Most mornings, as I’ve written before, begin with me making my social-media rounds while sipping coffee and listening to music old and/or new. Today’s choice: singer-songwriter Charlotte Morris’ Both Sides Now album, which I plan to spotlight later this week ahead of its Friday release. At some point, I inevitably find myself spiraling backwards through spacetime to long-ago family gatherings, holiday get-togethers, weekend outings with my late mother-in-law, our once-regular B&N excursions, and—what else?—concerts, albeit all from 2008 onward. I.e., I browse my Facebook Memories. In some respects, they’re a virtual version of my old desk diaries, where I jotted down the esoterica of my life for a few years.
As a result, I can say with certainty that on this day (April 28) in 2009, Diane and I attended a Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band concert at the Philadelphia Spectrum. (We’d take in the next night’s show, too.) I also know that, four years later, I shared a blurry YouTube clip of Joni Mitchell singing “Both Sides Now” on The Johnny Cash Show in 1969. That I came across that “memory” while Charlotte Morris’ sublime rendition of the song played blew my mind. Talk about serendipity!
Further back in time, as recorded in my 1982 Garfield-themed desk diary, I attended a mock UN conference in Philadelphia, which meant I took a train into town and somehow navigated my way to Drexel University in order to meet up with fellow World Affairs Club geeks.
At a certain juncture, however, once enough caffeine has fired up the synapses and the music has flowed through the soul, I shutter the memories and launch Apple’s native word-processing app, Pages, and begin writing something/anything.
I’m at my most productive mid-morning.
The Old Grey Cat 