{Note: The Madonna Timeline is an ongoing feature, where I put the iPod on shuffle, and write a little anecdote on whatever was going on in my life when that Madonna song was released and/or came to prominence in my mind.}

It will never rain, never rain

If the great sky falls down, no rain, no more rain

Blood’s pouring down, high alert, we watch it burn

It’s a world undeceived, sirens, sirens

Everyone’s whispering, the CIA, MI6

Hire the unknown

We’re at the end of days

For heaven’s sake 

The queen’s been slain

She’ll never rule again

The queen’s been slain

She’ll never rule again

Your queen’s been slain

Queen’s been slain

This lackluster Madonna Timeline entry was one of the’ Rebel Heart’ bonus tracks, and it probably should have been left off that hodge-podge too as it is a dirge-like bummer of a song. I suppose it holds a certain power and grace, offering a hint of royalty and a time of manners and honor and respect long gone. It was also reportedly written in honor of Princess Diana, which is neither here nor there.

I don’t much care for it, and that’s ok. The bridge is trying at best, echoing another sub-par work ‘Hey You’ (which is about as exciting as its title suggests). The rest is all gloom and doom, and we’ve had enough of that for the moment. Let’s fast-forward this – it’s one big meh…

Who will take her place?

It’s written on everyone’s face

The truth is slowly dawning

I hear tomorrow calling

Some things can’t be replaced

The realization of a new generation

On the eve of imitation

All gone, overthrown

May God bless you all.

SONG #135 – ‘Queen’

{Note: The Madonna Timeline is an ongoing feature, where I put the iPod on shuffle, and write a little anecdote on whatever was going on in my life when that Madonna song was released and/or came to prominence in my mind.}

HOLD ME CLOSER, FULL DISCLOSURE

LET IT OUT, LET ME IN

ON YOUR KNEES, CONFESS TO ME

EVERY DOUBT, EVERY SIN

THAT’S HOW LOVE’S SUPPOSED TO BE

Every work day begins with the same ritual: the walk from the car to the office building. Whether I’m being dropped off or parking on site, there is always The Walk. Throughout a decade and a half of state office work, I’ve had a number of variations on this theme, but The Walk has remained constant. From a parking lot where my Subaru would bake in the hot sun, to a comparatively luxurious covered-garage where the path to my desk was entirely shielded from the outside weather, The Walk was different for every location, but its essence was the same. These days I’m lucky enough to be driven to the side of my office building, where I make a brief but important fifty foot trek to the door. It’s short, but a lot happens in that small distance.

I WANNA KNOW WHAT YOU’RE ALL ABOUT

YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL WHEN YOU’RE BROKEN DOWN

LET YOUR WALLS CRUMBLE TO THE GROUND

LET ME LOVE YOU FROM THE INSIDE OUT

EVERY SCAR THAT YOU TRY TO HIDE

ALL THE DARK CORNERS OF YOUR MIND

SHOW ME YOURS AND I’LL SHOW YOU MINE

LET ME LOVE YOU FROM THE INSIDE OUT

It is here where I truly “dress” for the day. No matter what extravagance I’ve draped over my body, no matter which coat and bag I’ve chosen as armor, I’m not completely dressed until The Walk. You see, or you don’t see in this case, the most important thing a person can wear is not on the outside. It’s how you carry yourself. Do you believe enough in who you are to wear whatever you want? Or do you falter and waver, relying on a power suit or black dress to instill the confidence you lack? To me it depends on the day. Sometimes I am that strong, sometimes I’m not. No matter which it might be, I take a moment on The Walk to prepare myself for whatever may come. In the darkness of a winter morning or the bright emboldening sun of the summer, in the balmy humidity of August or the dry chill of February, I make The Walk, and try to decipher a little bit more of who we dare to be, and why.

LET’S DISCOVER ONE ANOTHER

KISS ME HERE, TOUCH ME THERE,

PUREST FORM OF ECSTASY

TRUTH OR DARE, DON’T BE SCARED

LET ME SOLVE YOUR MYSTERY

I summon the spirits of Miranda Priestley, Norma Desmond, and Margo Channing. I conjure the regal bearing of the kings and queens that history has worshipped and deified. I become imperious, haughty, untouchable and divine. With each step I inhale the brisk, blunt, bold persona I so desperately want to embody, and I build myself up to mythic stature through sheer force of will. If I believe it, they might believe it too. By the time I enter the building, I am, in my own mind and countenance, a formidable force. If only a fraction of that comes through, I might be all right. I might make it through the day.

I WANNA KNOW WHAT YOU’RE ALL ABOUT

YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL WHEN YOU’RE BROKEN DOWN

LET YOUR WALLS CRUMBLE TO THE GROUND

LET ME LOVE YOU FROM THE INSIDE OUT

EVERY SCAR THAT YOU TRY TO HIDE

ALL THE DARK CORNERS OF YOUR MIND

SHOW ME YOURS AND I’LL SHOW YOU MINE

LET ME LOVE YOU FROM THE INSIDE OUT

On most work days I take my lunch alone. I prefer it that way. In my line of work I have to deal with people all day – phone calls, meetings, discussions (even going to the bathroom can be a social booby trap) – so when I get a break I revel in whatever moments of solitude I can find. Yet even on my own, I’m keenly aware of how people react to me. I notice every furtive stare, every stolen glance, and I’m extremely, though inwardly, self-conscious about it. It’s a vicious little cycle – in paying attention to others, I’m deflected into paying attention to myself, which, contrary to all apparent evidence and popular belief, is not how I prefer to spend my time.

LET’S CROSS THE LINE

SO FAR WE WON’T COME BACK

CAN’T READ YOUR MIND

I SHOULDN’T HAVE TO ASK

CYNICAL SMILE

TIME TO TAKE OFF YOUR MASK

I’M ON YOUR SIDE

SO LET ME LOVE YOU

LET ME LOVE YOU

LET ME LOVE YOU FROM THE INSIDE OUT

Last week, for some unknown reason, I didn’t notice the people noticing me. A few surely were, I did catch one or two, mostly because I had a ridiculously over-the-top coat on. But then I looked down at the sidewalk, and then up at the buildings and storefronts, and when I stopped noticing them noticing me, I was overcome with a wild sense of relief, and a wonderful feeling of freedom. “When one’s mind is on one’s own business…”

Maybe it’s a sign of growing up. Maybe it’s a sign of authentic confidence. Maybe it’s a sign of genuinely not giving a shit what others think. When you play at something long enough, it tends to come true.

I WANNA KNOW WHAT YOU’RE ALL ABOUT

YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL WHEN YOU’RE BROKEN DOWN

LET YOUR WALLS CRUMBLE TO THE GROUND

LET ME LOVE YOU FROM THE INSIDE OUT

What does this have to do with a Madonna song? I’m not entirely sure. Madonna has always been about self-reflection/self-obsession, and a song like ‘Inside Out’ can be read as a simple ode of love to another, or as a way of getting to know your own self better. It’s one of the more majestic cuts from the ‘Rebel Heart’ opus, a beautiful power ballad with a meandering bass line and magnificent bridge. Pop perfection in a world that has lost touch with melody and song structure. At a more risky and romantic time, I would have given myself to this song, and to whomever held my interest at the time. I’m older now, and yearnings have quieted into something resembling sense.

EVERY SCAR THAT YOU TRY TO HIDE

ALL THE DARK CORNERS OF YOUR MIND

SHOW ME YOURS AND I’LL SHOW YOU MINE

LET ME LOVE YOU FROM THE INSIDE OUT

I still make The Walk every morning I go to work, but some days I forget myself, not bothering to build up the image that I expect others have of me. I forget to channel Madonna and Miranda and Margo, and I walk in without artifice or attitude, content to study the air, seeking a hint of spring, searching for something bigger than myself.

SONG #134: ‘Inside Out’

{Note: The Madonna Timeline is an ongoing feature, where I put the iPod on shuffle, and write a little anecdote on whatever was going on in my life when that Madonna song was released and/or came to prominence in my mind.}

It wasn’t starvation, it was simple hunger. The difference between a burnt bagel and a family torn apart and killed in the Holocaust. I do not lay claim to any sort of real suffering, not yet. But each of us has our own trials and tribulations, our own demons to be slain or worshipped. The longer we last, the more the world can wound us. The question is not who has suffered the most, but what we do with our pain if we are lucky enough to simply survive.

I WANT THE GOOD LIFE, BUT I DON’T WANT AN EASY RIDE

WHAT I WANT IS TO WORK FOR IT

FEEL THE BLOOD AND SWEAT ON MY FINGERTIPS

THAT’S WHAT I WANT FOR ME.

The rickety huts stood on stilts in the ocean off the coast of Manila. A glimpse of them seered itself into my memory bank as I visited the Philippines in 1997. We drove past the long rows of jumbled tin shacks, not much more than scrap pieces of metal propped up against each other, and groups of kids running and waving and smiling in the sun. Those smiles are what haunted me.

I WANT TO KNOW EVERYTHING, MAYBE SOME DAY I WILL

WHAT I WANT IS TO FIND MY PLACE

BREATHE THE AIR AND FEEL THE SUN ON MY CHILDREN’S FACE,

THAT’S WHAT I WANT.

The Westin Hotel in Manila is rich with dark wood. A pool extends behind it, and guards with conspicuous ear-pieces and sunglasses stand sentinel, lending a bit of tension to the most relaxing of moments. We take the elevator to our floor, and enter a spacious room. After a few days in the province with only a bucket for a shower, this is bliss. Then I think of those children again.

I GO ROUND AND ROUND JUST LIKE A CIRCLE

I CAN SEE A CLEARER PICTURE

WHEN I TOUCH THE GROUND I COME FULL CIRCLE TO MY PLACE AND I AM HOME,

I AM HOME.

Walking to the little balcony, I am dismayed to see the door has been left open a crack. Warily I suspect there will be mosquito bites in the morning. I walk onto the ledge and peer out onto the courtyard in front of the hotel. Half a world away from any home I’ve ever known, with an Uncle who left me to my own devices and a family I’d never met before, I’ve already done away with any shiver of loneliness. We’ve come to the end of our trip – my first to my Dad’s homeland – and in such a short time I’ve already grown up a little. For all the cock-fighting, beer-drinking, karaoke-singing craziness of the Philippines, it is the image of those kids that stays with me. They looked so happy, but they lived in such squalor. I’d never seen poverty like that. I couldn’t get my head around it, and knowing it was my own background and privilege that prevented me from understanding better didn’t make it any easier.

I WANT TO LET GO OF ALL DISAPPOINTMENT THAT’S WAITING FOR ME

WHAT I WANT IS TO LIVE FOREVER, NOT DEFINED BY TIME AND SPACE

IT’S A LONELY PLACE,

THAT’S WHAT I WANT

They lived in the extremes of dust and mud. It was caked on their faces and feet. Their clothes were torn and ragged, and their hair was matted and weighted down with dirt and oil. Most played in their dangerous terrain without shoes, and the ones I did see were worn flip-flops on the verge of disintegration. Yet they smiled, and laughed, and waved – and it was the most genuine and heartbreaking sort of joy I’ve seen in my forty-plus years: the utter bliss of being a child and having nothing to do but play the day away. I wondered what sort of terror they witnessed when a typhoon swept everything into the ocean, or disease and death stole parts of their family away.

I GO ROUND AND ROUND JUST LIKE A CIRCLE

I CAN SEE A CLEARER PICTURE

WHEN I TOUCH THE GROUND I COME FULL CIRCLE TO MY PLACE AND I AM HOME,

I AM HOME.

I’m sorry. I don’t know why I wrote all of this for a Madonna song. Maybe because one man’s supposed torture would be an easy ride for any one of those children. My life has certainly been easy in comparison, and I gratefully own up to living an enchanted and charmed existence. That doesn’t mean I haven’t seen things. It doesn’t mean I’m unaware. It simply signifies that everyone’s ride is different. Sometimes it’s difficult, sometimes it’s easy. Rarely is it one set thing. For the lucky, life can be long. The chance to be loved, the chance to run about and play on a sunny day – these pockets of salvation in the midst of hell are what get us through the journey.

In the darkest and most shameful part of my soul, I wondered if my discomfort at seeing such happiness in such seeming poverty made my misery mean so much less. There are ugly sides to almost all of us.

I GO ROUND AND ROUND JUST LIKE A CIRCLE

I CAN SEE A CLEARER PICTURE

WHEN I TOUCH THE GROUND I COME FULL CIRCLE TO MY PLACE AND I AM HOME,

I AM HOME.

As for this particular song on the timeline, it begins and ends with a flourish of strings, fitting bookends of elegance to Madonna’s’American Life’ electronic pastoral. This one is a down-tempo orchestral beauty that magically completes one of her most controversial, and therefore under-rated, albums. It’s also turning out to be one of the most ahead-of-its-time albums given the current state of political affairs.

I GO ROUND AND ROUND JUST

ROUND AND ROUND JUST

Being invincible doesn’t mean you haven’t been battered. In my experience, the most invincible among us are usually the most battered. But somehow, they get up again, they go on, they become invincible because of the battering the world gives them.

SONG #133 – ‘Easy Ride’

{Note: The Madonna Timeline is an ongoing feature, where I put the iPod on shuffle, and write a little anecdote on whatever was going on in my life when that Madonna song was released and/or came to prominence in my mind.}

A stand-out track from Madonna’s most recent ‘Rebel Heart’ album, ‘Devil Pray’ intertwines drugs, booze, religion, and faith into one folksy sing-along, somewhat reminiscent of ‘House of the Rising Sun’ and unlike anything she’s done before. Surprisingly spiritual, melodically accessible, and as fun to sing as it is rich to ruminate upon, this is classic Madonna, over three decades into her reign.

TAKE MY SINS AND WASH THEM AWAY

TEACH ME HOW TO PRAY

I’VE BEEN STRANDED HERE IN THE DARK

TAKE THESE WALLS AWAY

I’VE BEEN SWIMMING IN THE OCEAN

‘TIL I’M ALMOST DROWNED

GIVE ME SOMETHING I CAN BELIEVE IN

TEACH ME HOW TO PRAY

At the end of the winter of 2015, I drive along the Massachusetts turnpike. Dirty snow, but not a lot of it, winds along the edge of the road, and gritty salt and mud spray coats the front of the Ice Blue Show Queen. We are both a little tattered at the end of the winter, both in need of escape. She longs for a sunny day in the driveway with Andy, I long for a similar day behind the house and beside the pool. Each of us pines for something just beyond our grasp, but at the tail end of the forlorn season neither expects much.

AND WE CAN DO DRUGS AND WE CAN SMOKE WEED AND WE CAN DRINK WHISKEY

YEAH, WE CAN GET HIGH AND WE CAN GET STONED

AND WE CAN SNIFF GLUE AND WE CAN DO E AND WE CAN DROP ACID

FOREVER BE LOST WITH NO WAY HOME

YEAH, WE CAN RUN AND WE CAN HIDE

BUT WE WON’T FIND THE ANSWERS

IF YOU GO DOWN THEN YOU’LL GET HELP ALONG THE WAY

BUT IF YOU WANT TO SAVE YOUR SOUL

THEN WE COULD TRAVEL ALTOGETHER

AND MAKE THE DEVIL PRAY

In Boston, candles flicker in the condo, their reflection mingling with the patches of snow seen beyond the window on Braddock Park. One reaches the end of its life, quietly expiring in a thin wisp of smoke. It smells like winter; spring is not yet in the air. Hunkering down with a cup of hot green tea, I sit on the couch and open a book, enjoying the simple luxury of the moment, waiting for the winter to go.

MOTHER MARY CAN’T YOU HELP ME

‘CAUSE I’VE GONE ASTRAY

ALL THE ANGELS THAT WERE AROUND ME

HAVE ALL FLOWN AWAY

THE GROUND BENEATH MY FEET’S GETTING WARMER

LUCIFER IS NEAR

HOLDING ON, BUT I’M GETTING WEAKER

WATCH ME DISAPPEAR

My mind wanders back to Brandeis, to a small pool of water in the midst of three houses of worship. Founded on the principles of diversity and freedom of religion, Brandeis ensured that each sanctuary offered a suitable space for its disciples. As a Catholic, I stepped into the church and sat in the last pew, kneeling down as I made the sign of the cross. In a state of loneliness tinged with some slight homesickness, it was a way of reconnecting to my life at home.

Outside, the morning is pretty, filled with a low September sun that was just starting to burn away the fog. When I exit the church, my eyes need a moment to adjust to the light.

I will attend Sunday services only a few more times. My homesickness will soon abate, my loneliness will travel with me for life, and I will come to understand that God can be by my side at all times. That sanctuary opened up to me when I was a little kid, squirming around on the cool, cruel hardness of the dark-stained wooden pews of St. Mary’s church, and I realized that God didn’t require the ritual and the confinement, and certainly not when one was a child. I knew too, however, that my parents did need that tradition, out of superstition or blind faith, and even at that young age I knew that the way through, in the easiest way possible, was to pretend certain things. So I sat upright again, my feet dangling over the wood, my hands cupping a violet I’d picked from the back yard and brought now as an offering to Jesus.

AND WE CAN DO DRUGS AND WE CAN SMOKE WEED AND WE CAN DRINK WHISKEY

YEAH, WE CAN GET HIGH AND WE CAN GET STONED

AND WE CAN SNIFF GLUE AND WE CAN DO E AND WE CAN DROP ACID

FOREVER BE LOST WITH NO WAY HOME

Shifting back to Boston, like walking to a different stained-glass tableaux, we revisit the end of winter. My book has been closed as my mind recalls those September Sundays at school. There is comfort in those memories, even as they are rife with tension and unresolved issues. One can’t return to certain moments with impunity and safety. Memories carry always the risk of forgotten agony and hidden heartache. Tonight, however, the risk has no unintended or ill consequences. Tonight, it is simply the return to a simpler time.

YEAH, WE CAN RUN AND WE CAN HIDE

BUT WE WON’T FIND THE ANSWERS

IF YOU GO DOWN THEN YOU’LL GET HELP ALONG THE WAY

BUT IF YOU WANT TO SAVE YOUR SOUL

THEN WE COULD TRAVEL ALTOGETHER

AND MAKE THE DEVIL PRAY

The next day, I return to the Massachusetts Turnpike, still bordered by brown snow, still dirty and dismal, and drive back to Albany. I sing along with Madonna as she tells her story. I think of all the places we’ve been together. I think about where we might go next.

OOOH SING HALLELUJAH

OOOH SAVE MY SOUL

OOOH THE DEVIL’S HERE TO FOOL YA

UNTIL MY STORY’S TOLD

SONG #132: ‘Devil Pray’ – Winter/Spring 2015