Down the foggy ruins of time

Hockey season is back again and once more we have the pleasure of watching Pavel Datsyuk and the Detroit Red Wings. When I was in high school in Detroit, we didn't have a hockey team. But a group of us hockey fanatics would rent out an hour of ice time at the Detroit Skating Club, from 11:00pm to 12:00pm on Saturday nights. It was a badge of honor to be one of the 22 selected to play each Saturday night.

It was also date night. That too was a badge of honor, to bring your date to the arena to watch you play. Yes, those were some strange times. I worked myself up to be a regular of the 22 by skating circles for 2 hours every day after school at the State Fairgrounds arena. One of the other skaters each day was a girl named Sheila Young. She ended up winning a Gold Medal in the 1972 Olympics.

Now some forty years later, I don't skate anymore, I don't play hockey anymore, Saturday night is no longer date night for me, whether in a relationship or not. No, let me take that back. M and I used to go dancing at a club here in Phoenix on Saturday nights. The closest we ever were as a couple were those special moments on the dance floor, sometimes just locked in a deep passionate kiss, with all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves. No hockey game ever compared to those kisses, those dances, those date nights.

All of that is gone now. The skating, the hockey, the date nights, M. It seems that nothing ever stays the same. It changes for the better, it changes for the worse, it changes just for the sake of change. But one thing never changed in all of that. Every time there was the future. Every one of those skates, games, dances, passionate kisses was full of hope and giddy expectation of what would be coming next.

And what came next?

Writing about what was once and forever, my life.


Then take me disappearin' through the smoke rings of my mind
Down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves
The haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach
Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow
Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free
Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves
Let me forget about today until tomorrow.

The Moon is a harsh mistress...

....she's hard to call your own.

On Steve Jobs

On the day Steve jobs died, I posted a note to my subscribers regarding the technical analysis of AAPL. One of my subscribers, a very bright and supportive subscriber who has been with me a very long time wrote me an, "how dare you" message, accusing me of an insensitivity that I cannot deny. As an Apple customer, shareholder and advocate since 1987, I could have instead written a sad post of his passing. My bad.

Death follows us with its icy stare and constant patience throughout our lives. For Jobs, death was a part of his life in the later years. No wealth, nor personal accomplishments could possibly compensate for those years he endured, waiting for the end. We all waited with him, knowing there was nothing short of a medical miracle that could stave off the inevitable. His strength and courage right up to the end was an inspiration for all of us who felt we knew him and worked with him every day we opened our MacBooks, or answered our iPhones. I loved that man. Not because I knew him, but because he knew me.

As each of us move toward the inevitable, we have the choice to exert the strength and courage to live our lives with the passion that was Steve Jobs. I have made some extreme decisions along the path that winds through my days. I have hurt myself and those that love me as I always chose the trail least traveled. Along that way, I have touched the beauty and felt the pain that fell upon the life I have chosen to live. Yet nothing I have done can ever be compared with the accomplishments of a man who traveled with death every day of his latter years. We live with his legacy every day, with every key stroke, every ringtone, every iPad.

Steve Jobs is an eternal inspiration and his passing left the world a lessor place, as his life made the world a better place.

Another Sunday Night

These thoughts and feelings were first published here a couple of years ago. I ran across them again tonight. Who was this man so full of hope, expectation and faith? What does he feel, what does think, who does he dream of in the dark corner of another Sunday night?

I am not sure what needs to be said here. The words and melody, a soft and raspy voice, melodious, tranquil; the synthesis of age and beauty creating a portrait of the artist as an old man.

A mirrored testament of a life serene, if only for this passing moment.

Sunday is my personal day, a time for reflection and rest, a day to share some personal joy, or angst as these later years seem to prefer.

Something unwritten, unsaid, seeks release with the harmonies, the words, the music and the sentiment his art.

In the end, subtly and unfinished, it leaves an image of our lives, expressed in a song, delicate, vibrant, eloquent.

It remains one of my favorites, a Best-of-Allan, for all that it says about love and life, for all that is says about you and me.

Find someone to love, then love her.

A