Southpaw Jones

Southpaw Jones presents
Is This Interesting?
Thoughts/feelings that just might not matter:
I woke up in Portland, Oregon the morning of September 11, 2001. I was sleeping on the couch in the living room of Al’s house. Al had graciously provided lodging for Erik Muiderman and me; we were both traveling as part of Tourbaby 2001.

I had met Al briefly the night before, when he told us that he’d be waking up early to fly to a men’s retreat in the Midwest. I woke up groggily around 9 and stumbled into the kitchen where I saw two packed bags on the floor. Right about that time, Erik came down the stairs, just as groggily, and Al came around the corner.

He told us that his flight turned around and returned to Portland when “someone crashed planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.” What a strange thing to hear. Of course, I first imagined small planes. I was wrong.

We turned on the TV to see a cloud of gray and brown. It was almost noon on the east coast, and as I recall, everything had already happened. The planes found their targets, Flight 93 had crashed, and both towers had fallen. We watched replays, confusion, and scrambling anchors for as long as we could before leaving the house.

Erik, Al, and I found some local breakfast and tried to get our minds off the whole thing. The newspapers already had HORROR! on the front page, bigger than any headline I had ever seen. I was looking forward to that day because my favorite band, They Might Be Giants, were releasing their first album in years, Mink Car. This was also the day that Bob Dylan’s Love & Theft came out.

Call me shallow, but the record store was open, so I bought the CD. It was odd how everything seemed business-as-usual in Portland. Everything was open. The weather was beautiful.

I went into a bank to make a deposit. Two very nervous Middle Eastern men came in to do some business, while another waited outside. I wanted to get away from them, and they wanted to get away from me. So began the whole new world.

We had sushi that night in another attempt to ease our minds. It was the freshest fish I have ever eaten. I ate a fried shrimp head, eyeballs and all. One of Al’s friends, or maybe Al himself, took a sliver of each kind of sushi and placed it aside “for the gods.” I may never leave sushi uneaten again, but I didn’t dare touch our discarded bits that night. We needed some friends upstairs. Still do.

Southpaw Jones presents
iPawed [Classic]
Pound for pound, the best sounds around. For free!
A quick clip from the musical response to my 9-11 experience in the Pacific Northwest. This song appears in full on Live @ Bongo Java.
Oregon Blues (Live)

Southpaw Jones presents
And Another Thing…
More verbosity with velocity and viscosity:

The lyrics from Oregon Blues:

Oregon’s a good a place as any to hunker down a while
Oregon’s a good a place as any to hunker down a while
I saw and learned so much there
That I started up a file

The coastline is a stunner, I headed down to Devil’s churn
The coastline is a stunner, I headed down to Devil’s churn
When those girls in Eugene flash a smile
The world just has to slow its turn

The loggers and the huggers, they fight like cats & dogs
The loggers and the huggers, they fight like cats & dogs
There’s this mighty flowing river
That that dam Bonneville clogs

Heard ol’ Bob Dylan sing “Today’s been a sad and lonesome day”
Heard ol’ Mr. Guthrie sing
“Roll on, Columbia roll on”
“Roll on Columbia roll on”
Went out to the fish shop
Got some shrimp, bought some mussel, ate up some prawn

Met a wise man up in Portland. He sees where every wild beast plods.
Met a wise man up in Portland. He sees where every wild beast plods.
We shared a mound of sushi
Even offered up some to the gods.

Towers fell in New York on a day called 911
Towers fell in New York on the day called 911
Breaking this cycle of terror
That’ll be the biggest thing man’s ever done

Down in Pennsylvania, that’s where the final missile fell
Down in Pennsylvania, that’s where the final missile fell
It held purpose and evil and oceans of fuel
And a handful of heroes as well

Can’t send me to Asia, I’ve got these goofy songs to sing
Please don’t send me to Kabul, I’ve got these goofy songs to sing
Ain’t got no heart for fightin’
I wouldn’t even know which gun to bring

Two dark gray military jets patrolled the empty sky
Two charcoal military jets slashed the northwestern sky
I headed south to Ashland,
Had me some boysenberry pie

Oregon’s a good a place as any to sit and rest a spell
Oregon’s a good a place as any to hang your head a spell
There’s plenty of ways to ease your mind
While the world goes straight to hell

Spike Gillespie presents
Spaiku!
A look at her world / seventeen syllables and / three lines at a time:

Herman Haiku #1

Herm goes to work in
Mississippi. Spike laments,
“I miss the hippie.”

Southpaw Jones presents
Paw Prints
Pics of Southpaw, his environ, and his interweb:
Devil’s Churn on the Oregon coast:

Thank you, come again!
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©2006 Southpaw Jones. All rights reserved.