Once, years ago, I asked a pretty girl what she wanted to hear and she requested this song. I didn’t know it, but of course I’d heard it, so I pulled the words up on my phone and I went for it. Sometimes that goes really well and I become a hero for five minutes. This time it was too high and I had no soul. It was awful and I lost that girl’s attention as quickly as I had gained it.
Maybe if I had known the song, we would have hit it off – which would have been a shame, because I might have never met my wife, and we would have never made it to our one year anniversary (8/7/18), and I would have had no one living with me to say “sounds good honey,” and I would never try anything new, and I’d drink too much, and instead of practicing medicine I’d be selling flip flops.
On our honeymoon I went to a Hawaiian mall and bought a pair of Olukais. The salesman told me they were leather, so they really shouldn’t be worn on the beach or by the pool or anywhere that they could get wet. I was like, what, they’re like business flip flops? Pfffft! So I wore them on the beach, and by the pool, and for months I’ve been sloshing them around various Colorado hot springs, and they, like my marriage, are still going strong.
I would like to dedicate this performance and my inaugural attempt at split screen video to my wife, Rebecca Juan.
I will also use the subject of marriage in general to give shout outs and thanks to Karrah Toledo and Ian McDonald, and to Jennifer Horsley and Brady Colvin, two couples who gave me the honor of presiding over their wedding ceremonies this summer.
In Colorado you don’t have to be ordained as a minister to stand at the altar and get people to say “I do” – and I am certainly not one, but the unexpected challenge of coming up with appropriately reverent words to bridge the transition to married life proved to be just the right kind of pressure to make diamond speeches out of English major coal.
This recording features a chopped and refinished 1946 Hammond BV organ customized with smooth action B3 drawbars pumped, as God intended, through a Leslie 147 amplifier (itself shoehorned into a short 145 rotating speaker cabinet). I bought the organ in Colorado Springs in 1999 for $250.00 and was told that Rick Wakeman played it once; there was a “Yes” sticker on the lid – fairly flimsy evidence indeed, but I did appreciate that the instrument came with a story.
Don’t forget to like, subscribe, etc etc and check out my upcoming shows – and thanks as always for listening/watching/reading/clicking or whatever you did today:)