A Son’s Question on Father’s Day

Father’s Day weekend my daughter was at the beach with a friend, so I got to have some good father/son time with my 10-year-old Aaron.  We had a great time hanging out, playing video games, catching up on Iron Man and Iron Man 2 and eating manly food.  I took him to Outback Steakhouse for the first time, and he loved it!  My daughter did call me Sunday to wish me Happy Father’s Day, and we talked for quite a long time as she told me all the fun stuff she was doing with her friend.

Aaron will be 11 in a little over a month, and he’s got a serious crush on a gal at school and was lamenting not being able to see her all summer.  When school was winding down a few weeks back I told him that the yearbooks they got at the end of the year offered the perfect opportunity to try and stay in touch– when they exchanged books to sign, he could ask for her phone number or give her his number so they could call over the summer.  He flushed red at the suggestion, and said he just couldn’t do that.  Not that I was in any moral high ground there– being too bashful or shy when it came to girls pretty much defined my adolescence and early adulthood.  But quite a few girls I pined for from a distance and never made a move years later would tell me that they always wondered why I didn’t ask them out on a date.  I told Aaron that regrets can really pile up if you let bashfulness rule your life.

Of course, he’s only 10, but still… as a dad I want my son to have much more success with girls and women that I did, and if I can lay some groundwork now before puberty hits and all those hormones and awkward body changes surge through him maybe I can help make things a bit easier for him.

Anyway, this weekend being filled with so much good father/son time, I mentioned to Aaron that part of my job as a father is teach him and impart what wisdom I’ve gained through the years.  “If you have any questions about boys and girls, men and women and their bodies, sex or anything like that, I want you to feel free to ask me anything and I will do my best to give you a good answer.”

He nodded and thought for a few seconds.  “I actually do have a question, Dad,” he said.

My mind raced, wondering what in the world he’d ask me.

“Why do girls try to control you so much?”

I had to laugh… my ten-year-old son, asking such a question?  What sort of girls do they have at his elementary school?  Of course, this is the sort of “mysteries of the universe” question that if I had a real good answer to I could probably write some books and retire a wealthy man.  Aaron is a very bright and perceptive young man, but he’s still only 11 years old, so how to answer him?

“Well,” I said, “perhaps some try to control boys because they don’t feel strong in other areas, maybe they don’t feel physically as strong, or maybe their don’t feel like they have much say in what goes on at home, so trying to exert control over boys gives them that feeling of strength they’re missing.”

“Hmm…”

I thought a few moments more.  “Also, I think sweet guys like you and me, we enjoy making other people happy, and sometimes people will take advantage of that, so whatever girl you like, make sure that she wants to make you happy too, and that you’re not just giving and she’s not just taking.  Does that make sense?”

“Yes, I think so,” he said.  “Thanks, Dad!”

Later, I mentioned this conversation to my roommate, who’s got the experience of having three ex-wives and numerous girlfriends over the years, and he laughed and laughed mightily.  Of course, as grown-up divorced men we could certainly get cynical and dark when it comes to pondering why women try to exert such control over their men, but my son is just starting to tip-toe towards the wonders that the opposite sex hold out to us.  It’s a helluva bumpy ride that lasts a lifetime full of ups and downs, and I want to do my best to give him the tools he needs to hopefully enjoy the trip.  I hope he’ll ask me a lot of these sorts of questions in the coming years.

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…She’d Love Seafood Too

Okay, so my new healthy eating plan has been going really well, and I’ve got a pretty good routine going with foods that I like… but most of it are things that are easy to prepare and things I can prepare ahead of time and warm up later in the microwave.  And that’s all fine and good…

…But sometimes you’re in the grocery store and see a package of scallops and your mouth starts salivating and your heart speeds up a little faster.  It probably didn’t help that I was a rather hungry at the time (rule of thumb – never go to the grocery store hungry).

I love seafood… I mean really love it.  Shrimp is probably my all-time favorite, but scallops are right up there too, and since they’re a bit more expensive I rarely have scallops.  It’s been so long I can’t even recall when the last time I had scallops was.

Suddenly, I found a package of scallops in my basket.  I recalled that I had some rainbow Swiss chard and broccoli at home (ingredients for my Green Smoothies) that were getting a little wilted, and figured I could toss them in my big fry pan as I saute the scallops.  I then ran across a package of sliced mushrooms, “exotic blend” which had Shiitake, Oyster, and Porcini mushrooms… and I knew my dish was complete.

I would dub thee… Scallops Delight!

So I added a little olive oil to my fry pan, tossed in the mushrooms, broccoli and chard to get them started, added the scallops, tossed in a little garlic powder, pepper, and Italian seasonings, and after about 10-15 minutes it was ready for my plate.  I added a sweet potato and looked at my dinner.

I just had to take a picture…

Yep, I made this

Looks good, huh?  I plugged the recipe into Calorie Count and it wasn’t bad at all, just 560 calories and fit right in with my plan.

I could have easily split this in two and had a side salad to round out the meal.  I had a brief moment of thinking “damn shame I don’t have a special lady to share this with!”  But then I dug in and just delighted in satisfying my seafood craving.

Do you like seafood?  It was easy to make, go indulge yourself

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The Plot Thickens…

A couple months back an old friend had gotten in touch, saying she was going to be in town visiting some friends and wanted to know if I could meet up with her so we could catch up.  I met J.L. many years ago when she was the freshman roommate with my sister, and instantly liked her.  She was brainy, quiet, a bit shy, and totally adorable and attractive without even realizing it.  My sister– who was a bit of a wild child at the time — kinda brought her out of her shell, and a few weekends a year I visited my sister we all would party and have a great time.  J.L. and I struck up a friendship and wrote letters to each other for a little while.  I even still have a picture catching us on a quick midnight kiss for New Years.

Eventually J.L. and my sis took different paths and didn’t hang out so much, and I lost touch with J.L. (though my sister kept in touch).  Fast forward a couple decades and now we have Facebook, wonderfully getting us all back in touch with friends we lost track of over the years.  When I saw J.L. post something on my sister’s wall, I sent her a friends request, hoping that she’d friend me back, and was thrilled when she did.  I was curious to see where life had taken her.

Well, turns out that J.L. is still brainy — she just got her doctorate — and is still totally adorable and attractive.  We love lots of the same books (and sent each other book recommendations), have the same politics, share a similar sense of humor… in short, just a really awesome woman.  So I was really looking forward to meeting up with her before — not for possible romance (for those of you wondering), she has a boyfriend — but just because, as I talked about before (Paradigm Shift) I want to expand my circle of friends and JL is Good People!  Not only will it be great getting reacquainted, but who knows who I might meet through her?

Unfortunately our meet-up falls through… I had wanted to take the kids to see The Hobbit, and it turned out the best time for them ran right into the meet-up time with JL… I texted her when we were done, but she was winding down and wouldn’t be up too much longer.  “We can try again another time,” she said.

So it looks like next time will be… this Saturday!  We’ll be meeting for dinner to talk and catch up — for me it’s Splurge Saturday, so we’ll be going to Plaza Azteca for yummy Mexican food and maybe a margarita– and then later I’m going to meet her at a bar to watch her boyfriend’s band perform (he actually lives nearby).  I love watching live music — and occasionally performing it!

And to make things extra intriguing, she recently left this in the comments of one of my Facebook status updates:

I need to mosey over to your blog. BTW, I’ve a gal you might wanna meet. *GRIN* We’ll talk … I’ll be good.

My response, naturally…

Hee hee, the plot thickens….

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The Reboot: Bennie 3.0

Sorry I haven’t written much lately.  I guess I haven’t been overly inspired…  Losing my father and both my grandmothers in the span of four months the tail end of last year really knocked the wind out of my sails, and then recently I had a health scare regarding someone who is very close to me (and who seems to be coming through it okay, fingers crossed and prayers for continued success).

While family and friends have been a blessing of support during these times, not having a significant other to lean on for comfort and strength has me feeling particularly lonely and sad, which in turn has made it tough to blog “on theme.”

When I started this blog, I had just gone through a split with my wife, and rather than become bitter about marriage and women, I wanted to use the blog to focus on what I loved about women, to be a source of positivity and joy.   Memories of past relationships have been a treasure trove of inspiration for quite a few posts over the life of this blog… but I’m beginning to feel like I’m scraping the bottom of the barrel.  I really haven’t had all that many relationships so the pickings were slim to begin with.

No… what I really need is to make new memories!

But then I look at myself, look at my life and wonder:  how in the world can I really expect to find anyone willing to date me?  I’m overweight, out of shape, and between working a full and part-time job, and visitation with my kids, there’s very little time I could spend on dates.  I’ve got some discretionary spending, but supporting two kids ain’t cheap.  Plus, my “good” car (I also have an old van) is a hand-me-down from my ex that’s good for shuttling kids around but isn’t really something that would impress a date.

Now, I know I have a lot of positives going for me and have a lot to offer the right woman, but I have to be honest with myself and question whether a good woman would take a chance on me, given the relative downsides I listed above.  The other day it occurred to me:  I’ve got quite a few female friends… so why have they not tried to set me up with any of their single women friends?  The answer:  why would they?

Last week I finally recovered from a really nasty cold, and Thursday I was feeling so much better… and it reminded me of the times in my life where I decided to take my health more seriously, began to eat right and exercised… and once I’d begun to do that, the feeling you get from feeling so much better…  it makes you wonder why in the world you stopped to begin with.  I latched on to that feeling, and decided to get back on the program.  For real this time.  If I want to make new memories, I need to be the kind of man a woman wants to be with.  I’m a good man, kind and generous, smart… really the only thing (I think) holding me back is a healthy body.

I’ve done a lot of diets over the years, and read a lot about health.  I knew what works and what I wanted to do.  So Saturday I planned it out, splurged a bit on some “bad” food, and then this past Sunday kicked it off!  I’ll detail my new way of eating in another post soon, but as of Day 4 everything is going according to plan… and I’m pretty stoked!

Regarding the time and money… well, I have managed to shift my life around to the point that I have each Friday and Saturday off.  Every other Saturday I get my kids, but that still leaves Fridays and every other Saturdays to spend time with future lady friends.  Money… well, that’s not something I see changing for a while, but I’m pretty creative in finding fun things to do that don’t cost a whole lot of money.  I’m not going to be anyone’s sugar-daddy that’s for sure, but I think we can have some fun.

As far as my car… well, this year I do plan on getting a new car.  Or at least, a car that’s “new to me” just not too old.  Assuming my current car holds out, I’m looking at July or so for the purchase… and when I go shopping, I’ll certainly be looking for something that I can be proud to pull up in front of a future date’s house.

So anyway… I suppose the focus of this blog is going to shift a bit to be more about my reboot, becoming “Bennie 3.0” and my quest to becoming the kind of guy my women friends want to set their friends up with.  Should be a fun ride!  What do you think?

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If You Were a Girl, You’d Always Be Pregnant

“I’m not saying I would put a stop to the project, because I’m sort of a nice guy. When I was a kid, my mother said, ‘Stephen if you were a girl, you’d always be pregnant.’”

I was reading a recent interview with Stephen King where he shares the news that he’s writing a sequel of sorts to The Shining, one of my favorite King books — well, one of my favorite horror books, period!  I wrote a blog post about being a horror fan before, so if you’ve read me a while you probably already know that.

Anyway, I’m reading the interview, smiling at the always amusing and down-to-earth King, and getting excited about the notion of seeing where Danny Torrance is now, 30 years after the horrible things that happened to him as a boy at the Overlook.  And then I get to the quote above, and it gets me thinking about the difference between men and women… in other words, grist for a long overdue blog post!

First off, I found it interesting that King’s Mom would say such a thing to her son as a kid!  It makes me wonder if the anecdote is accurate given how memory works as years go by– god bless him, but it’s been quite a while since King was a kid.  But let’s assume she did say that to a very young Stephen… wouldn’t he respond with “What do you mean?”

And what would Mrs. King say to that question?

The context of the quote was an interview question concerning Warner Brothers potentially developing a prequel to The Shining based on material cut from the beginning of the novel King wrote.  King doesn’t want that to happen — he doesn’t explain why, but we can assume than as an artist he decided to cut that part out of his book and likely feels that his creative decision should stand — but he mentioned that he isn’t sure he’d put up a fight to stop Warner Brothers from going forward with the project.  Then he says:

“I’m not saying I would put a stop to the project, because I’m sort of a nice guy. When I was a kid, my mother said, ‘Stephen if you were a girl, you’d always be pregnant.’”

Which then got me thinking… the whole “nice guy” persona, something I’m very much familiar with, really is pretty much a male phenomenon.  I thought back to the posts I wrote about The Friend Zone, and The Mating Habits of Beta Men, but with an eye on just how different the whole friendly/nice dynamic is different depending on whether you’re the guy or the girl.  Being “the nice guy” really does tend to put you in a place where romantic and sexual contact is pretty rare, whereas being “the nice girl” can get you a fair amount of romantic and sexual contact if you so choose.  I often think about how interesting it must be to be a woman who has that power of choice, the ability to take a friendship with a man and one day just take it to another level if she desires.  How do women feel about having that freedom?  Are they thrilled by it?  Or burdened by it, in a “with great power comes great responsibility” sort of way?

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Signals, Noise, and the Isle of Misfit Toys

The other night after getting home from work late I fixed a glass of wine and flipped over the movie channels to watch a little something while I relaxed and got ready for bed.  I settled on watching the beginning of The Dreamers.  I really like that movie for quite a few reasons– I love the unabashed sexual under- and over-tones, the blatant artsy-ness of it… and I really love the youthful energy, the raw joyful lifeforce of the lead performances.  I’ve seen the movie a couple of times, and had to remind myself that it was late and I didn’t need to get hooked on the movie and end up staying up way too late on a work night, but I gave myself about 20 minutes of the movie… the “getting to know each other” part, where the young American in Paris meets and falls for the young French brother and sister.  The romance of the new relationships developing from the very beginning are fun to watch.

It had me think back to my younger days, past relationships both romantic and platonic, and beginnings.  I mean, of course it’s the very nature of youth that you’re immersed in the new; new experiences and new relationships built upon those experiences.  I thought about beginnings, meeting my ex, and other romantic connections, and how I met the people who became significant friendships in my life.  Those meetings, in retrospect how relatively easy and plentiful they seemed to be back then– not everything stuck, but there was an enviable volume of new encounters, and through the noise there were signals that drew us together that were strong, exciting, potent.  Back then I didn’t think of it like that, and I certainly used to give in to despair and loneliness a lot more than I should have, but I realize now, when I wasn’t feeling sorry for myself back then, there were plenty of connections being thrown out there to explore.  I certainly grabbed a decent share of them and they made their mark in my life.

As I get older, and especially as I shed the life I had as a married man, I realize that it’s so much harder now to find new signals.  People I’ve known for years and years have their long-term connections they’ve built and maintained, and are on cruise-control, warm, familiar and constant.  I suppose if my marriage hadn’t failed I’d probably be much the same way.  But I had my comfort stripped away, my foundation rocked, and the roles I used to play — the roles I’m supposed to play — in so many of my long-term connections is suddenly screwed up.  Instead of a solid rock I’m now quicksand, all needy and flailing about, and suddenly possessed of this desire to look for more signals in all this fucking noise.  Here I am, middle-aged, and what I need, what I want, are more beginnings.  So many people my own age, it seems they’ve put that sort of thing squarely in the past– it’s about nurturing what they have and planning out how it all ends up… and I realize I don’t quite comfortably fit in with them anymore.  My wants and needs and dreams are almost alien to them and I can sense that in the distance that’s been put up between us.

But then I certainly don’t fit in with the few people I know who are out there looking for beginnings, beaming signals through the static– mostly of course they’re young, and they think an old guy like me certainly wouldn’t be interested in [fill in the blank].  It doesn’t even hit their radar that maybe I’d like to hang out one night and talk about philosophy, or music, or love, or art, or politics, that maybe my signal might be interesting, engaging, and heck– maybe even a significant chapter in the story of your life given the chance.

So it’s like I don’t fit in with the people my age, and I don’t fit in with the younger folks.  I feel like a refugee from the Island of Misfit Toys.  It’s a strange goddamn state to be in, and quite a challenge that’s for sure.  I’m definitely excited about trying to muddle my way through this perplexing chapter of my life, to fix my tuner and carve through the static.  There’s gotta be other signals out there, other connections to be made, chapters to write, people — maybe other misfit toys — to walk with.

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Time Traveling

Not long ago I wrote about eliminating light from my bedroom so that I can sleep in total darkness, and the hopes that I would reap some of the alleged benefits from sleeping that way.  Almost immediately I could tell a difference in how deep I slept.  It’s kinda hard to explain, but sleeping this way now lets me know by contrast just how light I was sleeping before, drifting in and out of sleep, getting up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom once or twice a night, tossing and turning.  Now, a few minutes after I turn out the lights I’m gone, like dropping into a deep dark hole for solid hours and hours.  When I wake up in the morning I’m in a bit of a daze because I’m climbing out of a deep sleep without the benefit of sunlight, but once I turn on the lights and get moving, I know– I’ve been ASLEEP!  And I feel recharged!

And the dreams!  I’m not sure if sleeping this way lets me dream more vividly, or if I’m just dreaming in a deep slumber right up until waking now as opposed to shifting from deep to light sleep before waking, or maybe some combination of them both, but I’m loving it.  I’ve always had vivid dreams that I remember here and there in the past, but now it feels like just about every morning I awake with at least a good chunk of a dream remembered, letting me reflect on it in the shower and on the drive into work.

Last night’s dream was nice, starring my ex but it was like traveling through time back to when we first met 20-some years ago– the “happy days.”  Thinking back on the dream this morning was funny, how young we both were in the dream–just kids really–crazy about each other.  And it got me thinking… Sometimes now and then as I ponder the long, slow wreckage of our marriage, I question whether she ever really, truly loved me, or whether she was in love with the idea of being in love with me… or maybe was just settling on me as a safe and steady choice.  And the thought of not ever really having someone head over heels in love with me… made the romantic soul in me very sad.

But the dream… I know it was just a dream, but it felt very real as opposed to accurate, and the emotions and things that happened in the dream captured the spirit of the our situation all those years ago.  No, it wasn’t perfect, and it certainly didn’t end the way one would have hoped… but the dream reminded me, deep in my gut, that for a while there… she really did love me, head over heels.  Which makes me glad.

Funny how the brain works when you let it…

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Ready for Happiness in the New Year

Wow, hard to believe 2012 is winding down, huh?  Time sure flies, and seems to fly faster every year.  Remember as a child when an hour seemed soooo loooong (especially if you’re doing something you don’t like) and summer vacation lasted forever?  Now you blink and days and months have rushed by.  I’ve actually heard a theory as to why that is back when I was in college that makes a lot of sense.  When you’re a child, each unit of time represents a much larger percentage of your experience than you do as you get older.  When you’re 10 years old, a year is 1/10th of your total experience, 10%.  When you’re 25 a year is 1/25th or 4% of your total experience.  At 50 a year is 1/50th or 2% of your total experience.

I think the morale of that story is, as you get older, you really should make the most of the time you have, dedicate as much as you can to the things that make you happy.  Your passions, your family, your friends.  And for God’s sake, don’t waste time!

That said, I spent a lot of time recently doing not much of anything.  Some of you who read my blog know I work a ton– I’ve got a full-time job, and a part-time job that I work quite a bit, and a regular weekly gig writing about a hobby I enjoy.  In the days leading up to Christmas I had off from my full-time job, but worked a bunch of extra  hours at my part-time job– 44 hours in 4 days.  And then, from December 26th through Dec 30th… I had no work at all.  Not my full-time job, not my part-time job (though I did still do my weekly writing gig, but I love doing that so it really doesn’t feel much like work).  Five blessed days off work… why, it’s rather unheard for me in my modern era!  I’d had hopes to visit family, get organized, clean house, run errands… and while I did do some of that, for the most part I just chilled out alone, caught up on sleep, watched some movies, played some games.  Didn’t follow any schedule, didn’t set any alarms.

It was wonderful!

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A Man Worthy of a Strong Woman

My friend Molly put up a meme on Facebook that was taken from Jada Pinkett-Smith’s Facebook page that I thought was pretty powerful.  I’ve always liked Pinkett-Smith, she’s always struck me as a very strong and smart woman (in addition to being beautiful).  Even though she’s physically so small, especially compared to her hunky husband Will Smith, I’ve never gotten the impression that she takes the back seat in their relationship.  They seem like they have a partnership of equals.

Here’s what she wrote:

“How is man to recognize his full self, his full power through the eye’s of an incomplete woman? The woman who has been stripped of Goddess recognition and diminished to a big ass and full breast for physical comfort only. The woman who has been silenced so she may forget her spiritual essence because her words stir too much thought outside of the pleasure space. The woman who has been diminished to covering all that rots inside of her with weaves and red bottom shoes.

I am sure the men, who restructured our societies from cultures that honored woman, had no idea of the outcome. They had no idea that eventually, even men would render themselves empty and longing for meaning, depth and connection.  There is a deep sadness when I witness a man that can’t recognize the emptiness he feels when he objectifies himself as a bank and truly believes he can buy love with things and status.  It is painful to witness the betrayal when a woman takes him up on that offer.

He doesn’t recognize that the [creation] of a half woman has contributed to his repressed anger and frustration of feeling he is not enough. He then may love no woman or keep many half women as his prize.

He doesn’t recognize that it’s his submersion in the imbalanced warrior culture, where violence is the means of getting respect and power, as the reason he can break the face of the woman who bore him 4 four children.

When woman is lost, so is man. The truth is, woman is the window to a man’s heart and a man’s heart is the gateway to his soul.

Power and control will NEVER out weigh love.

May we all find our way.”

~ Jada Pinkett-Smith

Now, for as long as I can remember, I’ve been drawn to strong women.  My mom is strong, my sister is strong, so I grew up admiring strength in women.  I’ve never quite understood the attraction to a woman who’s subservient to her man, but I just figured, at some level, I wasn’t really manly-man or macho enough to have that swagger and urge to dominate.  I didn’t really see it as a weakness within myself, rather just as being a bit different from the archetypical male.

But Pinkett-Smith’s words here make me think that perhaps it’s that swagger, that urge to dominate, that can be a real weakness, especially when it pushes men to put women “in their place,” to be quiet, submissive.  How is man to recognize his full self, his full power through the eye’s of an incomplete woman?  These men tear women down to cover their own weakness, and end up diminishing themselves in the process.  And perhaps being drawn to strong women, that finding their strength attractive, is in fact a real strength within myself.

My muse Rachel touched on a similar theme in her recent blogpost “Head for business, bod for sin.“  She was reflecting on the struggles that women were going through in the countries of the Arab Spring, how there’s been a back-lash against women, pushing them to cover up and hush up.  She goes on to reflect on women’s struggles here in the States, and her own struggle as a smart woman in a body that’s stereotypically not taken as serious as she deserves.  It’s a good read, you should check it out.

Rachel concludes with:

“Well, I am upending this story.   I am about to conquer the world in my short, round, curvy, fat-assed, curly-headed body.   If no one lets me have a seat at the table cause I don’t seem to portray certain things-  well, watch me build my own table.”

Now, what kind of man doesn’t want a woman like Rachel, or Pinkett-Smith, by his side?  Who doesn’t want to tap into that strength and vitality to help you conquer whatever stands in your way, to build a life worth living, sharing, and celebrating?  Because a man worthy of the love of such women is a worthy man indeed.

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Of Monsters and Men and Social Animals

Of Monsters and Men

So recently I got to check off one item from my bucket list:  getting to see the amazing song Little Talks performed live by Of Monsters and Men.  I just love that song so much; from the moment I first heard it I just swooned.  Every part of the song just brings a goofy smile to my face– the music, the singers, the lyrics– and just etched into my soul the need to see it, feel it, and bathe in the performance.  So when I saw the announcements months ago that they were going to come right here to Richmond to play, I prepared to snap up tickets the moment they were available.

I’m glad I did– the show sold out weeks ago!  But I had my tickets…

Unfortunately, I couldn’t seem to find anyone who wanted to go with me to the show, so I ended up selling the extra ticket.  Thankfully, I did know two friends who already had tickets so I was able to sit with them and enjoy the show in friendly solidarity rather than having to be alone in a crowd like when I went to see the last show (Neko Case).  While I loved getting to see Neko Case live, it was a mixed blessing… being alone in a crowd of people who were all in groups of two, three, or more really kind of emphasized the rather lonely situation of being an older divorced father who’s friends are mostly all paired up and settled down.  Which makes me a bit of a oddball who doesn’t seem to fit in with anyone socially.  I left the show feeling both elated and melancholy.

Thankfully for the Of Monsters and Men show I had two friends to sit with, which made all the difference in the world.  We are really such social animals, and the security of being part of a small group within this huge, sold-out crowd gave me the ability to just lose myself in the music and the energy of the live performance.

This is an actual pic from the show that my friend Tommy took from where we sat

And oh, what a performance!  Of Monsters and Men is a seven-piece band of some really talented musicians, and they had a joy about them, an obvious love of playing music for a live audience that was infectious and riveting.

The drummer was electric– so full of energy, it seemed to be an effort for him to keep seated and pound on the drums (and quite often he would leap up and run to the front of the stage to get the crowd pumped up before rushing back to his kit).  He was dressed in a suit, along with the base player beside him, though they were just in vests without the coats.  Like most base players, he held down the beat in a low-key way.  The lead guitarist was surprisingly not flashy or looking for attention– he spent most of the show to the side, working his guitar and producing a lot of interesting sound effects via a whole host of effects pedals on the floor at his feet.  He gave me the sense of being a quiet maestro plying his art.

On the other side of the stage from the drummer and base were a man and a woman at two keyboards, though they often jumped up and played other instruments.  The woman played trumpet, accordion, and for one song banged on a huge base drum; the man got up and played accordion on a different song.

Last but not least were the two lead singers, who also played acoustic guitars.  The man was short, round, and red-haired, and reminded me of a gnome.  He had a cool and real interesting singing voice.  The woman was short, dark-haired and waifish, and sung like the Icelandic angel that she is– her voice reminded me a lot of Björk from the Sugarcubes, a high-pitched lilt, but without Björk’s weirdness.  The two singers’ voices were different but sounded great both solo and harmonized together.

The band not only demonstrated great musicianship but great showmanship as well.  They obviously subscribe to the notion I do as well, that art isn’t just what is being produced by the artist, but it’s what’s found in that space between artist and the audience.  They got a real charge out of getting the audience singing along, clapping along, stomping along, waving and cheering.  They gave me a real creative jolt being a part of the experience, and my mind whirled with ideas as I drove home.  I was grateful to be able to experience it with my friends Tommy and Amy, to be part of a little group within the crowd, so I could both experience the thrill and the joy of the music without feeling lonely, and also have someone there who I could talk to, smile with, and just share in the performance.

If you ever get a chance to see Of Monsters and Men, I heartily recommend it!  Below the cut I’ve got a link to a Youtube video of them performing live (in a more intimate location), as well as lyrics to the song Little Talks — I really love the words to the song, it strikes me as a ghost story, with the girl’s part being the living person, and the guy’s part being either a ghost or maybe a voice in her head.  What about you?    

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