From Where To Eternity...

How my love for Otis Redding developed is a little embarrassing. Growing up I always really liked his biggest hit, Sitting On The Dock Of The Bay. But I really didn't know any other Otis Redding Songs. Flash forward to some time in mid 2000. It's late on a Saturday night and I am flipping through our cable channels. I come across a man sitting in a hospital bed. His nurse comes in to check on him and one of her breast starts rubbing against him and falls out of her nurses outfit. Teenage Frankie is immediately captivated by whatever the hell it is he is watching. A few moments later, in walks James Gandolfini. Little does Frankie know it but he has begun what will become a love affair with both The Sopranos and Otis Redding. I watch the rest of the episode and try to catch up with the reruns of the show and catch up with story lines from the first season. When season two premiers on HBO I start watching all the episodes during their original airtimes.

Music was always a big part of The Sopranos. David Chase has spoken about how the music that opened and closed the shows were always carefully chosen. Well, the song he chose to open episode nine of the second season was awesome. The episode (spoiler alert) starts with family and friends distraught in the hospital as they wait to see if Christopher will make it through after being shot. The soulfulness, the sadness, the beauty and pain in the opening scene are matched beautifully by the song. The song returns throughout the episode. Each time it's so beautiful and appropriate. I became obsessed with finding out who sung the song and what the title was.

We had just recently gotten the internet at my house. I searched some song lyrics and found the name of the song was My Lover's Prayer by Otis Redding. I started to look up and download other Otis Redding songs. I burned them onto a CD and would listen to them in my room and on the walkman I bought with my first few paychecks from working at Babies R Us. My mom very quietly noticed. One day something came in the mail for her. She handed it to me and said it was for me. I was so confused. I opened up the small cardboard box and inside of it was an Otis Redding greatest hits CD.

Anyone who really knows me how much I love Otis. I mean LOVE. While his vocal range is limited his soulfulness is unquestioned. He can tell an incredible story with his voice, especially when he is singing love songs. I cherish that CD so much. It has special meaning to because it came from my mom. I looked further and further into Otis' life. I learned that he died young. He died in a plane crash  just days after recording his last two songs, Sitting On The Dock Of The Bay  and I Got Dreams to Remember. I learned that he was the biggest star of the Stax Recording studio founded in Memphis, Tennessee. Shortly after I left San Diego for New jersey, my friend Kati went to go visit the St. Jude's headquarters in Memphis with one of our students. She posted this picture of the student holding up a Stax records frisbee. Right away I knew where they where, and I never told Kati this but, I was so jealous.

My Lover's Prayer is not my favorite Otis Redding song, though it is a great one. But had it not been for The Sopranos and that song I probably never would have been exposed to Otis and all of his great music. 

JohnTravolta was a big part of my teenage years...

I recently told a friend that when looking back on my life a lot of things pointed to me eventually living in New Jersey. My favorite Dodger growing up was Eric Karros (who was born and raised in New Jersey), I became big fans of comedian Jay Mohr, writer/director Kevin Smith, and The Sopranos. Bruce Springsteen is one of my favorite singer songwriters and even wrote a song that helped me decided whether or not I should move to San Diego to take a job ("I know a pretty little place in Southern California/Down San Diego way/where they play guitars all night and all day/you can hear them in the background strumming").

Anyway, I had no idea (until just prior to writing this) that another man who played an important role in my adolescent life is also from New Jersey. Mr. John Travolta. He is from Englewood, New Jersey. Why is John Travolta a big part of my life? I'll explain. Around the age of 10 my mom introduced me to a show called Welcome Back Kotter. 



I loved the theme song. The show, on second view, is not as good as I thought.

The show always ended with Mr. Kotter (Gabe Kaplan) telling his wife Julie a corny joke (this probably played a huge role in the development of my sense of humor). 



Travolta played a high school idot/Don Juan (Vinny Barbarino). This introduction to Welcome Back Kotter and Travolta all came around the same time of Travolta's career resurgence thanks to Pulp Fiction. My mom fell in love John Travolta. Loved. Her three favorite actors at the time were Morgan Freeman, John Travolta and Tom Hanks.

Anyway, flash forward to Christmas Day 1996. A day that will cement John Travolta's role in my life and the way I think about Christmas forever. Our family Christmases had always been hit and miss up until that point. But 1996 was a particularly bad one. There were not a lot of presents as I recall. Plus, on that day, and in the days leading up to it, my father had locked himself in his office and was battling his addictions. Unfortunately for him and for us he was losing this round pretty handily. 

(side: note last week my dad "plus oned" one of my blog posts on Google Plus. So Dad, if you're reading this I want you to know I am not mad at you, and you shouldn't feel bad. I love you. Promise.)

Back to the story. We had been invited to a relatives house but didn't want to go because... well... how do you explain your dad not being there? So my mom, brother and I went to the movies and watch a movie that was opening THAT day. The movie was Michael. Michael starred ... you guessed it... John Travolta. New Jersey's own. Michael even included a dance sequence. i can't hear Aretha Franklin singing Chain of Fools without thinking of that movie, my mom, my brother or John Travolta.


 Anyway, we watched Michael and followed it up with the traditional McDonald's Christmas dinner. Yes. McDonald's is open on Christmas. Why? Because families like mine exist that's why. Not a Christmas day goes by that I don't think of that movie or McDonalds.

But it wasn't until later that year, in July, that Travolta starred in a movie that included a song that will is part of the thirty most meaningful/best of my first thirty years. He starred in a film called Phenomenon alongside Kyra Sedgwick (who knew Kyra Sedgwick also played such a role in my life). My mom took my brother and I to see this movie in the theaters. Going to the movie with my mom was a big part of my teenage years. The soundtrack was headlined by a song that 13 year old Frankie became obsessed with: Change The World by Eric Clapton. I loved the very simple guitar, melody and Clapton's voice. It doesn't take much to impress a 13 year old version of myself. While i wouldn't even put this on the list of my favorite 100 songs, it's a song that means something to me. Just like listening to a Pink Floyd's The Wall, The Doors, Sade, Bob Marley or Madonna's This Used To Be My Playground reminds me of my dad. 



So for that reason Change The World makes my list. Thanks New Jersey. Thanks John Travolta.

I Get By With A Little Help

Relationships with other people are a difficult thing for me.

I don’t think I’m particularly good at them.  There are a lot of reasons for this.
 

One, is that I believe that I am the type of person that can very easily be taken advantage of or for granted. It’s just kind of my role in the eco-system. I tend to attract people who love to talk. Even when they are listening, they’re either waiting for their turn to talk, or hear me say something that reminds them of something else and they immediately jump in with their own story. I don’t necessarily mind it. In a lot of ways I enjoy it. It's nice to see people so excited to share their stories and lives with me. I like listening, but every once in a while it’s nice to be heard.

The second, was that the model for a relationship at home wasn’t particularly very good. It made me distrustful of others and it makes me very wary in terms of what I expect from friends and others. In fact, I often tell people that I try not expect things from them (or from situations).

Relationships shouldn’t be like vending machines. You shouldn’t put in with the hopes of getting something of equal or greater value back.  When you start to expect things you can only be disappointed. If someone does something nice for you and you expect it, a little bit of the shine comes off that gesture. If that which you expect never comes you can become angry and resentful. 

But I will say that this: I try not to expect things from people. It’s hard not to. It goes against the way we socialized. You work hard at something you’re supposed to be rewarded for you effort. It’s like the Beatles who finish their song The End by singing: "And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make." We are told in almost all aspects of our life to expect back what we put in. But often I find myself saddened to know that that’s just not true.  

In some relationships people will take what you give for granted, often directing their attention and energy on less productive and satisfying relationships. It can hurt. But hey, that’s life I suppose. Most people I know tend to put their focus on things that aren’t good rather than those things that are. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that we do that with people in our lives either. Hell, I am doing it right now in this blog post.

 

In  my 30 years of life a lot of the song I loved the most have captured that sense of disappointment and frustration that comes from expecting things from people and things. Best of You by the Foo Fighters is one that does it very well.

Has someone taken your faith?
Its real, the pain you feel
The life, the love you'd die to heal
The hope that starts the broken hearts
You trust, you must
Confess

 

 

And for my friends, those of you who are there to listen when I need you, those who share with me in good times and bad, those who don’t try to “fix me” when something is wrong, the people who I can not speak to for months (even years) but when we're in the same room it just all clicks. For the people who mean the most to me, this third song is for you. Love y'all.

Does it worry you to be alone?

How do I feel at the end of the day?

Are you sad because you're on your own?

No, I get by with a little help from my friends