The Really Real : 3 of 12

Every Day is Evolution

There's a thought, and has been since philosopher and theologian Teilhard De Chardin coined the term : "Spiritual Evolution."

Chardin believed that however we might hinder ourselves with the destructive acts we humans can commit, we are yet evolving spiritually to become kinder, more empathetic, community-oriented people with the ability to create societies that protect and care for life.

In an age of gun violence, war, greed and hypocrisy, we might look at this notion as extremely implausible, naive and unrealistic.

We might feel, lately, like we are flailing. We don't trust "Godlike" people. We feel they limit freedoms, take the cash and run, lie, and use their faith to express a desire for a world with restricted rights for women, no Gay people, and racist attitudes. They seem to exist in a denialism that would revoke history. In their minds, there was no Holocaust. Slavery was not evil. And women were better off in the kitchen, not voting, and existing to procreate.

We're experiencing huge divides culturally, and currently those who might take us back to medieval times seem to be running the government here in The United States.

Maybe for some, to evolve is to return to what they deem as a more "moral country."

Many of us, however, would counter that by glorifying in the achievements that have taken place.

Immigrants have lifted up the country, we say, and have provided a work force and a commitment to new foods and arts and ideas. Isn't Evolution a broadening of diversity with greater options? And with these, a greater tolerance as well as a curiosity to know what has been foreign?

My song, "Evolution" delves into my ability to lose control, yet maintain center. To keep swinging even with my back against the wall. To keep singing, even when the curtain starts to fall.

I think Evolution begins with trust in another person. Once you let go with one you love, you find yourself more open to others and aware of the beauty of being in a vast, loving community of interesting people.

My feeling is that if I can give up fear, I can move into falling, being caught, held and cared for.

Playing music, playing electric guitar is like that. It can be scary to solo, not knowing what will come. But the band supports, listens, plays with you, and this enables the music to come. God knows from where? It just evolves.

Leading me to conclude that if I can just get out of the way, nature will run its course and that is definitely an evolutionary one.

In the long run. And every day.

The Really Real: 2 of 12

Waiting For Life

We were talking about how prolific we became during COVID, when suddenly we had to learn how to play bass and navigate Pro Tools, arrange our own songs, produce and mix, over and over, just try.

Each an island. There was a freedom in this.

You didn't have to show up for anyone, because you couldn't. You were given permission to absorb yourself in your own work, and take your time in doing it.

This is when you felt at the peak of your artistry.

And solitude is good for a peaceful confident mind.

That is, until you realize you haven't been living in much of a reality. Is your own head a great place to reside inside permanently? I think of the old quote: "Your mind is the most dangerous playground."

But what I wonder.. is... in this world of social media, and texting and never phoning and sometimes never seeing people.. are we in a holding pattern?

Loneliness could be the wake up call.

I realized I had spent most of my time making lists, and then living by them. If I accomplished everything on paper, I could sleep, knowing that my life was worth something. It gave me a way out, too, in terms of ever feeling the need to contact anyone. What needs to be accomplished?

Yet for all I had written, checked off, what had changed in me? I stayed within my four walls, elbows on the table, head in my hands, lying on a sofa. In fact, when I thought of what I needed to accomplish, I was forever behind. I had so much to do! I was never through.

Until it hit me that I was not unlike Eleanor Rigby. One thought folded into another, one hand drawing the other hand. I could bury myself alive in my own thinking, yet it was here, sitting, for hours, at a desk, or in front of a computer, or holding an instrument, that I entertained myself with myself, ultimately too tired to want to go anywhere, by the end of the day.

This was a Covid reality that extended past the Covid years. Folded over by excuses and reasons not to leave, not to speak, not to engage anyone.

Until I had a sharp feeling in my side and then in my heart . I was just waiting for life to happen.

I had deep frozen myself. I felt nothing. I wasn't happy. I wasn't miserable.

And I wondered if there were any like me? Living but not feeling like living. Just going on. Just getting the day done. Somewhere watching others have fun.

This was a real way of living that became a trap, not a haven.

An emotional straitjacket which I suppose ultimately links to anxiety or fear. But whose fear?

How did I come to wear this and accept it? I think that's a pretty good question.

My song has a ticking time bomb, even though it is sweet, and everything sounds fine.

That's the current weird danger of an existential life. KNowing when it is ok, and then when it really is not.

The Really Real: Part I of 12

Henry James, cat writer and lover of literature

Today is Tuesday, April 14, 2026.

I feel pain and anxiety frequently and have been advised to take a pill for it. Not sure when these feelings began, but I can connect the dots to a whole series of social misfortunes which have caused us all to have to adapt, protest, conform, just move on.

Wildfires occurred in Los Angeles, Trump was re-elected, ICE became omnipresent and forces to fight Trump felt impotent or invisible. Many of us crawled into innocent comforts like nostalgic music, or EDM or any sound to take the edge off the reality we couldn't avoid. Life seemed to get more complicated. MAGA became more entrenched. Those opposing seemed either beaten down or raging. And then many others went on vacation, got involved in binge watching, anything to avoid dealing with the constant drama of the news cycle.

I have taken two years to make my next record, THE REALLY REAL,which is not yet released, but will be in July 2026.

In the summer of 2025, I lost my friend and advisor/companion, HenryJames. It had been a steady three months of caregiving, as Henry's pancreatitis returned, and with it, diabetes, and soon enough lymphoma. Henry needed meds twice a day, but he was willing and wanted very much to live, never hiding, always present and endeavoring to do the things he liked to do.

Henry James succumbed to what we believe was a heart attack on Friday, August 15, 2025 at 11:30pm. He had had a good day, eating, jumping up to look out the window. And he spent his last night watching TV as he always did. I fell asleep on the sofa, and he died next to the TV set,

inches away from me, quietly.

Somehow, the stillness of his surrender, in my presence, as I slept, haunted me. His gentleness, his ability to go with the pain he suffered, and not to complain, but to wring the most out of the time he had.

It was very inspiring, though I felt his loss so deeply I couldn't breathe for weeping.

I went to the desert, as I always do, in hot summer, to write in the loneliness of a rented cottage, for three straight days.

There is something very real about being alone with yourself. It's not a comfortable feeling, but ultimately the voices come, and lyrics flow as do melodies. God knows where they come from, or what they mean. It's a matter of staying still and letting them spill out on the page, then into song as I held my guitar.

I guess at the core of it, my writing is confessional. I have to leave people to find out what is inside, and what is going on. It reveals itself, and for this, I feel I can't take credit. There is some spirit alive, that knows things. I just have to trust it. And I need to be away from my home and familiar people. It's too easy to get distracted.

I had no idea what this record would be. When it became obvious that electric guitar was to be my instrument, I felt both elated and terrified.

I would need to have a band. I would need to find places where people would come and would hear this band.

But what if this weren't party music? How would people feel? Was there even a place for music like this?

I end with no answers. In a world that seems to be increasingly about "the bottom line," it seems to me that most artists, writers, musicians, remain the same. We do what we do because we feel some need to listen to that voice that is larger than us, that speaks to us when we can find a way to remove ourselves from the spin cycle. Henry James, in his last months, knew how to do this too. And whatever dance we fall into, it's never about money or financial success.

This goes far deeper. It goes somewhere I am now calling The Really Real.

I'll be writing about that journey and the songs that were revealed to me along the way, here, in this blog space. Thank you for reading.