I don't know
what brought the music to mind. It had been years since I had heard it --
likely 45 of them. “Chris, Chris & Lee" was a vocal group of local
popularity emanating from a college in my home town. Perhaps fantasizing about
some fictional future when the group would be known as “Chris, Chris, Lee and
Tim” my high school freshman self hungrily sat in the audience whenever they
performed in the area; an aspirational, albeit delusional musician, I loved the
harmonies, the guitar, and the banjo. Indeed, I would for a time take lessons
from “Lee” on that latter instrument though I'm afraid I never progressed very
far. After college Chris and Chris went on to successful careers in the music
business; Lee may have as well though I'm sad to say I have no real idea. I
completely lost track of him after that brief season of life.
Whatever had
flared the memory of that music in recent weeks, I desperately wanted to hear
it again. The only problem was I couldn't.
Long before
the days of digital downloads or even CD’s, “Chris, Chris & Lee”
self-produced a vinyl LP comprised of originals on the "Ours" side
and covers on the “Theirs” side. The album happily found a prized place in my
teenage record collection which remains largely intact in boxes stored in our
basement, next to the inexpensive portable turntable I found at a store a dozen
or so years ago and purchased to eke out a little residual value from all that
vinyl. Or to justify keeping the boxes. Somehow, however -- perhaps through a
careless move or more likely a dog’s chew -- the power cord got irreparably
severed. The turntable was stilled.
The pieces
of that power supply have jostled around in the floorboard of my car for weeks,
ever since discovering them in a jumbled box of miscellaneous electronics that
surfaced in one of those occasional basement reorganization projects that
stirred us several months back. Surely I could find a replacement at Radio
Shack. Oh, wait -- the Radio Shack store closed who knows how long ago?
And then
this prodding compulsion to hear again that music -- those vocals, those
guitars and that banjo.
Power is an
essential but ephemeral phenomenon. Whether a battery in a cell phone, fuel in
a car, a plug in a wall socket or nutrients in the soil we don't much think
about it until it's absent -- when the flashlight dims, the car coughs to a
standstill, the plants spindle and limply die, the oven stays cold, the spirit
grows numb.
Or the
turntable doesn't turn.
It's why I'm
conscientious about soil health -- the power supply of the garden. It's why I
have gas cans in the barn and fresh batteries in the drawer. It's why we
installed solar panels for the house. It's why I plug in my phone every night.
It's why I read. It's why, after 20 years of marriage, we still go on dates.
Otherwise, the things we value, the tools on which we've come to depend, fall
silent or still.
My aural
craving has a happy ending. The internet, I'm continually experiencing, is
amazing thing; and after a brief search I located and ordered a replacement
power supply for the turntable. It arrived yesterday in the mail, prompting a
subsequent, mercifully brief search through those afore-mentioned boxes. The
album was found, the vinyl platter extracted, the needle was dropped, and music
spilled forth...
The
harmonies, the guitars, the banjo.
And I smiled
-- an indulged and satisfied smile 45 years in the making.
And humming,
I walked away wondering what else around and within is winding down, depleting
or dimming that I need to plug in, fertilize, or nourish.
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