Play Time

Memory exercises are part of my daily inventory when I believe I am skirting the edges of psychosis. This most recent memory exercise is Muscle Shoals Studio. How did that become a significant name in my memory? I know, with confidence, that part of the significance came from a horny old drunk who was attempting to build a sound studio underneath his hillside cabin on Lake Travis. Building beneath a house which sits on a limestone hill is no small engineering feat. Far greater a feat than untangling the chords to the sound equipment. That is where I first entered his private sanctuary in the mid 80's. By then, his modest equipment collection was old enough to show the alcoholic dementia. His chords were a mess. That's okay. I'm pretty damned good at untangling knots. I even kind of enjoy it. I have been known to untangle knitting yarn bags, just to keep my hands busy. Electrical chords are easy street next to untangling yarn. His beginnings at Muscle Shoals Studio were a dominant theme in his drunken meanderings as I sorted his tangled mess. I don't remember his stories too well. His alcoholic dementia was too far progressed for them to make allot of sense. I believe even his horniness wasnae any longer physically possible. I never did get the story on the carved limestone walls and floor of his studio. My memory exercises arenae going well, but I am letting that be okay. My musical memory is even more tangled than my childhood memory. I feel like I should congratulate myself for approaching that can of petrified worms at all.

Setting the yaddahs of those blahs aside for now. . .

When the last leg of this wandering soujourn found me in the odd collection of burgs which holds Muscle Shoals, my memory exercise generated a playful impulse. I submitted a contact form to the studio which spun off from the original. Why not treat myself to a custom, high dollar souvenir, if the ifs come into alignment? The ifs aligned. Got a studio date this afternoon. Even if it turns out to be nothing more than a hi-and-fly, it's been fun so far. Even hubs approves.

New musical term needed. Bob Dylan *works* music. I *play* with zero desire to give up my favorite game to work ethics. I reserve the right to play with any instrument. Okay, okay. . . I have my rock 'n' roll fantasies. You may lift your lighters now.