outside voices
The first deep breath I remember taking today was while I was sitting in my parents’ garden,
The first deep breath I remember taking today was while I was sitting in my parents’ garden,
I’d put my headphones on because the neighbors two doors down had finally decided to have a friend over! and polish off a few boxes of rosé while talking louder than I ever thought possible. My favorite quote, nearly shouted: “Oh my GOD! I was so much hotter in college! Have you seen pictures of me from 2013!?” Later one of them lit a cigar and the foul smoke drifted over from the backyard over toward me. Right. Other people, I thought.
Drowned it out using Purple Rain by Prince — Live in Syracuse — I noticed my first deep breath at around minute three. I sent the song coursing through my subpar earbuds, his electric guitar and the Revolution behind him meandering effortlessly through the first six minutes and eighteen seconds, then gracing us with his voice. Something strange happens when the vocals kick in. Maybe it’s a background track for safety? There are two voices that overlap, both are his, one just ahead of the other before The Artist says thank you and picks up the lyrics where he’d left off, echoey reverb and all. After that, it’s smooth purple sailing. Almost twenty whole minutes of it.
Listening today, sitting in the chair in the garden, alone, but also surrounded by muted rosé-drinking millennials and crying babies, I thought of how clever Prince was. How incredible it is to have the foresight to write a ballad in which the audience must endure the brilliance of the beginning and middle of the song only to arrive at the end, the ooooohooooohooos. The entire song is a promise that we will arrive at this moment, finally. We’re all just waiting to join in.