“Things in life never come full circle. Maybe once or twice they’re hexagonal, but to me, they are almost always misshapen, as if drawn by a toddler in crayon.”
Adam Horovitz (Ad-Rock)
That’s how Ad-Rock of Beastie Boys fame described the feeling of looking back on Bonnarroo music festival, where the group was headlining, and not knowing it would be the last show they would ever perform together, before to Adam Yauch (MCA) died.
That hits hard. I paused the documentary to write it down, such a profound way to look at things. Misshapen, drawn by a toddler in crayon. And there is sadness in that, but there is also hope. I want to hold on to the fun, spontaneity, and fresh/beginner’s perspective that comes with drawing in crayon.
Our lives are built from the past. That’s what’s gotten us to where we are. Not just our past, but further back. The picture above is one of my all-time favorite photos. It is my grandfather, my Dad’s father, sitting in what was his father’s oyster shucking/packing/canning house. It’s about 1905 in Oxford, in what is now Oxford Marina & Boatyard; growing up for us it was Mears Marina. Where he is looking at is now the restaurant Capsize. I am looking at the framed black and white photo on my desk as I write.
I think of the things he saw in his 95 years; how his lifetime included the birth of my father, out of whose life I came into the world. So in a real sense, this moment I am having, sitting here typing and thinking about my grandfather, is built out of, is contained in a future state, in that photo. And that world is so different from the one we are living in now. And if you tried to connect the dots from that moment to this, it would look a whole lot like a child drawing in crayon.
Life should be drawn in crayon. It shouldn’t be angular, or too detailed, or a map from which there is no deviating. I like thinking about the enthusiasm and creativity that is in the eyes, mind, and hands of a child sitting down to a blank piece of paper. What if we could bring that to each day?
An old friend and I were writing back and forth about “Beastie Boys Story.” I said they are the soundtrack of our lives. A place it took him:
“Takes me to another place and time for sure. Lots of great memories of a time that can never be again- but I’m glad I got to live it.”
And I know he’s right. The same way that the life my grandfather lived can’t be had in the same way in today’s world, the things we did, the experiences we had in our earliest years of albums coming out and being played over and over, that is a time and era that our kids don’t get these days. Especially these days of quarantine. “Licensed to Ill” came out when I was a freshman, like my daughter Ava is now. By the time I was a senior, like Anna, “Paul’s Boutique” was the most played album in our cars and sung regularly at parties.
But then I also think about how music can still be a part of the new memories going on–further along the crayon arc. I think of Ava in her car seat in the backseat of my truck on the way to daycare asking to listen to the Beastie Boys “Grass Monkey” (I will wait on my parent of the year award)–I think of the song “Intergalactic” constantly playing in the Latitude 38 kitchen when I worked there; I think of newer albums and the song “Make Some Noise” (if you’re living) was an anthem for us in 2011. And about how all their albums are still in constant rotation on my playlist. And I love how thinking and remembering the band and their impact on my life even got to be a part of my writing, and how old lyrics still make sense in new ways to me today.
But there’s more. Adam Horowitz, talking about Yauch/MCA, says he was “a living contradiction of people’s ideas of how or what you are supposed to be or do.” They talk about how they were able to spend most of their lives to this point creating art, hanging out, and having fun as a group of best friends. They talk about how Yauch was the driver in learning new things, taking new adventures, growing and outgrowing old ways of being and thinking. And I wonder, what can we take from that? What can I learn from their example? How can we/I be those people who keep pushing boundaries?
I think about the number of times I have laughed at lyrics, or laughed watching the documentary, and how much we need humor in our lives, both day to day, but also a sense of the cosmic scale/sense of humor. And I love the idea that MCA was “drawn to the Dalai Lama because he was a funny dude.” And it makes me smile and remember that humor is so important in our spiritual lives.
What if watching a documentary about your favorite band and the life they’ve lived further inspires us to spend time and go on adventures with our friends–actual physical adventures, but also spiritual adventures, or literary/creative/musical adventures, depending on what form your creativity takes?
We can get nudged by life, by God, in different ways, if we are paying attention. And during a time when we are largely at home and isolated, our nudge can come in the form of documentary movies, from music, from books, from connecting with friends in new ways. Our nudge can help us to have new eyes to look at the things around us.
When we look forward, we don’t know what those special, transcendent moments are going to be or when they will happen. I like to think that each of us has so many more of those moments ahead, not just behind us as memories.
Looking back at the moment of my grandfather sitting among oyster shells captured in a photograph taken more than 100 years ago, and all the possible moments contained in it, that became real moments in his life, my dad’s life, my life, my daughters’ life–I wonder what those captured moments, what photographs or objects, or stories that are taking place now, are going to be those things passed down and talked about and laughed over 100 years from now?
And I can’t know that. But if I had to guess, when you draw a line and connect those dots and moments and stories, it will look “misshapen, as if drawn by a toddler.” And I hope they are using crayon.
