I'll take "Breakup Songs that make me happy" for $1000

Thao with The Get Down Stay Down - When We Swam

W.S. Merwin

Because April is National Poetry month, I've been reading and researching, W.S. Merwin. He won his second Pulitzer Prize for The Shadow of Sirius last year. Hearing him read from it at one of last years Wordstock events was one of the highlights of the festival, especially because Merwin himself comes across as such a lovely human being. It is always disappointing when someone one admires turns out to be arrogant or unpleasant, so it was doubly rewarding to have it confirmed that Merwin is neither.

I first came in contact with Merwin in grad school via his translations of Pablo Neruda. As a student of language and dabbler in translation, I admired his facility with language and ability to create translations that captured not only meaning but spirit and emotion. Literal translation is easy, but it is not such an easy thing to convey the feel of the original. Good translation is a fine art unto itself.

For a long time, I went along blithely unaware that Merwin was a gifted poet in its own right. It was only many years later that I ran into one of his poems, fell in love, then realized that it was my old friend. For a great piece on him (including some examples of his poetry) from Bill Moyers Journal, click here.

"The Nomad Flute."
W.S. Merwin, from The Shadow of Sirius

You that sang to me once sing to me now
let me hear your long lifted note
survive with me
the star is fading
I can think farther than that but I forget
do you hear me

do you still hear me
does your air
remember you
o breath of morning
night song morning song
I have with me
all that I do not know
I have lost none of it

but I know better now
than to ask you
where you learned that music
where any of it came from
once there were lions in China

I will listen until the flute stops
and the light is old again

As road tripping season begins, so do the road mixes. With mp3 players and Pandora and all the technology that exists, I suppose they aren't really that necessary, but there's something really pleasing about putting them together. Back when I was growing up (and walking up hill to schools both ways in the snow, even in summer), I remember creating mix tapes from the radio. You old people know what I'm talking about. You'd sit in front of the radio, fingers poised over the record button, waiting for the song to come on so you could get it on a cassette tape. And once you got it, it mostly didn't matter that you weren't quite fast enough to catch the beginning or that dipshit DJ talked over the first 1/4 of the song, because you had captured it and sweet, sweet victory was yours!

Now, with iTunes, it is all so much easier. You can get exactly what you want and they are fun to put together. I love it when friends give me their mixes. Each song is like a little surprise. Will I like it? Will I not like it? Will the next song be something new and exciting? Something familiar, but well loved? So much anticipation!

My friend, Jen, makes awesome mixes. I am always delighted at the stuff she manages to find. So, with a mini-motor to the coast with her on the horizon, I decided to re-purpose the birthday mix I'd made into a beach trip mix. I think I might still make a few changes to it (maybe replace some of the stuff that was put on for my godson who was supposed to accompany me on my birthday outing), but was over all pretty pleased with the results:

1. We've Got Scurvy - P!nk. This is from Spongebob's Greatest Hits. While I am now going to tell you that it was put on for my godson's entertainment, the truth is that I like it. I mean, it's a song about scruvy, for pete's sake! Plus, it has pirates in it and P!nk. What's not to like?

2. Eight Miles Wide - Storm Large. Silly, yes, but fun to belt while you're driving down the highway, because you can be a kickass bruiser and be feminine (and it makes me laugh to think of myself as a kickass bruiser...I can't even kill a spider). I also like the message of being big (in personality) and unapologetic about owning who you are. I don't know about you, but it's something I could be better about. It also doesn't hurt that Ms. Large actually has a really good voice. It's funny, I wasn't that into her when she was on Rock Star, but she's really grown on me in the ensuing years and now I think she is pretty awesome.

3. Sunshine Song (Live) - Jason Mraz. I really like Jason Mraz's voice (if not all his music...he has one song on his most recent offering that really annoys me). He has such easy control over his vocals. He has his own, unique intonation and it never sounds forced or strained. I love this song for its bouncy, happy melody and I love that someone is described as "cerulean". I would take it as a compliment if someone described me as such!

4. This Little Light of Mine - James Horner & Sweet Honey in the Rock. For someone who does not think of herself as particularly religious and has limited experience with any non-reserved protestant kind of church experience, I have always had a weird affinity for big-voiced black women singing gospel. This version is just so joyful and happy that it's hard to listen to and not be in a good mood.

5. How Do You Do? - Mouth & MacNeil. Is this the greatest song ever written? No. Is it even what could be called "good"? Not really, BUT this song cracks me all the way up, because it was (along with Bad, Bad Leroy Brown) the first song I remember really digging when I was a kid. It also cracks me up, because I can totally see it being performed by The Electric Mayhem on The Muppet Show. I think it was actually recorded even a few years before my time, so you know it's old! The thing is, I can totally remember being three or four in the back seat of my dad's GTO and getting excited when it came on. Why the radio was on any station that would play it is beyond me, because this was so NOT my father's kind of music. He was all about country and blues, so I can only assume that he had it on to entertain me. "And then we can nananana just like we did before" indeed!

6. Ride a White Swan - T. Rex. Again, I love this because it is fun and happy and quirky. Marc Bolan had a kind of odd quiver to his voice sometimes, but it is the kind of thing that grows on me. The song makes me want to take his advice and wear a tall hat and tattooed gown and run around with a cat on my shoulder like the people of the Beltaine (which is coming up, by the way!) It also makes me wonder where I can find a swan to ride and whether swans are traditionally ridden bareback or if one needs a saddle to do so. Is there licensing required or can one just take to the waterways? Could the cat and the swan live peaceably or would there be friction? So many questions. Oh why, Marc Bolan, can we not all just get along? Bonus aside: I read somewhere once that Marc Bolan never learned to drive, because he feared dying prematurely in an automobile accident. And guess how he died? Car crash. I wonder if it's really true that he was so prescient or if it's just a good story?

7. Me and Bobby McGee - Crystal Bowersox. American Idol and I have a weird relationship. I watch it, despite thinking it generally sucks the artistry out of any unique contestants, and (barring a couple Kelly Clarkson downloads) don't ever purchase anything they release after it's over. That said, I think Crystal Bowersox has a pretty amazing voice and I love that she (so far, the high heel episode excluded) remains mostly unstyled. This song has been covered a million times, but I think this version is pretty great and I hope she does well.

8. That's Not My Name - The Ting Tings. Again it's not the most brilliant song ever written, but it's fun and the boy LOVES it (as he loves anything rhythmic and drum heavy). If you have never ridden in a car with a four year old boy sing-screaming "That's not my name" at the top of his lungs, well, then you haven't lived.

9. Take a Chance on Me - Abba. This went on my birthday mix, because I totally remember having an Abba's Greatest hits 8-track when I was a kid and Take a Chance on Me was my favorite song on it. I would hole up in my room for hours watching the disco lights on stereo (that's right, it had disco lights!) and rehearsing my stage show.

10. I Think I Need a New Heart - The Magnetic Fields. I love the contrast between the light, bouncy arrangement of this song in combination with Stephin Merrit's deep, almost ascerbic singing voice and slightly testy personality. Seeing him in concert for the first time not too long ago somehow cemented in my mind this image of him as a besweatered (but weirdly lovable) curmudgeon. I know that doesn't sound so complimentary, but I respect a good curmudgeon and really do like him, because 69 Love Songs is one of my favorite cds ever.

11. The Way I am - Ingrid Michaelson. Remember when the sweater song was all over the place because of those t.v. commercials? It almost got played too much, but I still really love it, because it is just so sweet.

12. Cupid (Live) - Sam Cooke. I don't even have adjectives to describe how much I love Sam Cooke. He is a silver voiced god. It is so sad to me to think of all he could have done had he not been taken so early, because the catalog for the time he lived is pretty amazing. I love this version of Cupid, because it's just a little raw and shows a different side of Sam's voice.

13. A Little Bit of Riddim - Michael Franti & Spearhead. It's a little repetitive, but, oh man, does this song make me butt dance in the car whenever I hear it. Franti is another one who got some airplay because of one song that got picked up by pop stations, but actually has a catalog and established following. I downloaded their whole cd from iTunes on a whim, because I liked Say Hey when I heard it on the radio and ended up liking the whole thing for its socially conscious lyrics. It shows that popular music can be fun without being stupid (says the woman who likes "That's Not My Name").

14. I Love Rock n Roll - Joan Jett & The Blackhearts. If you want to talk about badass, that was Joan Jett in the early 80's. Jen and I talked on the way to the beach about how this song totally screams things about our teen years and roller skating rinks whenever we hear it, which is pretty funny, considering we both grew up on opposite ends of the country and I totally remember skating to this at Skate World.

15. Suddenly ... (I Miss Carpaty) - Gogol Bordello. There is so much that I love about Gogol Bordello. Their violinist is amazing, but I've talked so much about them the I feel I should probably just cool it, but they are a quirky mix of gypsy folk and punk and so awesome that I almost can't stand it.

16. The Story - Brandi Carlile. I love the notion that the lines on our faces (well, those of us who aren't botoxed beyond recognition, anyway) are a map of our experiences and I love the lyrics in general, especially the part about how "friends think that I'm blessed but they don't know my head is a mess", which speaks so accurately to the crazy I (mostly) keep just below the surface. Preach on, my whackadoo sister, preach on!

17. Pretty Flowers - Steve Martin. This is such a sweet little love song. Even though Steve Martin wrote it, it sounds like something you'd hear in The Songcatcher or find in an anthology of folk tunes. It's just so authentic and unassuming, pretty and unexpected from someone who built is early career dressing up like King Tut and wearing an arrow through his head. Hooray for Steve!

18. Drunkard's Waltz - Joel Savoy. If I could have a theme song, this would be the melody. It skips along so happily and free of care that I think it would please me for people to think of me when they heard it. We've have to do something about the name, though.

19. Cajun Song - Gin Blossoms. I have had the cd this came from since grad school. I received it as a gift and think I've probably listened to the full thing a grand total of once. Still, I've always loved this song, because as a companion piece to my old school gospel affinity, I have an inexplicable affinity for Cajun and Zydeco music. How some 1/2 German kid growing up in the NW with no ties to the bayou developed a fondness for this kind of stuff or why the Gin Blossoms were singing in the height of the grunge years it will always be beyond me.

20. The Lonely Goatherd - Julie Andrews. I don't know what is up with my goatherd fetish lately, but I love singing this song, because of the part at the end where I get to really ham it up, but that will just remain our little secret, Internets. I'm trusting you with this information, so please don't tell anyone!

Cleocatra

The Watcher in the Window
Originally uploaded by Martina

My sweet little Cleo cat died today. I will miss her.

Happy Anniversary to Me!

One of the many wonderful things about living in Portland is that two of my favorite places ever - the Columbia River Gorge and Maryhill Museum of Art - are within easy road tripping distance. Since nature saw fit to shine her light in all its glory on the first day of spring (which also happens to be my birthday), there was no other choice but to celebrate with a mini-road trip. So, I got together some of my favorite people and hit the road.

The day started with a lovely brunch with my adopted nephew and his family, who are slowly being absorbed into the auntosphere. It started with the boy. I keep his allegiance by buying him toys and feeding him copious amounts of sugar when he comes to visit, but the older daughter now makes occasional references to me as "Aunt Tina" too. The middle child is a tough teen nut to crack, but I am confident that I will win her over one day too, if I can get her to put down her cell phone and stop texting for long enough to notice there are other people in the room.

Aside from the company, the great thing about brunch was that it was the only meal I've had to cook in the past five days. Thursday lunch was Italian with coworkers and dinner came in the form of happy hour with my friends Goth Girl and The Tattooed Lady, who kindly treated me to pre-birthday porter and a roasted garlic burger. And the dining out has not stop with the weekend either! That's right Portland Area Restaurant Association members, my crew and I are keeping you afloat, so you better smile when you see me waddling up to your front door!

But, back to my story. Picture this. Portland, the first day of spring 2010. The sky is blue, the sun is shining, and people's stomachs are full of maple sausage and apple breakfast casserole. The brunch shift clocks out and the road trip shift arrives. The sun is shining so hard I want to pinch myself to make sure I'm not dreaming. I am not. If it were a dream, I would be thinner and George Clooney would be accompanying me.

Even Clooney free, it turns out to be one of my favorite days ever, mostly because my mom and the friends I was travelling with really are a lot of fun. You know how some people can be good friends, but not good road friends, because their pace is too different from yours or because you like piddling around and they have to have a plan? Well, these people are perfect as friends AND road tripping buddies.
As the day progressed, we visited Starvation Creek State Park (I totally want to go back for a picnic one day!) and stopped for lunch at Big Jim's in The Dalles, where the lady at the counter surprised me with free birthday ice cream, which she brought to our table BEFORE lunch came. If there's one thing I've learned in my many moons, it's that you don't mess around with waiting for after lunch when you are full to start with dessert. Big rookie mistake. It's much more efficient to go for the good stuff right off. That way you can be too full when it comes time for the lima beans and not the hot fudge. It just makes good birthday sense and I am ever so happy that Big Jim and I are of one mind on this!

After Jim's it was off to Stonehenge and Maryhill, where we wandered around taking pictures of the peacocks, which really are sexy birds and not just fancy turkeys no matter what some members of my party would have you believe. Then, as the day drew to a close, we sat at a picnic table on the grounds while my people showered me with amazing gifts before heading back to the city for the evening. Looks like this is my lucky year!

Blue Steel: A Love Story

It has recently come to my attention that all peacocks are named Derek. Well, all but they white ones, which are named Hansel. Like Tyra Banks and their namesake, Derek Zoolander, they are consummate models, who have mastered many looks.

Behold, Magnum:

But while stunning, it is not quite enough,

And so he unveils

Blue Steel

She pretends not to notice,

but eventually succumbs, because

he really is really, really ridiculously good looking

Hello Spring!

P1010018
Originally uploaded by Martina

The magnolia tree outside my bedroom window has just started to bud. The past few days have been so sunny and pink that I've been craving picnics and days at the beach even though there was frost on my windshield when I left for work this morning. Although it's my birthday this weekend and everyone knows you should get whatever you want on your birthday, I'm guessing that it's going to be hard get anyone on board with celebrating my naissance out in the cold, even if it is sunny cold or sunny cold with cake.

I've often considered moving my birthday to a month more amenable to picnics in wildflower filled meadows or maybe having a birthday and birthday, observed like some dead President from day gone by. Ultimately, this just seems like too much work. For one, I am horribly indecisive and it would be difficult to decide on a day, then once the day was chosen and then there'd be the bother of retraining everyone to shower me with gifts and well wishes at a different time of year. Who needs that kind of headache? Not only am I old(ish), but I'm lazy too. So, I'm sticking with the first day of spring, which has always seemed to me a very good day to start a new year.

There is something promising about pink buds and sunny days when you've already braced yourself for a few more rainy, gray weeks before summer returns. As luck has it, it's supposed to be in the upper 60's/low 70's on Saturday. While that's a little cool for sitting outside for long periods of time, it is perfect weather for a trip to visit the peacocks at Maryhill Museum of Art, which just happens to be celebrating its 70th season opening on my birthday this year. I like to think of it as my season opening too!