A post-Thanksgiving holiday meal at the Asian restaurant. The fortune cookie tells me: "You don't worry about the Future." It's true. I don't. I think the future is unwritten, and basically doesn't really exist. We can imagine it. but really, this moment is it. This might be a flaw in my thinking. I don't really plan for the future either. So when I get there, hell, I don't know if I'll be prepared or not. Probably not. I figure I will cross that bridge when I get to it.
Lately, I have been swimming in the past. As the saying goes, "you may be through with the past, but the past isn't through with you." Right. Musically, I am back to my favorite go-to artists: Dylan (of course) and Neil Young, both solo and with Crazy Horse. I am swimming in music from the 70's, 80's & 90's. I also watched Jim Jarmusch's great movie "Year of the Horse" (1997) a couple times over the last few days.
This music, these artists are in my bones. My DNA. Two of the finest artists of our lifetimes. The Jarmusch movie is transcendent. Watch Neil Young become a wild stallion on stage. Watch 4 musicians become one powerful, overwhelming, ragged and raging vibe. It is fabulous.
I am also reading an old novel, one that I initially read in my early 20's. Going back. I look at my library and realize I have forgotten so much more than I have ever learned. I am about 20 pages or so into a fat book: Fyodor Dostoevsky's "The Brothers Karamazov" (1880). I remember that it was a profound novel, about big and great things. I am only about 20 pages into it now, and I realize it's also really, really funny.
Huh. I don't remember it being funny. But I was laughing at the boisterous, debauched father. I realize I don't know what I know. I don't remember what I used to know. Maybe re-visiting is essential. That's where I am at right now. Swimming in the past. Bringing it forward into the now.