A Bridge Over Troubled Water

Finding solace in a record album.

Like most individuals, I was extremely troubled by the events that transpired at the Boston Marathon. I found myself searching for something that would make me feel better, something that would be soothing. Nothing seemed to help until I listened to the Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel album, Bridge Over Troubled Water. Though released in 1970, it seems to provide relevant messages for these times. All of the lyrics, with the exception of the cover of an Everly Brothers song, were written by Paul Simon. Here is a track-by-track look at the album, starting with lyrical excerpts.

When you’re down and out. When you’re on the street. When evening falls so hard, I will comfort you. I’ll take your part. Oh, when darkness comes. And pain is all around…

Your time has come to shine. All your dreams are on their way.

“Bridge Over Troubled Water” This is a song about human beings facing crisis. In times of crisis, we need the better humans among us, or guardian angels, to rise and protect us. We saw both the best and worst of humanity in Boston. The song reminds us that a better day is on the way.

I’d rather feel the earth beneath my feet. Yes I would.

“El Condor Pasa (If I Could)” Paul Simon added lyrics to a Peruvian/Andean song. In its way, it celebrates multiculturalism, like the national flags that lined the end of the Boston Marathon course near the finish line. We will find strength in diversity.

Cecilia, you’re breaking my heart. You’re shaking my confidence daily.

“Cecilia” The protagonist of the song comes face-to-face with life’s imperfections. He loves a girl who is unfaithful to him, she shakes his confidence daily. While our own sense of confidence was shaken and bruised by recent events, the music’s energy reminds us of the simple joy of life and living. The sun rises tomorrow over Boston.

Home is where I want to be.

“Keep the Customer Satisfied” The traveling performer want to return home. Boston has served as a second home to many college graduates, for whom the bombings — as President Obama expressed — felt quite personal. The senselessness of events made us feel exhausted like the traveling troubadour.

I can’t believe your song is gone so soon.

“So Long, Frank Lloyd Wright” This is a song that feels both like a dream and its conclusion. It signals the end of something, perhaps the end of the days that we take safety at sporting events for granted.

He carries the reminders of every glove that laid him down…

“The Boxer” The people of Boston may get knocked down, but they get back up.

I wonder how your engines feel?

“Baby Driver” This is Simon’s song about his family in which he pays tribute to sports, in the form of auto racing. Life and athletic competition will go on.

Half of the time we’re gone and we don’t know where.

“The Only Living Boy in New York” The song is about isolation. No doubt some Bostonians, in virtual lock-down for days, felt like the only living man or woman in the city.

Something is wrong and I need to be there.

“Why Don’t You Write Me” We all feel apprehension over events we cannot control.

Hello loneliness, I think I’m going to cry… Hello emptiness.

“Bye Bye, Love” Tears and hollow feelings ruled the day. The loss expressed in this song was echoed in the pain felt by those mourning the three persons killed in the bombings.

Ask me and I will play all the love that I hold inside.

“Song for the Asking” The nation displayed its love for the city and people of Boston during this fateful week.

Sail on by. Your time has come to shine. Your dreams are on their way. (Title track)

Sail on, Boston.

Joseph Arellano

This article originally appeared on the Blogcritics Music site:

http://blogcritics.org/music/article/bridge-over-troubled-water-finding-solace/

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Baby Driver

The Art of Racing in the Rain: A Novel by Garth Stein (Harper Perennial, $14.99, 321 pages)

There are certain books you look back on, years later, and think, "That was some story!" This is one of those books. It is a touching, emotional story made all the more so because its narrator is a dog facing his approaching death. As the story begins, Enzo the dog is ready to accept his fate; in fact, in a way he welcomes it because he believes – based on what he observed on a public television documentary, that his soul will then be freed to return to life as a human being. Enzo's lifelong study of these creatures with opposable thumbs and the ability to speak clearly has convinced him that he'll do quite well in his next life.

While this story will leave you with a warm and fuzzy heart (and moist eyes) at the conclusion, it is filled with a lot of the negative things that can happen to people in this life… Which is why the tale includes stops at a jail, a criminal courtroom, a hospital, and a cemetery. Even two-thirds or three-fourths of the way through you'll begin to doubt that there can be such a thing as a happy conclusion to this dog-gone tale. But hang in there, reader, because author Garth Stein begins pulling the rabbits out of his writing hat in the very last pages; with this, his writing takes on a certain special quality. Let's call it the ability to fashion a sparkling magical mystery trip.

As with Everything Matters! by Ron Currie, Jr., you won’t see the ending coming until it’s upon you. And as with Everything…, there’s a fake ending followed by a reprise (or slight return as per Jimi Hendrix) that ties everything together. Maybe. Or maybe the final ending isn’t what it seems to be. This is something that will keep you thinking for a few days after finishing this novel.

I hope and pray that if this fictional tale is made into a movie they don’t change a thing – The Time Traveler’s Wife, anyone? – including maintaining Enzo as the story’s narrator. Now, let’s see, who would be the ideal voice of Enzo? Me, I hear Nicolas Cage when I think of Enzo, but that’s just me. As Enzo would say (or bark out), “I know a lot about a lot of things, but I don’t know everything about everything.”

Highly recommended.

Joseph Arellano

This book was purchased by the reviewer.

If you read and enjoy The Art of Racing in the Rain, you will likely also enjoy reading the fun and marvelous Walking in Circles Before Lying Down: A Novel by Merrill Markoe. It’s another fine feast for dog lovers, available as a trade paperback book (Villard, $13.95, 288 pages).