The wind is lifting leaves off the white oaks in my backyard like so many orange and yellow butterflies with an occasional firebrand red as I write this. Call it poetry for the eyes. I see the meter of their flight in couplets and stanzas, and feel the alliteration (blazing butterflies/red rain), and hear the onomatopoeia (lisping leaves), and even the colors seem to rhyme. Psychologists call the stimulation of one sense through another synesthesia. Some of you may recall that my tight-lipped pharmacist had an employee whose senses actually traded info that way; but you can do it with your imagination.
Very little imagination needed for the ultimate autumn classic, however. That would be the descent of the Eagles on Target (Center) under a harvest moon in mid-September with every bit as much elegant color and sound. And as magnificent as that record size concert was, my highlight began a few hours earlier with the arrival of soul-bro Glenn Frey at sound-check. It’s always an impromptu scramble to put some quality time together, but Glenn never fails. As you can imagine, it’s a hoot for a dismal T sax player like myself to share that ethos, and the author in me benefits immensely from such a vantage, but Glenn and I did not initially bond over the glitz of the legendary band he founded and maintains. Call it creativity or independence or just something maverick we recognize in each other. We would have seen that if we had met on an assembly line or in a foxhole. In a world of clichés, my radar is always on for the truly original whether it’s centerstage or behind the curtains.
But back to the sound-check before the concert, because that was what triggered the synesthesia. Sitting there alone in the dark of 21,000 empty seats while a few feet away Glenn, Don Henley, Joe Walsh, Timothy B Schmitt – and I think Bernie Leadon was sitting in at that point – took a few of their indelible classics apart, element by element, brought home the parallels with how any artist must think. As I mentioned to Glenn later, it was like seeing ear pictures. Nice to “hear” the colors while they are still on the palette.
But I’m glad I don’t need 15 semis to haul around the logistics of my craft like the Eagles do. On the other hand, I think I could handle the jets and the four tour busses decked out inside like something out of an F Scott Fitzgerald novel. Writing is definitely not performance art, even if filling the well is. And filling the well is what I have been doing this autumn. Hope you are filling yours too. Last month I defined the perfect sanctuary as, “…where you can be just as honest as when you’re alone but you have the added benefit of not being alone,” and I asked you for your perfect sanctuaries. What you came back with included:
“Floating out in space on a star.” … “Night doors locked, a beautiful wife, an ambrosian meal, wine and a dancing fireplace. Leave out the f/p in the summer.” … “Meeting my Prince Charming.” … “Talking with someone who really understands me.” … “Having a secret pond in the middle of a forest.” … “In bed with a soul mate.” … “A lavender boat on a pink lemonade sea.” … “Knocking back lime Rickeys on a beach at sunset.” But the one that really rang my bell was the woman who wrote she had a constant feeling that she should be somewhere else doing something else and that her sanctuary would be “coming home.”
This month’s digital dozen photos are as follows below: #1 that’s me with my lad Sean aka “the boy,” Shane or Sully the Lesser; #2 playing with Shane’s rescued 1-eyed dog named Tess; #3 bowling; #4 hiking above the Crow River; #5 fire-running at Crow Hassan; #6-7 Glenn Frey & I having an exquisite dinner in his dressing room before the Eagles concert; #8 Sully with an Icelandic pony named Njola; #9-10 happy trails under vivid clouds; #11-12 hiking friend Lisa and moi at Crow Hassan.
More Q&A awaits you in my October column at SU. Trick-or-treat at this link: [ http://storytellersunplugged.com/thomassullivan/2013/10/15/thomas-sullivan-hammer-the-grammar-sister-immaculata/ ]
Do you feel the exhilaration of the oncoming holiday trifecta…fallen leaves rushing through the streets whispering excitedly about witches, their blazing orange soon to become the bronze of a Thanksgiving feast whose leftovers are magically whisked into memory by the purity of a white Christmas? Hope you get to celebrate all three surrounded by your loved ones. But may you also see it from outside so that you can watch people – it is all about people, isn’t it – because that will make your heart warmer and your mind wiser…
Thomas “Sully” SullivanYou can see all my books in any format here on my webpage or follow me on Facebook:
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