Listening to the sound of my own voice. It’s a recording I made at the Calvary Cemetery Chapel a few weeks ago. I really need to get the Sony PCM-D50 field recorder fixed up. It’s prone to static and noise when in motion, including being on a bus or train. And it often takes several attempts to be able to turn the stupid thing on. That’s why I started making long recordings, to avoid the bother of turning the thing on. Waiting for that next windfall to come through this week. so might get the recorder fixed up after that comes through.
In this take I am talking out loud about some of the stuff I was writing about here at the time, regarding my final arrangements. It was Mother’s Day. I’m reminded of a story Joe G. told about his visit to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, in Cleveland. I forget the person’s name but there was a special memorial for the person who I think founded the museum. As Joe described it you were to walk up a set of stairs at the top of which was a glass cabinet. In that cabinet was the cremation urn of the museum’s creator. This was presented without warning or any clue as to what you were going to be looking at. This was also something like 35 years ago, when cremation was not as common as today. Joe described it as extremely odd that you would unexpectedly be looking at… THAT.
I rarely listen back to these recordings I make, though I have made a conscious effort to do so lately. Instead of my continuous pattern of accumulation I think it would behoove myself to decumulate, or at least sort through the mountains of detritus I generate and focus on the quality stuff… if there even is any. This week and last I’ve been scooping up hours of passing sounds, intending to catalog excerpts for the binaural enthusiasts out there. Binaural has somehow never caught on as anything but a curiosity and I don’t understand why. I think its use in movies is the sort of thing you would notice if it was not there. But for pure audio experience it has never reached more than niche interest.
I had a long Snapchat chat last night. I don’t think I’ve ever used Snapchat for that. It was with Simone, a mutual friend of Rob, who I bumped into a few nights ago. She had sent me a Snapchat filtered image, and it seemed appropriate to mention how I happened to cross paths with him. She never knew him much from Sunswick but found that he was kind of a constant presence on Facebook.
We ended up talking about L., a person who I was certain Simone knew. I mean I have actual vivid memories of the two of them in the same place at the same time. But Simone had no idea who I was talking about. Funny because L. certainly knew who Simone was. I went so far as to send Simone a picture of L., a maneuver which was hard to orchestrate from this tablet device. All Simone could say was damn, she’s pretty. No doubt about that, not that looks go very far with me. Beauty like that, especially in someone who is so aware of it, is a pain in the ass. I’m just confused as to why my connection between those two people was so certain. I guess I’ve just lost track of how and where certain worlds collided and where they did not.
But any time I consider that person all I can think is man, what a monster mistake that would have been.
What was quite strange was that Simone could not even see L.’s Facebook page, even though it appears to be at least partially public. It’s as if L. blocked Simone, which sounded incredibly unlikely until I vaguely remembered L. having something of a chagrined reaction when I asked if she ever talked to Simone. But that could be a foggy artifact of memory. No sense thinking it over too much but still, was strange. It reminds me how the people who post the least or seem to do nothing on Facebook are often the ones most obsessed with it.
Beyond that the conversation was high spirited, save for some family travails Simone is experiencing. Was sorry to hear of that.
Now I am listening to the sound of a ride on the Q60 bus from Queens Center Mall to what ended up being… I think it was 33rd Street. I and all aboard (well, all three of us) thought the bus was going all the way to Queensboro Plaza. There was an Asian kid blabbing in a language I did not recognize, and a middle aged black man fielding a string of wrong numbers coming into his phone. This is not an especially rich soundscape, and the static that surfaces whenever the bus moves or hits even slightly rough terrain is incredibly annoying.
Not that I should blow money on such things but instead of getting this one fixed for $300 I could get the newer and allegedly superior model, which is about $800. Yeah, that’s a brilliant idea. I could consider that if I ever find a way to make money with the sound of my voice.
I was hoping today would be monumentally productive and that I would not leave the apartment. But here I am at the ghetto coffee shop. At least I am listening back to this mountain of audio, as I’ve intended to do for so long.
I really have nothing to say on this gloomy, overcast Memorial Day. I heard a radio voice decry the way people say “Happy Memorial Day” or “Happy Holiday.” It’s like saying “Happy 9/11” or “Happy D-Day.” There is nothing happy about Memorial Day. That was Joe Walsh, my latest radio find.
