Chuck Pride here!Inhale deeply and exhale all of your troubles! Why? I'll tell you just why. The Great Spirits are showing you favor. If you are reading this, you have obviously found your way here. 50 million blogs, and you have found yourself here at this place of hope and glory. You are among the little ones! It is a beautiful day indeed.
Welcome!
I will give you a bit of an introduction. I have much work to do yet today so I must keep it brief. I'd like to get into the studio some this afternoon and I still have groceries to purchase.
Folks, we live in a troubled time. Fear-based anger runs rampant today. We don't understand each other. We kill each other. We commit sex crimes. We photograph fatal accident scenes and post the carnage on the Internet for all to see. We cheat on our spouses. We lie. We take our comfort in fast food and booze and prostitutes and television. We give our children toys that resemble weapons...I could go on and on.
The Great Spirits work through me. I give to you what is given to me in form of song.
I will provide a quick example.
These are the lyrics to my song, "Are You Going to San Antone?". I will explain the words with commentary in red text.
Are You Going to San Antone?
Pain dripping off the brim of my hat (this line is from Great Spirit Hughie. Hughie is explaining how the troubles of the world today just keep dumping on him like rain)
it sure is cold today (it's cold today = there's no love today)
and here I am'a walking down sixty-six
Wish she hadn't done me that way (Hughie was actually walking down 1966. The Great Spirits can do that. "I wish she hadn't done me that way" = Hughie used to be in love with this other Great Spirit, Claudia. When he and Claudia broke it off, Claudia took a bunch of Hughie's things in a fit of anger. One of those things was what you all know as Pandora's Box. Pandora's Box fell to Earth when Claudia tripped on a comet. I'm leaving out part of the story, but the end result = trouble today)
Sleeping under a table at a road side park
A man could wake up dead
But it sure seems warmer than it did
Sleepin in our king size bed (I actually didn't have any help with this verse and I was pretty drunk when I wrote it. I have no idea what I was talking about.)
Chorus
Is anybody goin to San Antone
Or Pheonix Arizona
Anyplace is alright as long as I
Can forget I've ever known her (Does anybody have any idea how to get out of this stinkin' mess? HA! Claudia had Hughie all tore up for awhile.)
Wind whipping down the neck of my shirt
Like I aint got nothing on
But I'd rather fight the wind and rain
than what I've been fighting at home (Hughie still just trying to express his feeling what with all the Earthly troubles and Claudia running off and all.)
Yonder comes a truck with the US mail
People writing letters back home
Tomorrow she'll probably want me back
But I'll still be just as gone (At this point Hughie has accepted that things are the way they are. He's figured out which direction his head is pointing and he's started moving. This was the beginning. This was my first song and my first message.)
Chorus
Is anybody goin to San Antone
Or Pheonix Arizona
Anyplace is alright as long as I
Can forget I've ever known her
Anyplace is alright as long as I
forget i've ever known her
I decided to share these lyrics with you today because this is a beginning for us. Blogland is a new world for the Pride Parade, and I wanted to give you all a look at what was the first chapter of the journey we have been on for the past several years.
The lyrics you have just read may not have a specific answer spelled out, but the lyrics are the answer. The voice and the ear are the answer. The fact that it is.
The answer is not the words, the answer is the book. The more you read, the less you will learn. The harder you listen, the less you will hear.
Your pal,
Chuck
