Survivor Journals

Bob of If I Die Before I Wake has invited nine journallers to participate in a Cyber Survivor Adventure.

Every couple of weeks, the group will be issued a "challenge entry". The site will post a excerpt from the challenge entries, as well as the link to the complete entry found on the journaller's own journal site.

After the challenge entry is posted, the nine journallers will vote one of the writers off the site.

The "ousted" journaller will actually remain on the site, but rather than posting further challenge entries, they will act as a judge and commentator.

The first challenge entry has been issued, and can be found at the Survivor Journal website. The actual entries should be completed by
October 1, 2000.

Please take the time to visit, especially once the challenge entries are posted. There is a message board to post your thoughts/comments and also a instant poll where visitors can vote for who they would want to see kicked off the site.

The reasons behind Survivor Journals are simple.

1. To try something new.
2. Increase the interaction of the journal community.
3. The challenge.
4. Increased exposure to all journals involved.

So take a look around, explore all the journals involved.

If you would like to take part in Survivor Journals, Year Two (around Nov/Dec 2000), let Bob know!

WONDERFUL! WONDERFUL!

Last night, I was up every 90 minutes to change tapes in the tape recorder. I was recording Ned’s all night show for Nelson, a huge rock’n’roll buff who was thrilled to have discovered a station that played classic rock from the 60s and 70s, his favorite era. He was like a little kid as he listened to the tapes, saying that it couldn’t have been better if he’d been able to go into the radio station himself and hand pick the music.

Today as we drove down to and around San Francisco, we played the four tapes I made during the night. Six hours of classic rock. Nelson was in 7th heaven. I’m afraid my reaction fell a little bit short of Cloud 9. See, I never got into rock. I remember when Elvis gyrated his way onto the scene. I wasn’t interested. I was listening to crooners. Perry Como, Bing Crosby, Vic Damone, Dean Martin. My father’s whole world was music, but music of his era, the 30s and 40s. So while I never could sing or dance to “Blue Suede Shoes,” I knew all the Andrews Sisters songs, and loved Hoagy Carmichael and Johnny Mercer.

But as an adolescent, my idea of the ideal popular music was Johnny Mathis. Many’s the night I spent in a darkened room with “Chances Are” playing on a phonograph while couples clung together, barely swaying back and forth. Chances are ‘cause I wear a silly grin The moment you come into view Chances are you think that I’m in love with you We were exploring the possibilities.

It was an age where dating among catholic school kids was just that--dating. Hugging. Some chaste kissing. “Necking” was suspect and, of course, we only whispered about the girls who engaged in “petting.” The big question was whether or not to kiss on the first date.

If we were lucky to find our soulmate, the one who captured our heart, Johnny was there to help us find the right words: You ask how much I need you Must I explain I need you oh my darling Like roses need rain You ask how long I'll love you I'll tell you true Until the Twelfth of Never I'll still be loving you Somehow it seemed a little more meaningful than She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Last night Nelson had me tape for him the Beatles Anthology that ABC ran. It told about the impact that the Beatles had on popular music and on history as well. I found it difficult to relate. Not surprisingly, I was not a Beatles fan either. I can recognize some Beatles songs, but I guess I was just a little too old to have gotten swept up in the craze. Call me a hopeless romantic, but I don’t get swept away by I'm telling you, my friend, That I'll get you, I'll get you in the end, Yes I will, I'll get you in the end, oh yeah, oh yeah. Well, there's gonna be a time, Well I'm gonna change your mind. So you might as well resign yourself to me, oh yeah.

Whereas who can resist the sweet promise given in I'll love you 'til the bluebells Forget to bloom I'll love you 'til the clover Has lost its perfume And I'll love you 'til the poets Run out of rhyme Until the Twelfth of Never And that's a long, long time It makes a shiver run down your spine, your knees go weak, and causes those flip flops in your stomach.

Maybe music has a different purpose now that somehow just passed me by. I like lyrics that move me, that say something to me and whose message makes me stop and think, or to just say “Yes...that is precisely how I feel...” or whose sound recalls memories of special shared moments. A beat is all well and good, but as I listened to hour after hour of unintelligible lyrics shrieked at me while Nelson glowed from enjoyment of his music, I realized that I will always be a musical misfit, out of step with most of my peers. When I find a lyric that expresses precisely what I’m feeling, there’s nothing better.

It’s very definitely “Wonderful, Wonderful!”

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