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***The Official Wikkidpissah Irish Wake Thread*** (1 Viewer)

When I went to look for these in my library today, I checked to see if he had any other playlists, and I found this one:  Oasis Diner Jukebox.  I don't know or don't remember the impetus for this one and hope someone else does.


Mr. krista is home now and fixing a dinner of all the worst #### you could imagine, all to satisfy my need for comfort food.  I asked him if it would be OK to fire up this playlist for the rest of the evening, and of course he agreed.

First song on shuffle was this Fleetwood Mac gem.  I'm a notorious FMac hater, but loved this one.  Made me think of @Mrs. Rannous as I think she appreciates their stuff.

Next up was this, just attesting to Dale's breadth of musical appreciation.  :lol:  

 
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Mister CIA said:
We're gonna do this, gawt dammit.  :towelwave:   

To all: if you pull up Wikkid's profile page and click on "find content," do you see 560 pages of search results?


Yes!  It took me many clicks to figure out how to do this, but I finally managed and confirm I saw 560 pages.  My tech skills are weaker than Prosthetic's, but I'm warming up my ctrl-C and ctrl-V fingers.
Then tell me.  How does one find this El Dorado?

 
On the day of the argument, he was criticizing the new generation of music, like the single grooves, shapeless lyrics, etc.
So which one of them was Rick Beato?  This stuff pretty much sums up his complaints.  And mine, for that matter.

Also, Autotune.  Ugh.

 
I've struggled enormously in the last 30 hours or so with this feeling that he didn't know how much I cared about him, because I always held back more than I should have. 
Based on the things he wrote about here, he fell into the food is love category.  Your care packages made you feelings quite clear, I am sure.  I think you can rest easy on this one.

 
And thanks for that awesome Fleetwood Mac song.  I didn't even draft that one.  I think I drafted the Ray Charles one in a recent draft.  (Some time before Genrepalooza, obviously.)

 
... any and all direction and contributions are welcome.
We all have certain incidents in our lives that when we look back are big chapters in our life book.

Wikkid shared an incident that took place back in 1971 that he shared more than one time so it played a big role in his life.

This story gives an insight into something that helped to shape him.  A terrifying story.

I was late contributing to this forum but noted Wikkid when he made this post because I had a 'threatening' encounter in the same area of Wyoming.

------------------------------------------------

THREAD --  The 100 greatest songs of 1971 #1 “When the Levee Breaks” Led Zeppelin By timschochet,
May 6, 2020 in Footballguys Free For All

Posted May 28, 2020 (edited)  by wikkidpissah said:

yeah, '71 was the year i was held at knifepoint on a deserted road in western Wyoming while the driver who'd picked me up pulled his #### out. a lapse of his attention allowed me to get the metal mailbox flag from the outside pocket of my haversack, bring it across his nose, pound him to unconsciousness & slice his face to remind him not to do that anymore. i thereupon walked the last 85 miles to Utah, certain that the entire state was looking for my sobbing 16yo ###. had the "predatory hitchhiker" microfiche printout of the newspaper story on my fridge for years and the biggest party i ever threw was on the day the staute of limitations ran out on it. yeah, 1971 was a sweet, endearing year with a fantasy quality....

------- My reply ------

Dude. 

Age 23, I Had a narrow escape in Western Wyoming at a deserted rest stop but got away without violence.  Huge guy in a wife beater was coming in while I was leaving the rest room.  Long story short, he kept following me back to my car which was loaded with camping gear and my bike as I was coming back from a bicycle tour of the Canadian Rockies.  

I stopped and looked him and he 'tentatively' looked into my vehicle and asked if I was alone.

Have no clue where it came from but I IMMEDIATELY said that my brother and friend were in the car and gestured for him to be quiet so as not to wake them up.

Got to my car and peeled out of there and drove for hundreds of miles before stopping even though before that adrenaline rush I was exhausted. 

----------

wikkidpissah said:

let's write a rock opera together - the Deliverance West Motor Inn. we can call ourselves Little America

----------

 On 5/28/2020 at 1:26 PM, BassNBrew said:

  • I'm having a hard time following this.  You're roadside with one dude holding you knife point and the driver you were riding with pulled his johnson out.  I assumed you pounded the guy with the knife, but it kinda of reads like you beat up the guy with his #### out.
wikkidpissah

nice  youth-preacherish guy, non-Wyomingy vehicle (VW staion wagon) picks me up, asks me if i wanna go swimming. hot day, no shower in a wk(s), sure, he drives like 20+ miles, i'm kinda wtf, he pulls over, i still feel no danger, but then have a knife to my throat. he tells me what i'm gonna do as he pulls his joint out. my pack's at my knees. got the flag there just for this. i win. you wanna hear more, read the lyrics of Bracie & my rock opera

-----

Me ------- You've definitely been by the landmarks noted....

wikkidpissah

i'd been a construction flagman on I-80 near Evanston for a coupla weeks that spring. if i didnt know the territory a li'lbit, i probably would have walked myself to death by dead reckoning

ME ----- That's three days walking high desert. 

Where did you get water and that had to be near Rock Springs.

wikkidpissah

it was before Li'l America, cuz i remember that was my target - to get lifts from truckers. Wyoming then had bar bounties on the hair of any hippies (i knew of at least a dozen guys been beaten half to death and three girls who'd been raped & shaved under the terms of that), so i was wary of cowboys and this guy was the opposite of a cowboy. it's beautiful country which i hadnt got to appreciate cuz i didnt stray from the 80, so i went along. i walked 6 days (western hitchers who dont carry a thermos deserve to die) til i caught a N/S rte that i knew was in Utah and turned north (which sucked cuz it was just getting cold at night - early sept). for my next year on the road i hadda either hop trains across  Basin/Rockies or go from SLC south to 70 (or vice versa) and pick 80 back up in NPlatte when i crossed country

======================== Different thread -----------------------

Charity Music Draft - Theme 1

Posted December 7, 2021 (edited) by wikkidpissah

What song are you blasting in the car?" 

Singing Winds, Crying Beast/Black Magic Woman

It's all about the 101.

Nothing captures the above words in my heart like this song and the road it must be meant to evoke. The incredibly promising air, always the hint of both seaside and industry, Mother Nature's chenille bedspread of linty shrubs dotting brown hills and the magical mystery of a wind that says you're never too late. I equate my first trip on Cali's handiest highway - from the heart of Los Angeles to the human clouds of Humboldt, thru paradise & parking lot - to Lewis & Clark reaching its Oregonian portion 200 years before.

In Sept of 1970, two months before the birth of my eldest son, i was made aware that the brothers of the high school girl pregnant with him were making serious noise about doing me in for knockin up sis. While mourning the death of Jimi Hendrix in my basement bedroom w copious amounts of psychedelics, i decided i would have to take them seriously. packed my Boy Scout haversack & sleeping roll and stuck my thumb out on what is now I-95 in Salem MA. I was a month shy of my 16th b'day.

Nights of confusion, fear, loss & deprivation, not to mention negotiating the I80-90 loops of the midwestern highway system, had rape attempted on me by a Wyoming motorist and, after winning the tussle with a violent act, walked the last 80-90 miles off-road til i was as sure i was in Utah as i was that the entire Wyoming State Police force stalked my progress.

Made straight for the Haight when i hit mythic California, but found i was a few yrs late for any of the Hippie Miracle but the drugs and crowding of desperate young souls. After several days, i made my way to the nearest highway for points south. Great fortune found me a ride that was going to Monterrey and he made it sound bright to go the whole way.

Within a week, this New England boy had set up in the scorekeeper's booth of a seasonally abandoned downtown stadium in a town where, miracles of miracles, the the temp was the same winter & summer, night & day. A few blocks walk to a strand with tourist & the wealthy from whom to beg stake or steak, some pockets of hippiedom in the legendary Cannery Row, with promise of work if i got desperate. 

Having bummed a Niners game at Kezar up in SF to great profit when i was first up there, i decided to hitch back north for a weekend. A Fort Ord (as gone now as Kezar) serviceman got me out to the highway and the first folks to pick me up were a fam curious about my lifestyle and my patter was attractive enough for them to buy me dinner @ Sambo's (yeah, there was a restaurant chain named Sambo's then) to better enjoy my tale. I found myself working that spiel on several occasions when i was hungry, always to the nice folk of the 101 during the almost 2 yrs that Monterrey was the base of operations of my runaway life.

I imagine i first heard Abraxas from an 8-track on one of those rides, for i know i knew it when i heard it f'real. Walking one morning from my scorekeeper's booth to the main drag, i heard rock & rollmusic coming from the grand ol' Golden State Theater. It was Elvin Bishop's group in what was a popular rehearsal hall for many Bay Area bands. Someone who saw me more than once sitting at an exit to listen when he went out for smokes invited me in, i got to know staff and was allowed in to thrill in sound more often than not. Next was Santana, playing music that was more surprising and wonderful than any portion of rock i had heard to that point. Miragloso!

When i hear the cymbals roll on the road to Black Magic Woman, it rolls down the window to the most instant & lifting joy i know. nufced

 
Today's tidbit of wikkidwisdom comes from an email correspondence at a time early this year when I felt overextended and exhausted.  I'm posting it in case it might help someone else as well.

Dale:  "do something non-mental tomorrow. massage, go-karts, random act of kindness. surprise yourself. or dont be a completist, which is like telling me not to alliterate."

Me:  "I'd never tell you not to alliterate, though!  Rough workday, and workweek, upcoming but I'll take your advice tomorrow at least.  We've been having brilliant weather for weeks, and I haven't taken advantage of that nearly enough, so something outdoors could be in order..."

Dale:  "dont forget to frolic. and try to smell something brand new."

:heart:  

 
I'm late to the party, but today is the first day I get to sit and celebrate, reminisce and weep me ever-lovin' eyes out.

I want to write a metric ####-ton about what wikkid meant to me, but I'm just wordless. Miss you, brother. Slainte!

Currently playing: Stevie Wonder Songs in the Key of Life.

Still too mellow for the Pogues.

 
Yep.  Figure out the small treats for those days.  The frozen custard stand not too far away has the best waffle cones in the world.  A little cone of heaven.  The chocolate-dipped ones with toasted coconut ice cream are amazing.
Big fan of the small treats and try to get one in everyday.

Today was dragging my aching knee into the pool with my two grand daughters (5 and 7).  Didn't start out well as the pool had a ton of leaves in it and I had to hand scoop them out.  But later, the 5 year old had me laughing as she always does.

I had watched Caddyshack Friday night.   So before getting out of the pool, I told them the "dootie" scene and I've never seen them laugh so hard. We then fired up that scene and replayed it a few times for them before dinner. Good times.

 
well, i do have a a pretty specific program i use in helping people, but the reason i'm presently offering it for free is that i'm still learning how to teach it, something i need to do in order to best write it up for general benefit.

one of the perks for the first dozen or so people who've tried the full monty is that i've tailored the lessons very specifically to them. i won't launch til i have a pretty long & strong arc conceived for how to roll it out for each individual, so i'll be thinkin on you for a wk or so before getting real & formal.

one thing is becoming rapidly apparent as i consider your needs - we have to dash some of that mastery out of you. i scanned your last year of FFA posting history (although i was sure you'd gotten into an ontological harangue with a bible pounder in that time but couldnt find it) and it decidedly recommends you as a human being: caring, concise, great facility with word, thought & feeling.

but it sure gives a sense that you are trying to outrun life. you can't. that's why you're crashing. real change is made in a quiet, deep place within a person and we're going to have to find yours. it's more likely than not that we will but, especially with Gen Xers, failure to find one's q-spot has easily been the #1 reason that people havent gone past the first phase with my program. i'm still learning as a teacher and have become more flexible with the wide variety of cases i've handled in the last year, but this has been a dealbreaker so far.

so how do we get you humble? we know you know how to set things aside because youre in a profession that requires doing so regularly and you couldnt have served your wife & your Hayden so well in their difficulties without doing so. that's half of it anyway. but setting down a powerful intellect in order to reboot is a whole nuther thang.

since we have a lot of similarities, i'll try to get you thinking about humility with the story of the way it began to come to me. my HS sweetheart is far & away the sexiest woman i've ever met (and Rosanna Arquette has kissed my pants). in her mid 60s now, her son's friends still watch the sex bounce of her walk with awe & glee. she means a tremendous amount to me because i've never been in her league but she still regularly favored me with favors over a 40-yr span of time.

many years ago, we were reminiscing about her best friend, a woman i took great pleasure in hating. after she told of one occasion where i was deliciously disgusting to her pal, i attempted to defend myself by asserting that, considering who she was, i thought my treatment of her was actually kind. Betsy got verrrry serious, verrrry quickly & surprisingly, stared me right in the eye in a way that made me feel like she was grabbing my collar and said, "now you listen to me, mr wikkid - you are one of the most delightful, entertaining, generous people it has ever been my pleasure to know, but dont you ever......ever refer to yourself as kind in my presence. i've know you since you were twelve and not once have you done anything that wasnt 100% on your terms. kind!"

That speech echoed in my mind through another couple of decades of acting precisely as she'd described, but i am soooo glad i had it in my experience when i needed it. putting oneself utterly & completely away in service of others is one of the most important things a wiseacre like you or me can learn to do because, eventually, if youre lucky, it will teach you to put yourself away on your own behalf. it is then that one stands on a ledge above a bottomless pool of joy and one has but to dive to be forever free. think about that for a few days while i continue thinking about you. til next -
Lol, this mf'er could write. This is one of the earliest PMs he wrote me.

Betsy was wrong. He was the kindest soul I ever met. Or, at least hearing that truth from her, he learned and changed. Because my interactions with him were downright lovely. H learned to become the father we both wished we always had. And he learned to become the friend everyone wants to have. And he was there for everybody, without limits, even random people on the innerwebs. 

 
I'm late to the party, but today is the first day I get to sit and celebrate, reminisce and weep me ever-lovin' eyes out.

I want to write a metric ####-ton about what wikkid meant to me, but I'm just wordless. Miss you, brother. Slainte!

Currently playing: Stevie Wonder Songs in the Key of Life.

Still too mellow for the Pogues.


Welcome!  I regressed today to a lot more weeping again.

Ah ####, while I was typing this I saw  you posted again, with something that needs time and thought, so I'll stop with what I was going to say and take that in instead.  But maybe find another song to post first.

 
Welcome!  I regressed today to a lot more weeping again.

Ah ####, while I was typing this I saw  you posted again, with something that needs time and thought, so I'll stop with what I was going to say and take that in instead.  But maybe find another song to post first.
yes, please. more music. It always struck me how he appreciated music. It was an irony how he loved musicals, and how much i hate them. You both have taught me quite a bit on how to appreciate music with more alacrity and humanity.

 
I'm late to the party, but today is the first day I get to sit and celebrate, reminisce and weep me ever-lovin' eyes out.

I want to write a metric ####-ton about what wikkid meant to me, but I'm just wordless. Miss you, brother. Slainte!

Currently playing: Stevie Wonder Songs in the Key of Life.

Still too mellow for the Pogues.


Perfect timing to get to the second song Dale sent me when he was boycotting the board but not boycotting @Captain Cranks and his glorious giviing.

When he wouldn't post in the thread but sent to me, his second pick in the "tell Squibbles what music is" draft was as follows.  I think you'll love the connection to your current listening.

"2.xx What's Going On, Marvin Gaye, R&B

I wasnt gonna pick the Greatest Song of all Time, was gonna go off the page with my last pick and take Erykah Badu's Back in the Day (Puff) or Donny Hathaway's This Christmas for R&B. But i can't leave it on the board this late...

Speaking of sacred, i think you & i split hairs on R&B. I luvluvluv the sweaty Stax/Volt folk, but still not as much as you. If you ever hear my rendition of  And I Love Her, you'll know i like it waaaay back in the beat, so much so that the leader of my BFF's weekend band calls me "the late Mr Bickford". Diamond in the back/sun roof top is how i roll.

And this is the best of that, the fulcrum moment launching R&B into soul. The fellowship of those who cant be ####ed with. One of the points that cant be made enough in the history of music is what Motown's two greatest talents did with the freedom-short-of-independence they were granted at the turn of the 70s. Stevie's Music of My Mind began one of the greatest creative runs in any medium and What's Going On brought home OH's point about genres like nobody's business. I will support that further within my picks for Rock & Pop (as well as my explanation of why i didnt take HipHop), but the meeting of the creative and collective in WGO beats the urgencies of Otis, Etta and wikkipikkit winging it in front of show bands."

 
Dale and I corresponded about our mutual admiration of Jazz pianist Craig Taborn.  Wikkid once said Taborn and Amy Winehouse were the only two 21st century musicians that blew him away.  This started a PM chain about Taborn and other pianists we enjoyed.  Every now and again,  I'd send him links to new Jazz recordings, mostly solo piano and we'd discuss and exchange pleasantries.  His poetic flights of fancy were way more jazzy than my groundbound observations but it was nice to find common ground on such a narrow niche.

No one will be surprised that wikkid had strong opinions about the subject. He generally preferred solo piano to trio work and didn't care for Taborn's electric ensemble Junk Magic at all

1st run thru gives me a very random, Art Ensemble of Chicago-y, "here, i pulled this out my butt, blew that out my nose but you have to listen to it cuz i'm smarter than you" feel. he's trying a trance thing, then he's interrupting himself, whatever, there's no swing to it, even in the loosest possible terms, and that always loses me quick.


His favorite Taborn record was a quartet date from 2017 called Daylight Ghosts.  I'll close with its title track which starts with a mournful theme on sax and a restrained piano solo. Eventually a second line forms with a hopeful melody accompanied by Taborn's jagged right-handed chords.  It builds in urgency before gracefully drifting away.

Craig Taborn - Daylight Ghosts

 
Way back when, as I said earlier in the thread, wikkid and I had started a correspondence about modern greatness. His was a brief list. Jack White, Amy Winehouse (as Eephus just said), and Sufjan Stevens were among those he mentioned. That was about it. Before we adjourned our correspondence to a later date (never to be started again) he was telling me about Sufjan Stevens and what makes him great. This was because I had asked him if Sufjan wasn't a little bit twee for him. I couldn't quite understand what he was saying that day, but he demurred and told me that was not the case. He then gave a few reasons, but I regret sometimes that I wasn't able to keep up with him in his fancier moments, and alas, I still don't know. 

I figure this song will remind both us and him of Mary and the futile feeling of watching a loved one succumb to cancer or other infirmities. It's too perfect, both in subject and date. I've honestly never heard it before. It's a difficult listen when you know it's about Sufjan's mother. 

Sufjan Stevens - Fourth Of July 

RIP, wik. 

 
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@ProstheticRGK, this was a song that was deeply important to Dale.  I know it will be a killer to you, too, given your loss, but maybe it will give you some solace in a "shared experience" way.

Lyle Lovett - She's No Lady
Bless you straight to hell and all the way back up to heaven for this. One of the things that I loved the most about my interactions with him was that we had so much to share with each other about widowerhood. I loved him so damn much for how much he loved his Mary, warts and all. Especially all the warts. He found his sublime raison d'etre in his Mary. And she sanctified everything in his godfersaken life. His love and service made him holy.

He rejected me as a student and pupil, because I'm just too damn frantic and narcissistic. He accepted me as a friend and co-commiserator. We came to an understanding that we both knew something about sublimating ego to the service of the greater good. Stoicism, with love, That was his bag. Damn Irish sensibilities. 

 
Way back when, as I said earlier in the thread, wikkid and I had started a correspondence about modern greatness. His was a brief list. Jack White, Amy Winehouse (as Eephus just said), and Sufjan Stevens were among those he mentioned. That was about it. Before we adjourned our correspondence to a later date (never to be started again) he was telling me about Sufjan Stevens and what makes him great because I had asked him if Sufjan wasn't a little bit twee for him. I couldn't quite understand what he was saying that day, but he demurred and told me that was not the case. He then gave a few reasons, but I regret sometimes that I wasn't able to keep up with him in his fancier moments, and alas, I still don't know. 

I figure this song will remind both us and him of Mary and the futile feeling of watching a loved one succumb to cancer or other infirmities. It's too perfect, both in subject and date. I've honestly never heard it before. It's a difficult listen when you know it's about Sufjan's mother. 

Sufjan Stevens - Fourth Of July 

RIP, wik. 


:heart:   :heart:   :heart:   :heart:  

What can I give other than that.  Anything else would drag my heart into another place from which it might not surface.  Thank you so much for this.

 
I figure this song will remind both us and him of Mary and the futile feeling of watching a loved one succumb to cancer or other infirmities. It's too perfect, both in subject and date. I've honestly never heard it before. It's a difficult listen when you know it's about Sufjan's mother. 

Sufjan Stevens - Fourth Of July 
Aaaaannnndddd it's back to when I first saw the news.  That's one tough song.

 
Dale and I corresponded about our mutual admiration of Jazz pianist Craig Taborn.  Wikkid once said Taborn and Amy Winehouse were the only two 21st century musicians that blew him away.  This started a PM chain about Taborn and other pianists we enjoyed.  Every now and again,  I'd send him links to new Jazz recordings, mostly solo piano and we'd discuss and exchange pleasantries.  His poetic flights of fancy were way more jazzy than my groundbound observations but it was nice to find common ground on such a narrow niche.

No one will be surprised that wikkid had strong opinions about the subject. He generally preferred solo piano to trio work and didn't care for Taborn's electric ensemble Junk Magic at all

His favorite Taborn record was a quartet date from 2017 called Daylight Ghosts.  I'll close with its title track which starts with a mournful theme on sax and a restrained piano solo. Eventually a second line forms with a hopeful melody accompanied by Taborn's jagged right-handed chords.  It builds in urgency before gracefully drifting away.

Craig Taborn - Daylight Ghosts
Thanks for that. You know I jazz. What a talent. This is making me wish I wasn't so anti-social and sought more corresponding. I would have enjoyed being pulled through these conversations. 

When I put any effort into writing a draft pick, I always checked to see if wikkid liked it. I might even do a mental fist pump when he did. I remember taking Keith Jarrett's Koln Concert and iliciting a bunch of his solo pianist praise. Ah, affirmation. I'd tell you you're the only other I do that with, but then you might be nice and like somn for the wrong reason. 

Dale did send me an agreement that Beethoven's 9th was his best symphany (after another with whom he wouldn't engage adamantly claimed the 5th). His take was typical wikkid pron prose and I am unfortunately a msg deleter who couldn't possibly recreate it. The gist was the many who call it Ludwig's kiss to the entire world are just being lazy with that lyric. He made love to the entire world with the 9th. 

 
Thanks for that. You know I jazz. What a talent. This is making me wish I wasn't so anti-social and sought more corresponding. I would have enjoyed being pulled through these conversations. 

When I put any effort into writing a draft pick, I always checked to see if wikkid liked it. I might even do a mental fist pump when he did. I remember taking Keith Jarrett's Koln Concert and iliciting a bunch of his solo pianist praise. Ah, affirmation. I'd tell you you're the only other I do that with, but then you might be nice and like somn for the wrong reason. 

Dale did send me an agreement that Beethoven's 9th was his best symphany (after another with whom he wouldn't engage adamantly claimed the 5th). His take was typical wikkid pron prose and I am unfortunately a msg deleter who couldn't possibly recreate it. The gist was the many who call it Ludwig's kiss to the entire world are just being lazy with that lyric. He made love to the entire world with the 9th. 
I don't ask absently, just as an old friend, tell me what your estimation was.

 
I don't ask absently, just as an old friend, tell me what your estimation was.
In the rip thread I said he was a gift of knowledge and entertainment but more importantly wisdom. Add his selfless willingness to reach out and help any and everybody and it's hard to give him high enough praise. 

He did have one disgusting unforgiveable flaw. Celtics fan. Ooof.

 
He did have one disgusting unforgiveable flaw. Celtics fan. Ooof.
And thank God for that. It was what he and I were able to bond over the most.

As difficult as Dale could be to follow, he never lost me when discussing basketball. We even had a running bit about how I was his translator when people didn't understand him.

Last year he and I got into it during an NBA draft and it bothered me so I sent him a PM saying I was sorry to upset him and realized I let the competition bring out the worst in me was being a doosh.  Here was his reply:

"yeah, man, i had already put you on ignore and i didnt like that (if only cuz i lose a translator). i wish we'd  had it out over real b-ball so i couldve just flattened you and been done with it...i get disheartened by the younger folks and their propensity to quantify over qualify, and you certainly were a douchenozzle in that fashion. but youre one of my doods here, which makes the "no sweat" part of this roll easy off my tongue. you put together a helluva team, even tho i dont believe your li'l recency-bias cherry-on-top Dame is ever taking anyone anywhere. congrats -"

Man, I'm going to miss his wit and insight into the game. He saw things like nobody else around and could decipher the winners from the losers better than anyone. I still don't understand how he predicted the Utah Jazz's implosion in the playoffs 2 years ago but he knew they were cooked before anyone anywhere, including experts and professional analysts. And it wasn't luck because it wasn't the first or last time he was right against the wisdom of the crowds and "experts".

I'll drink a glass of Irish whiskey when Boston gets themselves another banner in memory of Dale. Wish they'd have pulled it out this season just so he could gone out with them on top, but somehow it feels poetic that they didn't. Seems like Dale's real life was a lot like Boston's season; better than anyone would have predicted with flashes of absolute brilliance and greatness and moments of heart and grit, but just a couple breaks away from reaching the mountain top.

Love you, good buddy. Go, C's.

 
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More than 72 hours after learning of this, and I'm here to tell you I am not doing better.  I realize that over time I will, and that there's virtually no way to hasten that process.  A couple of people here have provided meaningful conversations that have helped me, in addition to the various lovely comments in these threads, so I :heart: you for that.

I know that Kubler-Ross's work is not held in high esteem anymore, but damned if I haven't been cycling through her stages of grief, though I've no idea if in the order she outlined.  I've had anger at Dale for telling me I still had time with him, a ludicrous bit of bargaining with God (and I'm not even a believer) where if I did a particular thing we'd get Dale back (I did, and we didn't), and nearly a full day of denial where I convinced myself that Dale wasn't really dead but merely got tired of us, so he'd faked his death to get rid of us more easily.  I'm typing it now and realizing how ridiculous my scenario was, but how true that I would feel much better if I knew we bored him than if I knew we lost him.

I've also puzzled over how the world keeps spinning if we don't have him, how we just go about our daily lives... figuring out what to have for dinner, celebrating a holiday, mourning another mass shooting.  Not that I'm saying we shouldn't, of course.  But the world feels dimmer to me and Earth slightly off its axis, and I'm still reeling. 

I mentioned to someone that about a month ago I was looking up a book, "The Long Goodbye,"* and came across a review that said something along the lines that death is both the most extraordinary and most mundane experience we have as humans.  Right now I'm mired in the "extraordinary" part where I want to scream to the world that Dale died and it matters, but I look forward to getting to the "mundane" part, where I can take comfort that we all experience this universally, collectively and that it is as it should be.

Sorry this isn't really appropriate for an Irish wake; better served at the dreary and morose German funerals I grew up with.  But I've adopted this thread as the one where I'll post about Dale when I need to.  I'll post a song or some bit of wisdom next.

* @BobbyLaynewill remember this one as something I recommended to him when he experienced a loss as well.

 
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I was just looking for something else and found this perfect wikkid witticism embedded in an emailed back-and-forth.  Posting it to balance out the maudlin tone of my other post.  Still :lmao:  at "Big Tie."

Dale:   moms are made to give you confidence and make sure you never trust yourself completely. better combo than even italian beef & sausage. it's why they get a day.

Me:  Probably.  Why do the dads get their day?  Maybe just a paean to parity?  They never seem to get the same hootin' an' hollerin' around their day.

Dale:  the corporate machinations of the tie cartel (i was gonna say "Big Tie", but wasnt sure it'd work)

 
@BobbyLaynewill remember this one as something I recommended to him when he experienced a loss as well.
not sure if I ever told you but that book helped me so much!

The Long Goodbye: A Memoir

aa did The Year of Magical Thinking

(which may have also been your rec)

***************

Also…if you make this a habit you will rarely regret it.

Always go to the funeral

Its a small gesture, it means so much. It is often a small inconvenience. It is an incredible blessing to the people who loved the one who has departed. It will expand you in ways you never imagined possible.

[not a book rec, just a little essay I once shared here]

 
not sure if I ever told you but that book helped me so much!

The Long Goodbye: A Memoir

aa did The Year of Magical Thinking

(which may have also been your rec)

***************

Also…if you make this a habit you will rarely regret it.

Always go to the funeral

Its a small gesture, it means so much. It is often a small inconvenience. It is an incredible blessing to the people who loved the one who has departed. It will expand you in ways you never imagined possible.

[not a book rec, just a little essay I once shared here]


Yes, The Year of Magical Thinking was mine, too.  I recently recommended that one again as well.  I need some new material!  :lol:    Or maybe I should go back and read them again myself now...

I remember the essay and used it to make a decision for myself once, and never regretted that.  Thank you for it.

 
Yes, The Year of Magical Thinking was mine, too.  I recently recommended that one again as well.  I need some new material!  :lol:    Or maybe I should go back and read them again myself now...

I remember the essay and used it to make a decision for myself once, and never regretted that.  Thank you for it.
love you, friend 

In the 11 years, 8 months and 23 days since I lost Mom, I’ve thought of that essay often. In my former way of thinking I wouldn’t go unless 1) it was family, 2) “we were close”, or 3) we had an amazing shared experience. Like the entire paradigm was based on I Me Mine.

Now I consistently go to funerals, no matter how slight the connection. Friends parents I never met. Colleagues I hadn’t seen in 15-20 years ago, classmates or shipmates for whom it’s been even longer.. Church members or neighbors I barely knew.

Sometimes something special happens. Sometimes nothing does. But it’s not about me or what happens to/for me. I go in prepared to either be a blessing or be blessed, but also knowing the simple act has an intangible, unseen value that is often unfelt or unknown.

I know it’s worth it even if my knowledge of the impact remains incomplete.

 
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I keep coming in here ... thinking I know what I want to say, but still nothing sensible is coming out. I’ll get there but this is the oddest feeling I can recall having ... an odd respect and even love for a man I never met or even knew his real name. He just shared so much of himself that I know he is part of me now.

Thanks @krista4@BobbyLayne, @rockaction, @ProstheticRGK, @Eephus@Chaos Commish, @Mrs. Rannous, @Jayrod, @Mister CIA, @Charlie Steiner, @geewill and so many others for sharing your stories and parts of yourselves as well.

Despite the loss, I feel very fortunate to have this place and so many amazing people in it.

 

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