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DaRk AnGel : Why Home : January 2006 : The Bard's Betrayal

The Bard's Betrayal

Ugh. Sometimes writing comes so easily to me. I just sit and my fingers rattle away and something funny, thoughtful, or idiotic is created. Other times it is sheer agony! I will sit and write the first sentence, and then draw a blank and stare at the screen totally frustrated. Sometimes I feel like I need to write, and have no topic whatsoever in mind. Other times the premise is in mind, yet the words refuse to co-operate. How I wish I could just sit down turn on and type away.

A lot of what I write is either feelings I am dealing with, or things I see and notice in the world around me that effect me one in one way or another. I have never been much about creating a story. Sure I have a couple of great story lines in me, but as for seeing the characters, their strengths and weaknesses, and their interactions; - I guess I could, but just do not want to invest that much time into something unless it has a purpose or meaning. Now do not get me wrong, I admire prolific writers. Stephen King is a factory and does a great job. In fact my favorite book is The Stand. I read it annually and never tire of it, or fail to find something new I missed.

Stephen reminds me of someone I knew in the 1970's. His name was Sam Ruth and he was a singer in the bars of the French Quarter in New Orleans. He had a marvelous voice and his songs deeply touched my heart. I appreciate the poetry in music, more than the beat or the music, and Sam could so totally express feelings. Over time, we got to know each other. I always went to see him when he played and his girlfriend was a dancer in the bar where I worked. One evening I found myself honored when asked to join him on a Sunday afternoon to write together.

In the end I was devastated by that afternoon. I felt a bit like I had been defrauded. Some of the words to his songs touched me in a way that made me feel I had met a kindred spirit. Someone else had suffered or elated in something and only he and I could understand or relate to. It was our secret, our mutual experience. Except now only one of us experienced it. I felt cheated. I felt lied to and betrayed. Sam was a true wordsmith and story teller. But that is all that he was. He was someone with great skills and imagination - not writing from the personal wounds or experiences. I cannot turn on and turn off the words, he can. It certainly cheapened my emotions to think that someone could imagine, that which, I had to experience.

Now do not get me wrong. He is talented. Stephen King is talented. If Sam ever had made it big, he did pay his dues. Still his stories were fabrications, unlike for instance, Eric Clapton writing about the death of his son. You feel his sadness, and loss, and you want to console. You are bonded with him, because death is something that will touch all of our lives. The words are from the deepest parts of him. Stevie Nicks most poignant love songs were written during a time when she and Lindsey Buckingham were breaking up while both playing with Fleetwood Mac. Her words were a union with all those whose loves were failing.

I saw Sam in a new light after that. I had liked the songs and assumed that he was that man in them. On some ways he was, but he was not the man who lived the experiences that I bonded to. Sam was a good happy go lucky bard. But he was not what he sang.

The songs value changed for me as well. It was hard to feel the same way when I knew that what he was writing was not from experiences had. If I had never met Sam, or had never spent that Sunday afternoon with him, I would have never known that the words were just words. We need to believe the songs and writings that touch us and make us feel are those of a life's lesson. It gives us reason to feel that others do experience what we do. And more than that it gives us comfort, or hope depending on the work. I want to believe that people write great pieces because they have experienced the same thing as I.

Maybe that is shallow on my part. When I hear a song about love lost that touches me, I want to believe that that person felt that empty loneliness and rejection. It validates my empty loneliness and rejection. Yet at the same time it is something that I would wish on no one. And still it is comforting to know that it has not been my sole experience.

So I write when inspired. What I write I feel. These words are my thoughts and feelings, my emotions, my hopes and dreams, my tears, my laughter. Each key pressed is with feeling behind it. My words are my journey shared. I would have it no other way. It is what I believe when I see the words of others.

I have hunted for Sam over the years. Recently, online, I accidentally stumbled onto him. His name is changed and he is living in Canada. My attempts to reconcile with him have been fruitless, but I do know that he has received my letters and emails. He has a couple of CDs out and is a semi-local celebrity up there as he was 30 years ago on Bourbon Street.

I bought both of the CDs. His songs still tell great stories. Yet I hear them without feeling behind them. Or maybe it is that I hear them and I think of a Sunday Afternoon years ago, when all I thought was real, was exposed. In any event not all of us are what we write or sing. {Thank god for that Stephen King!} Not all of us proclaim to be.

Sam did nothing wrong. It was my need to be understood, verbalized, and not alone that chose to believe his tales were from the heart. We, at times, just desperately need to feel that others do know what we are going through, have been there, and have survived to tell the tale.