These Are Days

It is hard to be a person. And, to me, the hardest thing about being a person is seeing yourself the ways others see you. The best gift I’ve received is when someone—anyone—pulls me aside and tells me I’m being an asshole. And exactly why they think so. But that hardly ever happens. Because people don’t want to waste energy and social capital explaining to me that I have have obvious, correctable issues. Or that I have said a terrible, stupid thing. It is an unpleasant conversation, and I do not take it well. Ask my wife. Even she is reticent to give me the clarity I badly need. Because I will deny. And resist. And be angry and hardheaded. Or blame her instead of myself.

But eventually I realize she is right. And she is always right. And I do try to be a better person. For you who may be recent acquaintances and doubt my improvement, believe me. This is the best I have been. And worse, I hope, than what I will be.

Because the understanding of others is so valuable, I have always appreciated advice. A good advice giver will provide practical guidance earned with experience. But most advice, even bad advice, will also include an assessment of you and your circumstances. The words may be polite and unoffensive, but encoded within will be a valuable glimpse of how that person sees you. It’s not as pure or as valuable as someone telling you “hey, you just showed your whole ass back there.” But advice, though perhaps less useful than direct instruction, is more pleasant for both the giver and receiver.

Right now, you’re probably wondering “is this dude really gonna write 10,000 words before he says anything about 10,000 Maniacs?” I do apologize.

There may be no album I’ve listened to more than Our Time in Eden. I listened to it 10,000 times my senior year of high school and that summer before college. I’ve returned to it many times since. Because the way I hear the album it is a friend giving me the best advice I’ve needed and wanted to hear. Or it’s a girl taking down a book of poems and reading. Or it’s the memory of me hanging out with the first great group of friends I had just as I was becoming an adult. It’s always been all of these things at once.

When I hear singer Natalie Merchant’s voice on these songs, what I remember most is how amazing it felt to have good friends for the first time in my life, to feel warm and optimistic. Like I had figured things out at just the right time in my life. When I listen, I remember being 18 and graduating high school. I remember my freshman year in college and being with my first girlfriend. I remember all of us driving to downtown Houston to watch folk singers play at Cyrano’s coffee bar next to the Montrose library. Or going to a jazz bar. Or watching movies at Landmark River Oaks 3 (before I started working there). I think we all felt very adult and artistic, but also just grateful to be with each other.

The magic of the album, and probably the point of the title, is the way Merchant’s words encouraged me to appreciate the greatness of the moment, being on the cusp of innocence and adulthood, in real time. Hearing this album when I was 18 and 19, I felt nostalgia for my life as I was living it. I knew exactly how I good I had it.

These are days you’ll remember When May is rushing over you with desire To be part of the miracles you see in every hour You’ll know it’s true that you are blessed and lucky It’s true that you Are touched by something That will grow and bloom in you

Lyrics that read, on the page, as if they were lifted from an old Romantic poem or graduation speech, sound more convincing when Merchant sings them over the best songs and arrangements 10,000 Maniacs had ever put on record. This was the first and only 10,000 Maniacs album I liked enough to buy. The earlier records seemed bogged down by preachy lyrics and uninspiring 80s college rock production. But on Eden, Merchant’s righteousness mostly gives way to empathy and wisdom, and the band’s arrangements are bolstered on every song by lush, forceful piano playing from Merchant and original keyboardist Dennis Drew.

In these songs Merchant is remembering, too. In “Stockton Gala Days” she sings to a departed (deceased?) friend about how changed and withdrawn she’s become since they grew apart:

That summer fields grow high. We had wildflower fever. We had to lay down where they grow. How I’ve learned to hide, how I’ve locked inside, you’d be surprised if shown. But you’ll never, you’ll never know

In “How You’ve Grown” she rewrites the trite expression into on observation about how slow it seems to finally grow up ourselves, and how bittersweet it is to see our our distant nieces or friends’ daughters become women in our absence:

“My, how you’ve grown.” I remember that phrase from the childhood days, too Just wait and see.“ I remember those words and how they chided me When patient was the hardest thing to be Because we can’t make up for the time that we’ve lost I must let these memories provide No little girl can stop her world to wait for me

“Few and Far Between” begs a lover to stop using memories and regrets as an excuse not to move forward:

‘Till you make your peace with yesterday You’ll never build a future, I swear by what I say Whatever penance you do Decide what it’s worth to you And then respect it However long it will take To weather your mistakes Why not accept it?

When I hear the album now, there’s kind of a darkness mixed in with the good. Because I do have regrets. Because I have made mistakes. Because I’ve done things to lose some of the great friends I’ve had in my life. When I play it now, it’s the opening minor chords in “Noah’s Dove” that fill me, not with dread, but with a ruminative hollow. I remember the good and the bad. But it’s the missteps that are more deeply felt and acute.

You can get lost in memory and nostalgia. In regret. And at times, that’s what this album has been for me. A place to sit and have my coffee (or, my beer and cigarettes, when I was lost in those things), and think of old faces and trips I took or should have taken. A worn chair where I can be an emo sad bastard. I don’t get to go back in time and fix my mistakes. I haven’t always made things right with the people I’ve hurt. Sometimes they drift away and I never find out why or what I did or said. Because I maybe didn’t matter enough to them to make that effort.

In the title track, Merchant sings:

Believe me, the truth is we’re not honest, not the people that we dream We’re not as close as we could be

The best friends I’ve had have been willing to help make up the distance. To show me a glimpse of the person I could and should have been in the moment. To, let me know I missed the mark. I know it takes tremendous effort and patience and love to correct a friend and build a better friendship. It’s a lot to ask of someone. Maybe too much.

Instead, I just have to keep trying to be a better person. And of course, every now and then, when I could use some advice, I put on this record and remember that these are days, too. The ones I’m living now. The ones I share with you.

Fave lyrics:

These are days you’ll remember Never before and never since, I promise Will the whole world be warm as this And as you feel it You’ll know it’s true That you are blessed and lucky It’s true, that you are touched by something That will grow and bloom in you