the joy of Henry

Now those of you who know me know I have a few heroes and crushes that could be considered embarrassing or worthy of a teenager. You are only as old as your heart. Doesn’t make it much better. But I am fessing up to it so hold your horses.
This one particular infatuation dates back to 1997 where I came across a punk rocker turned spoken word artist still doing music named Henry Rollins. I forgot how exactly he crossed my path. Something I read. Some I guy I was into mentioning him. Some 80s flash-back. I bought a book he wrote and then another one. In November 1998 finally he made it to Berlin where I was living at the time, battling with a question I had been toying with too long: Should I go back to the US and live my life there? So I sat in Kreuzberg, on an uncomfortable wooden bench in a church that like many churches had a become a multi-purpose building for lack of churchgoers and listened to this raw and loud and unafraid guy ranting about life and its ups and downs. I loved his humor and the way he observed life. I loved the realness of it. You only have one life to live. And Henry Rollins lived it in Los Angeles, that town that had always stirred my longing, over there all the way in the West, where the Pacific ended the trail, where the sun would eternally shine.
A good year later I left Berlin. Within a few months I “met” Henry Rollins again, at a record store (now long gone) where he also signed my copy of a new CD by the Rollins Band who I later saw perform in Silver Lake. Wow, I had made it, living in the town of the guy that was one of the forces that kicked my ass. And don’t you always meet again? A month ago Rollins popped up on my favorite public radio station KCRW with his very own show. I could have listened to him before, on the fantastic alt-radio station Indie Rock. But you know, those radio dials are programmed in and it is really hard to flip them... But finally no escaping. He made himself heard on 89.9. And lo&b.hold his power to kick ass hasn’t diminished. Listening to the musical journeys he subjects you to is a jolt of life. a necessary reminder of what is out there, what music can do, what you did in your life when that track hit you. I sometimes forget how much I cherish music to make sense of my life and express my emotions. So that is what Henry is for. Ever combined the Ramones, some Russian avant-garde composer, Sonny Rollins and the Black Flag, not to mention the German favorite Killing Joke? Puts a smile on my face, makes me search my ipod for more treasures of my life during the week, even though it is a while back. Made me be buy (okay download) an old album by the Lounge Lizzards who are among the concert highlights of my life time. The joy of Henry, you can call me a fanatic any time!

opener

A German friend today connected to me on LinkedIn by saying social networks are the pest. I find myself agreeing with him. Time suckering endeavors, looking great for teenagers, now much hyped advertising tools. Oh so bitter I am. Sign o the times, everyone got something to say to anybody and your experience of life is valid only if you capture it for the digital highway. So you have your "friends" see the photos and read your updates and in return read their exciting adventures at the supermarket or in the bathroom. Wherever I go now I see people snapping away, txting, yapping on their cell phones about the moment they cannot experience because they are so busy reporting on it. I guess some of that gray matter up there will disappear for lack of usage. That my friends has already been scientifically proven as WIRED informed me recently. I see dark days. And hope. People are social beings, they are lonely, they want to be with a group, they want to connect, they want to share - it's been like this since they drew chalk paintings on the wall of their caverns. Different times, different techniques.
Now everyone is a sender and a receiver and the numbers are big. Today is the day that Ashton Kutsher's Twitter feed has a larger follower ship than CNN's. Albeit for the good purpose of buying mosquito nets.
So that is it then. Me starting a blog with a photo of my chosen home of Southern California.
Too much to figure out. This 21st century is full of change. Might as well share the confusion. Confront the skeptic brainy dark German me who searched for the light of California to stir her up. Heck, I always want to be a writer, I need the exercise. And you, the anonymous masses, will suffer the consequences.