New Years Day

"The job of art is to chase away ugliness." - Bono of U2

U2 is so big, so successful, so good, I sometimes just forget about them. I mean, their music is burned deep into my my cells, my chromosomes, my DNA by now. I used to play some of their records - yes, the original vinyl kind - over and over at top volume for years and years.

I'll never forget, I once owned a Pontiac Fiero, probably one of the worst cars ever made, it had a mid-engine design, which meant that if you hit a patch of ice at high speed, it would tend to spin clockwise, it would literally start spinning like a top. It happened to me twice, high speed, on different highways.

Anyway one time the Lovely Carla and I are cruising, we hit a patch of ice on an overpass and nearly careen over onto another highway. Instead we hit the guardrail, hard. And come to a smoking stop on the side of the highway. We were both wearing seat belts which probably saved us. But Carla was literally knocked out (when she came to, she remembered nothing of the accident). Her head had bounced off the passenger side window. I hit the steering wheel, my chest got the worst of it, I was stunned, but with all my faculties in tact.

Anyway, it was one of those times where everything was in slow motion. I could see we were out of control, spinning, hitting, bouncing. We came to a dead stop and the only sound is a buzzing in my head, my synapses crackling, and U2's album "War" is blasting out of the cassette player, the music just washing over us. It was like a movie. Carla is out, I'm stunned, and the music is filling up the universe.

They way I remembered it, the album just played over and over, for hours? Couldn't be right. Until the police came. A cop finally turned the music off. And then our lives started up again.