Blissfully Out Of It

When I lived in LA the damned celebreties seemed to be everywhere. I couldn't turn on the radio or the TV or open the paper or talk to a friend or go to a coffee shop without hearing about the latest exploits of some disposable pop star. Who's sleeping with who. (whom?) Who got drunk and trashed what club. Who is having trouble finishing thier latest album/movie/addiction recovery. Blah blah blah.

I don't know why it permeated the atmosphere down there. I found myself all too often caught up in it. I found myself all too often wondering about their lives and how sweet it must be to have that much money and fame. Just like everyone else.

One of the blissful things about the 'Boldt is that we seem to be a thousand miles from all that celebrity smog. For instance, I'm hearing second or third hand on the Daily Show about some tantrum that a movie star evidently threw which is making the rounds. I haven't heard it, don't really want to, and could not find an atom in my being which would even care. I'm hearing this about three or four weeks after it happened, evidently, and it passes over me like a bad smell that I walk by quickly.

No, here in the 'Boldt we really don't have celebreties. Oh, we have a young woman who went to Eureka high and then graduated to the pop charts; she's actually a very fine singer and a songwriter with potential. But no one around here makes much of a big deal of her, and even though her concerts are sold out when she comes home, it's not like you're surrounded by the poor girl every time you go in public.

We don't much care about the rich and famous in the 'Boldt. We've found our bliss in oblivion. Our famous beings tend to be tall trees that are hundreds or thousands of years old, living entities which have been around long enough to know that the trash we call the news is something that comes and goes like the waves, like the wind, like the migration of the ducks in the February sky.

I find myself curiously incurious about our culture. I'm reading lots of good books and listening to lots of good jazz and classical and, from time to time, some old folk and pop. I did buy the latest album by Bruce Springsteen and found myself disappointed that the songs seemed lukewarm. Oh well. The Boss has done so many excellent pieces of work that he's allowed a lapse from time to time.

My ear, by the way, has mended. I lost a bit more hearing in it, though I think most of that will eventually come back, too. In the meantime, I'm practicing my electric guitar for a special ceremony this Sunday in church--our pastor, Father Mike, is being installed by the Bishop and he's given me permission to bring my red guitar to Mass. So I have to figure how to sound appropriately spiritual with the electric, but also to add something new to the music that makes bringing the guitar worthwhile. Worked on it for hours tonight. Was happy as a small furry thing burrowed next to a redwood.