I got a thing for the wild ones

The twelfth periodic Tropical Depression digest post

Jan 03, 2024

Here’s your twelfth periodic digest post reviewing the last few entries and tossing in some recommendations, tidbits, etc.

“Eternal Cowboy,” Shae Bishop (detail closeup—photograph by Myles Pettengill)

In the year gone by, I learned that the pacemaker cells in a heart continue to oscillate even if you isolate them in a petri dish. I learned that Bobbie Gentry used to be a part owner of the Phoenix Suns. I learned that Mick Jagger and Keith Richards took Gram Parsons to Stonehenge late night after a Byrds show in London.

I was reminded, having forgotten, that pre-mega-fame, Sinead O’Connor painted the Public Enemy logo on the side of her head when she performed at the Grammys, to protest that the award for best rap song was given during a commercial break.

Are other people wondering if other people are wondering how to keep the house clean for more than a few hours with two small children? Do other people have their lives in order? Medical bills properly adjudicated and paid on time, lawn maintained without lapse, sparsely used subscriptions cancelled, regular checkups at the dentist, faulty plumbing fixed, stuff like that?

For the second straight year, by the time we disposed of our jack-o-lantern, it had rotted and filled with maggots. The smell once disturbed was identical both years—and memorable.

My main impulse for New Year’s is to get new books to read in the new year, like at the turn of the calendar my many unread books feel like old business.

If my son doesn’t get his way, he says: “Be nice!” He does it with an extreme Southern vowel shift, veering nearly to the sound of the first syllable in “nasty.” Be nice, mama! He says it as soon as my daughter even walks in the room. “Go away, Sissy! Be nice!”

In the year just past, I saw maybe half a dozen gators. I saw the film Red Rocket and thought it was good. I tried to teach my daughter to play chess. She liked it as a concept but the rules didn’t stick. I officiated a wedding for the first time in my life. I went to New Orleans twice. Or three times? I forget. I crossed the border into Mexico with an expired passport. My phone stopped working and I didn’t do anything about it for seven weeks. Missed a doctor’s appointment and a pregnancy announcement but otherwise it worked out fine. I think. You can’t miss what you miss altogether.

Sometimes, I thought, now I’ve finally settled into a groove. Sometimes for a couple months at a time. But then that feeling would go away. Breathe in, breathe out: We are yearning machines. Happy new year. Be nice.

Refer a friend

Call for submissions: Send me some photographs!

I’d like to experiment with mixing in some more images to Tropical Depression posts. Mostly I’m thinking stuff that has no connection (or only an oblique connection) to the content of the text. It doesn’t have to be a photograph—it could be art of any kind—but photos seem easiest? Game for images created as art, or just random shots that have a nice look. Anything that might fit with the Tropical Depression sensibility, whatever that is. Send one, or as many as you like, to: davidbramsey@gmail.com

I’ll be watching you

“I’ll be watching you,” Nathaniel Klein (winter 2014)

IMHO

Strange Vibrations from behind the Iron Curtain

Very hot Armenian disco track — according to YouTube, it’s “from the album of collected songs by the Armenian composer Aram Satyan…released in USSR in 1989.” Not sure when it was recorded; as far as I can tell, the singer is Narine Arutyunyan. Anyway, this one slays, highly recommended.

I see the morning light

And to take us out, here’s Linda Ronstadt performing Bob Dylan’s “Walkin’ Down the Line” on Hugh Hefner’s very strange variety/party show, “Playboy After Dark.” The episode, recorded in 1969, aired in April 1970.

Tropical Depression