I love music streaming, it has enabled me to visit so much more available, without the hassle of trailing round record shops, or buying albums on spec, like in the old days. I was recently trying to explain to my son how the small town I grew up in had 3-4 shops designated to selling only records. Well, first, he has little conception of what a record is, but the idea that everything ever recorded wasn’t instantly accessible was incomprehensible to him.
So tonight, I open up Spotify, find an algorithm-generated playlist, and the first two songs on it are the two that had bookended my first post about my illness, back in early February. It’s strange how these things happen, or maybe not.
“Grey November, I’ve been down since July”
How someone raised in a small town in Pennsylvania can write something so perfectly tailored for me is beyond me, but that’s music and art isn’t it? Regular readers (both of you, I’m grateful, really!) will be bored to tears of my lifelong obsession with U2, so we will have to see how things go with Taylor, but the early signs are good, and once she hits 40 I’m sure things will pick up even more. Her last two albums have been masterpieces in my view, some real melancholically-infused art, with just that small amount of optimism and hope to keep me clinging on.
I’ve had a small setback on the road to recovery, or rather the road to recovery is taking a slight detour into the marshes. Differential recovery has caused a problem with my right shoulder to add to the ongoing problems with the left. I could tell you all about it, but it’s tedious, a small setback, and we have a plan to get through the swamp and onto firmer ground. It’s just taking longer and the pace of recuperation has stalled. But I’ll get there.
In the meantime, we have October, and thanks to climate change, the trees are no longer stripped bare. But there is less light, Summer has gone, and the Spring seems a long way away. I never do well at this time of year, Lockdown 2 was horrible for me, far worse that 1 or 3, although as ever I caveat that with the usual comments about my relative good fortune.
I’ve done my best to stop watching the news, it’s too depressing, and I’ve stopped posting on Facebook, mostly. Ironically I got 7/7 on the quiz on the BBC News website today for the first time ever, and I’ve been doing it for years. So it would seem there is no escape even if you try. Only one thing for it, I’ll have to run away.
On Sunday I’m going to attempt my first 200km ride since January, I’m counting no chickens so we will see how it goes. It’s a mark of real progress to even contemplate it, even if I can’t reach the top of the fridge or carry a suitcase to the car. But where there’s a dynamo and a power meter there’s a way. In any case, it’s the only antidote right now, that green hill not so far away.
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