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What are you listening to right now? video edition
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#902
27-09-2020
Discovered the French singer Francoise Hardy about 15 years ago, after hearing a midi file (of all things) of her first hit, Tous Les Garcons Et Les Filles. I only have one of her CD's, The Vogue Years, but it has all her big hits from the 1960s.
Two good examples, for people who might not be familiar with her:
Two good examples, for people who might not be familiar with her:
(This post was last modified: 27-09-2020 09:17 PM by ScaryRob.)
#904
08-12-2020
I had to say farewell to my father late this morning.
Life wasn't perfect. My mother separated from my father after he changed and took a turn for the worse in very recent years; she went to live with my brother in Missouri, and Dad went to visit his old flame and former girlfriend in California, leaving me alone in Texas and living with some bum whom we hadn't seen or known for about 40 years.
Then about 14 days ago, Dad came back to Texas, picked up a package that had been delivered to my house, then went home and collapsed in his living room. At least he was lucid enough to call for an ambulance to take him to the hospital where he used to work. He had picked up a little passenger named COVID-19 while he was in California; his ex-girlfriend, her daughter, her sister and her friend Ron all came down with Corona too. They recovered fairly quickly. But my father did not.
COVID-19 is scary, but highly survivable. Dad would have survived the virus, but decades of neglecting his health had finally come home to roost; he has been hospitalized for cardiac arrhythmia and other heart-related ailments about four or five times in the past few years, he has hypertension (hereditary; my brother and I got our hypertension from him, and we can't get rid of it despite our physical fitness, so it looks like we're stuck with high blood pressure for life) which he wouldn't take any medication for...so he had an abdominal stint that had started leaking blood into his pelvic cavity while he was hospitalized, and the surgeons couldn't operate and fix his stint because his blood was rife with COVID, so cutting him open would have been a huge contagion risk. His kidneys shut down last night, his lungs were filling with fluid (again, thanks to goddamned COVID-19), and so this morning I got the phone call that no halfway decent soul ever wants to receive: "Get down to the hospital, it's time to let your loved one go."
My mother and I tried to lead him to a healthier lifestyle over the years. Mom tried to get him on the Atkins Diet, the Keto Diet and a few other diets here and there; he'd try each diet for a week or so, then go back to picking up hamburgers and french fries at Sonic. I took him down to the First Monday Trade Days grounds to walk laps around the Arbor pavilions with him; he'd quit after one lap before going home, then he stopped going altogether. I even paid for a dual gym membership at Anytime Fitness; he went three times, but only used the tanning beds, and he never went to Anytime again. It was a hard life lesson for me: You can't save people who won't lift a finger to save themselves.
So I was there, standing at his bedside today, with Mom and my brother Craig on my cell phone's speaker, all of us talking to Dad in hopes that he could hear us somewhere in the depths of his mind, despite his heavily sedated and unconscious state. Nurse Justin, following Dad's previously arranged DNR/Five Wishes instructions, pulled the breathing tube out of Dad's trachea, shut down his dialysis machine, shut down the monitors in his room and terminated all further efforts at Life Support. Dad didn't want to linger or be reduced to a vegetable if he ever came to such a state, and come to that state he finally had. His Life Support was terminated at 11:15 AM, but Dad hung on for twenty minutes more, with his breaths slowing and slowing until he finally stopped breathing altogether. Even then, his tongue flexed and moved two or three times after he had stopped breathing, as if he were trying to talk in a dreaming sleep, a sleep from which he would never awaken. And then Nurse Justin returned to our room and confirmed what I had already felt and knew in my heart of hearts.
My father was gone from the mortal coil. And all the while, all I could do was talk to him, rest my hand on his shoulder and watch him die. And I didn't leave his bedside — or his body — for another half-hour after that. It's so very hard to let go of someone whose time has come.
You can psych yourself up for that moment as much as you want. You can talk to the whole world, you can grow bitter or try to encase your heart with a shell of pure stoicism, you can outlive dozens of other people and lay them to rest (like my best friend of 27 years, an old Air Force buddy who was taken by a sudden cardiac arrest while getting ready for bed three months ago), you can revisit all of your memories or make a list of everything you love and everything you despise about that person...but when that moment finally arrives, when you must try but ultimately fail to hold onto that someone and watch them slip away into Eternity, there's not one blessed thing you can do to stop the crushing realization of loss from hitting you with every ounce of force known to gods and men. And all you can do is wonder, "How many more times will I have to feel this? How many more friends, lovers and family members will I have to bury before I pass this same pain and loss unto others with my own death? Why are we here? What's the point of life? Or is there any point at all?"
And for whatever reason, this song sprang right into my mind as I was leaving. Maybe it was the song, maybe it was the video, or maybe it was all the realization and sadness that comes with watching it.
I haven't been around Leefish much, but I'll probably be away even longer after this. I have a mountain of things to sort out, heart-to-heart talks to have with other people and with myself, changes to make with my life while I still have time to make them...I just need time alone now.
Goodbye, best of everything to you, and try to live the lives that you want to live, not the lives that authoritarian fools who couldn't care less about you, your well-being, your life or your death would prescribe. Be well.
Life wasn't perfect. My mother separated from my father after he changed and took a turn for the worse in very recent years; she went to live with my brother in Missouri, and Dad went to visit his old flame and former girlfriend in California, leaving me alone in Texas and living with some bum whom we hadn't seen or known for about 40 years.
Then about 14 days ago, Dad came back to Texas, picked up a package that had been delivered to my house, then went home and collapsed in his living room. At least he was lucid enough to call for an ambulance to take him to the hospital where he used to work. He had picked up a little passenger named COVID-19 while he was in California; his ex-girlfriend, her daughter, her sister and her friend Ron all came down with Corona too. They recovered fairly quickly. But my father did not.
COVID-19 is scary, but highly survivable. Dad would have survived the virus, but decades of neglecting his health had finally come home to roost; he has been hospitalized for cardiac arrhythmia and other heart-related ailments about four or five times in the past few years, he has hypertension (hereditary; my brother and I got our hypertension from him, and we can't get rid of it despite our physical fitness, so it looks like we're stuck with high blood pressure for life) which he wouldn't take any medication for...so he had an abdominal stint that had started leaking blood into his pelvic cavity while he was hospitalized, and the surgeons couldn't operate and fix his stint because his blood was rife with COVID, so cutting him open would have been a huge contagion risk. His kidneys shut down last night, his lungs were filling with fluid (again, thanks to goddamned COVID-19), and so this morning I got the phone call that no halfway decent soul ever wants to receive: "Get down to the hospital, it's time to let your loved one go."
My mother and I tried to lead him to a healthier lifestyle over the years. Mom tried to get him on the Atkins Diet, the Keto Diet and a few other diets here and there; he'd try each diet for a week or so, then go back to picking up hamburgers and french fries at Sonic. I took him down to the First Monday Trade Days grounds to walk laps around the Arbor pavilions with him; he'd quit after one lap before going home, then he stopped going altogether. I even paid for a dual gym membership at Anytime Fitness; he went three times, but only used the tanning beds, and he never went to Anytime again. It was a hard life lesson for me: You can't save people who won't lift a finger to save themselves.
So I was there, standing at his bedside today, with Mom and my brother Craig on my cell phone's speaker, all of us talking to Dad in hopes that he could hear us somewhere in the depths of his mind, despite his heavily sedated and unconscious state. Nurse Justin, following Dad's previously arranged DNR/Five Wishes instructions, pulled the breathing tube out of Dad's trachea, shut down his dialysis machine, shut down the monitors in his room and terminated all further efforts at Life Support. Dad didn't want to linger or be reduced to a vegetable if he ever came to such a state, and come to that state he finally had. His Life Support was terminated at 11:15 AM, but Dad hung on for twenty minutes more, with his breaths slowing and slowing until he finally stopped breathing altogether. Even then, his tongue flexed and moved two or three times after he had stopped breathing, as if he were trying to talk in a dreaming sleep, a sleep from which he would never awaken. And then Nurse Justin returned to our room and confirmed what I had already felt and knew in my heart of hearts.
My father was gone from the mortal coil. And all the while, all I could do was talk to him, rest my hand on his shoulder and watch him die. And I didn't leave his bedside — or his body — for another half-hour after that. It's so very hard to let go of someone whose time has come.
You can psych yourself up for that moment as much as you want. You can talk to the whole world, you can grow bitter or try to encase your heart with a shell of pure stoicism, you can outlive dozens of other people and lay them to rest (like my best friend of 27 years, an old Air Force buddy who was taken by a sudden cardiac arrest while getting ready for bed three months ago), you can revisit all of your memories or make a list of everything you love and everything you despise about that person...but when that moment finally arrives, when you must try but ultimately fail to hold onto that someone and watch them slip away into Eternity, there's not one blessed thing you can do to stop the crushing realization of loss from hitting you with every ounce of force known to gods and men. And all you can do is wonder, "How many more times will I have to feel this? How many more friends, lovers and family members will I have to bury before I pass this same pain and loss unto others with my own death? Why are we here? What's the point of life? Or is there any point at all?"
And for whatever reason, this song sprang right into my mind as I was leaving. Maybe it was the song, maybe it was the video, or maybe it was all the realization and sadness that comes with watching it.
I haven't been around Leefish much, but I'll probably be away even longer after this. I have a mountain of things to sort out, heart-to-heart talks to have with other people and with myself, changes to make with my life while I still have time to make them...I just need time alone now.
Goodbye, best of everything to you, and try to live the lives that you want to live, not the lives that authoritarian fools who couldn't care less about you, your well-being, your life or your death would prescribe. Be well.
(This post was last modified: 08-12-2020 04:12 AM by Pizzatron-9000.)
{{{hugs}}}
#907
12-12-2021
Among the stars, there is a new Fish, who kindly watches over us. And I am shivering from a sweet* invasion* of chills listening to this sound...
I am dedicating this music to Lee, our friend...
**: (a sweet one, contrary to the one of the TV series from which is extracted that piece of music...)
You're Full Of Stars (Max Richter, 2021):
I am dedicating this music to Lee, our friend...
**: (a sweet one, contrary to the one of the TV series from which is extracted that piece of music...)
You're Full Of Stars (Max Richter, 2021):
