Writing the Past
Something Got Lost In Translation: Neon Wonderland
I got off the plane into the hot Tokyo summer air. It was hotter than I was expecting, more humid, like being steamed alive, a real jungle heat. This was my attempt to escape my destiny as just another casualty, just another woman who had been abused as a child and ending up falling into […]
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Fishing Hooks and Head Stocks
A fishing lure hangs from your headstock. I never thought to wonder why. I bet you could catch a fish with a high E string and a G string hook with a feathery lure. I bet you could get a bite. You caught me through the cheek and landed me just fine, after all, with […]
MoreLiving Inside
I have lived back inside for six months now. Five years on the road in campers and tents with no inside showers or bathrooms, and now six months of showers whenever I want them, and the walk to the bathroom being across carpet not down trails. I had previously been homeless on a few occasions […]
MoreIN THE SAME VEIN (trigger warning: drugs, sharp things, no sex. A little rock and roll)
I’m needing to cut loose, to borrow a telecaster, plug it in, turn it up and thump out a kicking cover of Lorraine. “She got straight, she understand, aw she wanna die, but now she got plans, she wanna live, she wanna start her band…Go Lorraine!” Jim wrote the ultimate speedball song, she took that […]
MoreDown Here With The Rest Of Us. Mike Ness – white light white heat white trash hero
I love Social Distortion. I have a neverending urge to play Down Here With The Rest Of Us through neatly manicured state and national campgrounds that pander to the quarter of a million dollar motor homes, while not making any space for those of us who can only afford the rent on a campsite and […]
MoreChris Whitley: Americana Empathica
Chris Whitley never made it as big as he should have. He never fulfilled his potential. He was meant to be the next Big Thing, a new Bruce or a Dylan or a Neil Young, instead his star never really ascended despite Sony/Columbia Records pushing him heavily when he was launched as a major artist […]
MoreOn the day that you were born…
Dear Son, On the day that you were born you made everything alright. I had temporarily managed to get away from your father. He had beaten me up so badly when I was a few months pregnant with you, and I decided to run with your sister and take the consequences. So we ran. I […]
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