HUMAN WRECKAGE

Say Hello

I was talking with a friend of mine who lives in Calgary last Saturday night. Checking in long distance, my landline to his cell: he made a choice; he decided to take my call. I’m not sure our conversations have changed all that much over the course of some 50 years. I find that aspect as reassuring as his voice coming down the line. We generally cover current topical slices of life and work; all that is righteous on E Street; the Montreal Canadiens. The indignity of public toilets is a bizarrely frequent subject, something of an increasingly unhealthy phobic-fetish as we’ve aged.

Toward the end of our chat, I asked after a mutual friend whom we first met in high school and who also lives in Calgary. I said, “I’ve telephoned him a couple of times. They always go through to voicemail and he never returns my calls.”

“Oh, that’s funny. I was texting with him just last night, providing some Springsteen listening instructions. I think he only responds to texts these days.”

I said, “Oh.”

I suppose I cannot communicate with one of my oldest friends as easily as I used to because I am a Luddite. I am “Beechwood 4-5789,” a telephone exchange designated by a proper noun, while he’s got a supercomputer skinnier than my package of 25 king size cigarettes in his pocket. The Marvelettes meet Kraftwerk. I do know that when old and new technologies somehow mesh and allow us to speak again, we’ll pick up our previous conversation from the middle: “As I was saying….” We will find a way to ensure our friendship endures relentless, confusing and sometimes frighteningly dehumanizing change.

One of the charms of Bruce Springsteen’s latest record with the earthquaking, legendary E Street Band is its quaint title: Letter to You. The 12 tracks are not exercises in nostalgia, glory days. The album spins like a missive to any rock and roll soul who ever set a sneaker on E Street, “This is where we were; this is where we are; this is what happened,” the Boss just checking in.

Because my mental bombe functions with plug-ins and punch cards, I’ve contemplated creating an exhaustive list of once-popular songs whose narrative devices hinge on archaic ways to younger ears. You know, “Return to Sender,” “The Letter,” “Operator,” “Switchboard Susan,” and such. A big job for someone who never figured out Lotus Notes and those are just a few titles. What about scene setting opening lines? That “Long distance information, give me Memphis, Tennessee…” plea from Chuck Berry or Rod Stewart and Faces, “Just a telegram as your plane touches down…” that lovely and forlorn introduction to “Jodie.”

There’s no avoiding technological advancement. New habits can only be delayed before they’re formed. According to last year’s “Living in a Ghost Town,” Mick Jagger spent his first months of lockdown looking at his phone. My hunch is it wasn’t an elegant “Princess” push button model from Bell Telephone. The godfather of Caledonia soul has recently weighed in with “Why Are You on Facebook?” The consensus among music fans is that Van Morrison has always been a prick as a person, but that aspect of his character never manifested in his music. He’s always presented as a spiritual, romantic soul. Have I told you lately that he’s now a crabby old crank too? Van makes curmudgeon Don Henley seem like Raffi. This new song is so cartoonishly mean-spirited as to be uncomfortably hilarious.

The latest and best song about modern times is John Hiatt’s witty “Long Black Electric Cadillac.” The long black ride is a common trope and image in blues, country and rock music, as classic as the mystery train. Hiatt’s driver can cover a thousand miles between charges and, anyway, he’s “been running on artificial intelligence ever since I was a little boy.” The lyric fragment I’ve excerpted suggests a “Slow Turning” childhood memory: “I always thought this house was haunted because nobody said ‘Boo’ to me…” I am hooked by his new song’s sly nod to “Memphis in the Meantime,” Hiatt’s breakthrough: “After we get good and greasy, babe, we can go on home, put the cowhorns back on the Cadillac and change the message on the Code-A-Phone…”

John Hiatt’s tangential check in reminded me of “Boots and Hearts” by the Tragically Hip: “Well, I left myself on the answering machine, said I’m back in town tonight…” Answering machines, Code-A-Phones, how’d I forget about those? Sometimes I think I’ve spent half my life talking to a spooling reel of tape or responding to pre-recorded verbal prompts: “If you would like to speak to a human being, hang up.” If I wasn’t a lapsed Catholic, I swear to God my prayers would go to voicemail.   

meGeoff has been your most unreliable, unbalanced and inaccurate alternative source of aged, innocuous and meaningless observations  since 2013. My novella Of Course You Did is coming soon. Don’t miss out on the literary sensation of 2021. Bookmark this blog for breathless updates.