest son told me that there are people in the old St. Louis cemetery who were born in the 1700s. St. Louis is a little crossing several miles north of here. There’s a church, a couple of small buildings, an overgrown house or two, and, several hundred feet off the road, the cemetery. There are more people in the cemetery than there are in St. Louis. In fact, I’ve driven through St. Louis several times and have yet to see a single live soul there — or a dead soul, for that matter. Would I recognize one? Our son is gathering material for songs. He doesn’t say that’s what he’s doing, but I know. Music is in his blood, and he takes his guitar and notebook with him everywhere. Even at the age of twenty he is nourished by the road, by places, voices, faces. I see in him much of the old-style troubadour. He is a great listener hungry for experience, possessed of creative fire. He is also tired from too little sleep, but that’s no fault of his own — the days simply aren’t long enough to do all that needs to be done. I’ve seen him reading at the kitchen table one moment and sleeping soundly with his head on the table the next. I’ve walked around him, opened and closed windows, curtains, and doors, and none of it disturbed him. I’ve run the washing machine, only a few feet away. I’ve spoken to him directly in a loud voice without so much as causing an eyelash to move. And often, when he finally does awaken, he is surprised to find that so little time has passed. There’s a girl — as there should be at that age — who, fortunately, seems to understand. Quite possibly, she’s a little strange — enough so to recognize that being normal can be dangerous to one’s mental health. Or she might simply be lonely, which, of course, is a natural state for a human being. Why should loneliness be considered a weakness or an illness? It’s neither. But the fact that these two young people are attracted to one another is most interesting of all, even if nothing comes of it in the traditional sense. After all, life is about making music — with other singers, songwriters, and musicians, and with people we meet along the way. If the music is good and it shows promise, we linger. If not, we move on. The real difference lies in the stories we tell ourselves as times goes on, and whether or not we turn them into something unrealistic or implausible in order to preserve some pathetically sane notion of who we are, or who we think we’ve become. *June 12, 2007* Previous Entry Next Entry Return to Songs and Letters About the Author	Many of the poems on this site are available in print editions. Main Page Author’s Note Background Notebook A Listening Thing Among the Living No Time to Cut My Hair One Hand Clapping Songs and Letters Collected Poems Early Short Stories Armenian Translations Cosmopsis Print Editions Interviews News and Reviews Highly Recommended Let’s Eat Favorite Books & Authors Useless Information Conversation E-mail & Parting Thoughts Flippantly Answered Questions
Top of Page