Category: loss

Grateful Dead musings

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I watched Long Strange Trip the six part documentary by Martin Scorsese about The. The Grateful Dead. The last part (6) is when I got into the Grateful Dead in the 1990’s. I didn’t know how miserable Jerry was. How trapped by his incredible fame and recognizability. He was stuck inside hotels he couldn’t do anything. He took up scuba diving because there he was able to just be. I love Jerry he really was like a God to me. I had no idea that was what ultimately killed him the responsibility of performing mixed with the drive to keep going. Giving us the experience became an albatross. As I learned about the last years I was stunned by how trapped he was. I feel so badly for having a hand in his demise. Scorcese did the 6 part documentary. He closed with my first introduction to the Dead and absolutely favorite song Ripple because Marty is a genius. I was back to the day Jerry died. Sobbing uncontrollably. It happened to be my father’s birthday Aug 9. I went to see him but was inconsolable. I really was grieving and could not stop sobbing. Took three days to stop crying. I can’t imagine crying like that for my father unfortunately. That’s the thing about Jerry. I went to 22 shows and had the greatest time of my life each time. My father has not given me that kind of unforgettable joy once. How could I not have held Jerry in such high esteem? He was a grandfather I never had and always wanted. His humanity was what made his music so incredibly deep and melancholy. He was a people pleaser prophet. I still miss those days. How differently I see things now.

Jerry Garcia Foundation still doing good committing to fighting Covid19 https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/new-jerry-garcia-music-release-to-benefit-covid-19-relief-301103880.html.

Tennis and Poetry: “If” recited by Federer and Nadal

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Combining some of my favorite things i.e.  poetry, tennis, and tennis players.  This Wimbledon promo is simply a fortunate find.  Without further ado, I present Roger and Rafa reciting Rudyard Kipling’s “IF” which adorns the entrance to center court at Wimbledon. 

 

 

IF
by Rudyard Kipling

(‘Brother Square-Toes’—Rewards and Fairies)

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
 

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