Rewrite

Jim Croce's song "Working at the Car Wash Blues" is about a guy working at just such a place, after just having gotten out of jail "doing 90 days for non-support," which means not paying child support. This deadbeat dad's concern, however, is not making things right with his progeny, but being an "undiscovered Howard Hughes," who really has the business acumen to be in "an air-conditoned office with a swivel chair," not "working at this indoor Niagara Falls."

Simon's speaker here, a Vietnam vet, also has "been working at the car wash," and likewise has grander ambitions. Not on Wall Street, but in Hollywood: "I've been working on my rewrite... gonna turn it into cash."

What about the screenplay requires revision? "Gonna change the ending." You see, it was originally about this guy with kids, see, but: "...the father has a breakdown/ And he has to leave the family." Oh. Hmm.

Yes, but in the rewrite? "Gonna substitute a car chase/ And a race across the rooftops/ When the father saves his children/ And he holds them in his arms."

The satirical newspaper called The Onion mocks current events but also has reviews, and in one coined the term "Manic Pixie Dreamgirl." This is a fictional female who is winsome and cute; she exists to breathe life into the dull and cloistered lives of brilliantly creative but unappreciated and shy guys, like... oh, say, maybe some screenwriters.

Yes, but isn't that-- somewhat at least-- what art is for? To create a better world than the disappointing one we actually inhabit?

So, we can tease the car-wash guy for being twice deluded-- once that anyone would buy his cliche-soaked screenplay, and once that even if he gets rich selling it, that this will help him reunite with his kids. We can tease him...we can mourn his loss with him...

Or we can be glad at least his heart is in the right place. That, even in his frustration, he is able to find a creative (and not destructive) outlet for his emotions. If you can't have the real thing, at least you can know you want it. This is not unlike the conclusion Ibsen reached in his play The Wild Duck, about the necessity of illusion in the face of the true bleakness of life, such as that of the inventor who has been puttering on his never-finished creation for years.

There is an expression: "Fake it 'til you make it." In this case, sure, fake it all you want, car-wash guy, since we know you will never make it anyway. Who are you hurting? In fact, you are helping... helping yourself cope.

The chorus-- "Help me... Thank you for listening to my prayer"-- seems to be directed at the listener. But what is his prayer? Perhaps it is to know that, even if you won't come to see his movie, you will at least wish him luck on his rewrite.

Musical Notes:
This song features a number of perhaps unfamiliar instruments. The "glass harp" is an array of drinking or wine glasses with varying amounts of water in them, which affects the pitch produced when their edges are rubbed with the player's finger.

The "kora" is a cello-size African string instrument with a rounded body; it produces the music box-like plinking head in the song. The "djembe" is a goblet-shaped hand-drum; the smaller ones are held under the arm like a bagpipe, while the larger ones are supported between the knees of a seated player.

And an "angklung" is an Indonesian percussion instrument of ingenious design. A horizontal frame holds vertical bamboo poles of varying lengths. Sticks are placed within the hollow poles, and when the poles are shaken the sticks rattle inside, with tones differing depending on the lengths of the tubes they are in. Small versions can fit on a table, while larger variants are on larger racks resembling those for tubular bells. The overall effect is not unlike that of a vibraphone.

Next Song: Love and Hard Times

Quiet

The obvious reading of this song is that the "time of quiet" Simon refers to is death. But this album came out in 2000, and Simon was born in 1941. So Simon was not even at the usual retirement age when he wrote and released this song. Not very close to death, with the lifespan expectations of today.

Another reason is that Simon used the word "quiet"... and not "silence." We all know Simon's feelings on silence-- the complete absence of all sound-- and he knows that we know that this is a loaded word when it comes to his lyrics. So he avoids that word and chooses the less stringent synonym, "quiet."

I believe, therefore, he was not talking about dying. He was talking about easing up, going into retirement or semi-retirement. And he is looking forward to it.

His "restlessness" will be "past" (not "passed"). Evidently, he has been restless his whole life. Why? Well, now he will get to "release [his] fists at last." Are these the fists of fighting? Or of grasping? We shall see.

He is also looking forward to "solitude." After three marriages, several children, a duo partner and dozens of collaborators, plus legions of fans and who knows how many agents and managers, simple alone-ness might seem a blissful refuge. 

Also, he will find "peace without illusions." This can be read two ways. One is that, without illusions, he will find peace. The other is that this will be a real peace, not one dependent on self-delusion.

The next lines, "When the perfect circle marries/ All beginnings and conclusions," admittedly, does ring a bit like a death knell. The end meeting up with the start, forming a perfect circle akin to the one he quotes in "Sparrow"-- "Of dust were ye made/ And dust ye shall be"-- is a funereal image. And it's not about the start and end to a career (as if artists ever end their careers!) but "all" such starts and ends, including birth and death. 

Then come what sounds like the proffer of career advice, "And when they say/ That you're not good enough/ Well, the answer is..." Oh, we know what comes next! The answer is 'of course you are,' or 'I believe in you,' or something of that encouraging nature. 

"...the answer is/ You're not." Well! Thanks for nothing! But Simon is just being honest. It's not even clear if he has ever lived up to his own expectations, or the standards of his heroes. After all, he reads Wallace Stevens and Derek Wolcott! Never mind the opinions of the critics, the public...

Wait! Read the next line. Simon is going after such critics. He is saying: "Well, they say you're not good enough/ But who are they?" [emphasis mine]. Yes, who made them the arbiters of the "good enough," anyway?

Actually, the "but" starts us off on a whole new thought: "But who are they/ Or what is it/ That eats at what you've got?" Again, there are two possible readings. One is to say that, fine, this is the conclusion of that earlier thought. Who are they to "eat at," to gnaw away at, to erode, what you have made?  

Another reading is deeper. "They" only can call into doubt what you yourself doubt. If you were confident that you were good enough, you simply wouldn't care! Of course you are not good enough for them-- no one is. No one can please everyone. 

So "what you've got" is not what you have made. It's the talent you made it with! You can lose what you have made, but you have truly "got" your talent and skill. What is it that tells you that you are a failure, that eats away your confidence in your talent? Something internal. It's not "they"... it's it.

Let's back up. Why does it matter what the critics and public say? Well, if no one buys your album, you'll go broke! In that sense, it matters a great deal! 

Yes, but, Simon explains, using the same "eating" metaphor, "With the hunger of ambition/ For the change inside the purse/ They are handcuffs on your soul, my friend... and worse." If your work is meant only to please the buying public, you cannot produce work that truly expresses what is in your soul.

A brief historical aside captures this insight. Interviews were done with East German artists some months after the Berlin Wall fell. Rather than reveling in their liberty, they complained! Yes, they were no longer forced to conform to the dictates of the communist government censors... but now they were constrained by the tastes of the capitalist art-buying public, which were just as harsh, and even more fickle! 

These artists, who "hungered" for the "purse," found their "souls" in "handcuffs"... and "worse."

Simon began this album explaining that where he "belonged" was "walking down a dirt road/ To a river where the water meets the sky." He closes the record by saying that he is headed for "a place of quiet/ Where the sage and sweetgrass grow/ By a lake of sacred water/ From the mountain's melted snow."

These two images differ in their presence of greenery, and in their general climate; the "spiny little island man" in the first song may never have seen "snow," but "sage and sweetgrass" grow in Montana. 

But in both cases, Simon dreams of being at the water's edge. From the River Styx to the River Jordan to the Rubicon, the idea of the passage over water being a passage of no return is an ancient one. But in neither case does Simon actually mention crossing the water-- no bridge or boat is described. In neither case does he even mention another side of the water.

So again, I do not believe this is a song about death. It is a song about exactly what it says in the title: quiet. Of hushing the voices of "not good enough." He releases his fists, which have been grasping hungrily at success and wealth, and trying to sate an insatiable audience.

And simply by unclenching his fists, he allows these "handcuffs" to slide right off. So farewell to trying to restlessly please people so that they will buy his records. He is 60, and still productive, with nothing left to prove or pay back.

It's a relief, and a release, and he finally feels he has earned the right to chart his own course. Maybe we should not have been surprised that he called his next album... Surprise.

Next Song: How Can You Live in the Northeast?

Flowers Never Bend with the Rainfall

In his play The Wild Duck, Henrik Ibsen (Norway) shows that it is better for some to live with an illusion than with the truth that would devastate them. In his book of essays, "The Myth of Sisyphus," Albert Camus (France) explains that, since hope and despair are equally absurd guesses as to the quality of the future, one might as well choose hope. Another work this song calls to mind is Umberto Eco's (Italy) novel The Name of the Rose, which discusses-- since knowledge is power-- who gets to know what, and whether it might be better for certain people to not know certain things.

And then of course, there is good old Jack Nicholson (America), in the film, "A Few Good Men," frustratedly asserting that we cannot, in fact, "handle the truth."

Whether the speaker in our song is aware of any of these works is beside the point-- he would certainly understand them. He has tried to fathom something about reality, and it confounded him most horribly. He has nightmares about the unknown: "Through the corridors of sleep... my mind dances and leaps in confusion."

He is not sure whether the reality he perceives is, in fact, real... or is perhaps all in his head. He is unsure of even his own status as "real." It would be one thing if the "dark and small" image his mirror reflects was himself, for at least then he could try to come to grips with his insignificance... only, he's "not sure at all it's [his] reflection."

Understandably, he seeks explanations in the usual places-- "God" and religion, science and philosophy-- only to find that such intense "light" leaves him "blinded." It seems that he cannot, in fact, handle the "truth."

Before, there were too many "shadows," and now there is too much "light"! So, it's back to the darkness, and "wander[ing] in the night."

In the end, he basically gives up, and goes back to pretending. Not out of fear, exactly, but because he did find an answer, of sorts. The logic is simple, really. One of two things is true:

Position A is that reality is objectively true. Yet, it is unknowable by his limited, human mind, which means that, as far as he can know, reality can only extend.... as far as he can know.

Position B is that there is no objective reality, and what is "real" is only whatever he says it is. In which case, his experience is real... because he creates "reality" by believing it into existence.

His conclusion is that, ironically, whether there is an objective reality or not, he is in the same spot: only able to know what he can know.

So, to be fair, in the end, he does not give up as much as he takes Camus' insightful nonchalance. Since he can't even know IF there is a "real" reality or it's all in his mind to begin with, he might as well stop worrying about it and get on with the business of living ("I must... face tomorrow"), as far as he experiences life.

As he puts it, "my fantasy becomes reality." Again, that could mean that (Position A) there is a true "reality" that he only has a limited awareness ("fantasy") of, so it's true for him... or (Position B) his imposition of his opinions and biases (his "fantasy") upon experiences actually changes those experiences ("reality") into what he says they are.

But it doesn't "matter," he realizes, if you "play" the "king" who imposes your will on reality (Position B), or a "pawn" who is moved about by hands unseen (Position A).

In either case, he sees, "I must be what I must be." In the case of Position A, this is so because he has no choice; he is fated. In position B, it's because whatever he wills (or stumbles) himself into becoming, he will become, due to simple cause and effect, even if he-- and not fate-- is the cause.

He started off by "hid[ing] behind the shield of [his] illusion." Ultimately, he returns there: "I'll continue to continue to pretend" as before [emphasis mine].

'As far as I'm concerned,' he decides, 'flowers don't bend when pummeled by heavy rains."

For instance, he will ignore mortality and "pretend/ My life will never end".' Mortality is too disabling a concept, so best to ignore it and "pretend" it away. If one is focused on death, one does not live.

Why this example? If one thinks too hard about what is inevitable, one stops trying to move forward at all. Reality gets in the way; illusion permits motion. Reality-- or at least the acknowledgement of it-- causes the death of progress. Only by ignoring reality/death can one truly live.

Yes, he will continue to imagine a world that works the way he needs it to, with all the myths that help him stay sane and functioning... even if he knows now that, yes, they are myths. (In the movie Unstrung Heroes, we have this exchange between an atheist and a believer: "Religion is a crutch." "Well, a crutch isn't a bad thing, if you need it.")

Our hero will continue to hunt the Wild Duck, he will continue to push his Sisyphean stone uphill, he will continue to copy Medieval manuscripts without reading them.

At least he can handle the truth... that he can't handle the truth.


Next song: A Simple Desultory Philippic.