Thank You For The Birthday Wishes!!

I am and will be forever grateful for the wonderful depth of your support.
Thank you earnestly for the 55th birthday wishes yesterday.

I spent much of it reflecting on the 11 year cycles that illustrate & illuminate the double numbered years, which most of us humans will only possibly have no more than 9 of, since after 99 most of us have said goodbye to the double numbers, awaiting only thereafter the triple numbers of 111.

And I do not plan to hang around that long, it is a number unbecoming rock artists, the wrinkles are much harder to control.

And with the life expectancy of my profession, the insurance industry certainly doesn't count on seeing me make 66. The insurance premiums for my ilk are rather prohibitive as it happens, we are the Fast Red Sports Car of our field, expected to live fast, die young and make a lot of other bitches rich in the process.

I also spent only the slightest amount of time wondering what Eva Longoria was wearing, but now that both of us are married, I spent less time on imagining than I might otherwise have, out of respect for my current reality, which I must confess is holding up as well as can be expected when a wonderful intelligent fine woman like my Francesca marries a loose cannon wild card such as the likes of my roguish mixed bastard blood.

I always think of others with whom I share a birthday since we IDES OF MARCH bitches are a breed unto ourselves. I also have musical heroes such as Ry Cooder & Grandmaster Sly Stone who also share my date, along with the Beach Boys Mike Love & our fine examples Brutus & Caeser, that difficult couple from all those historical years ago.

Maybe by now they have worked their issues out with one another.
Man on man love never seems easy, at least to those of us who are watching it struggle to find composure from the outside looking in.

But there I go again!

My lovely wife the Mrs. Maitreya graciously drove me yesterday to a short pilgrimage I wished to undertake to bless my new year. Although we now know that one man's pilgrimage is just another man's filed trip, I ventured from my reticent turtle shell to sally forth (Sally Fifth was unavailable)
Towards the horizon that nestled the birthplace home of one of my great grand guru's of space/time's quantum reality parallels, GIUSEPPE VERDI.

And after spending a suitable enough amount of gravity absorbing his place of birth and thanking God for the opportunity to visit with one of his great prophets, I grabbed some gravel from his driveway ( I wonder whether he drove a Fiat or a German brand…) while reiterating a hearty sick joke about whether he found COMPOSING as easy as DECOMPOSING.

I felt his spirit chuckle yet remind me that I had already made this weak joke in reference to Beethoven several years before & that perhaps fresh material might be in order were I to wish to encounter the fresh spirit of Master Verdi's psycho acoustic time wave.

Then BACK IN THE RANGE ROVER BATMAN for another drive deeper into the countryside of Italy's famed Emilia-Romagna region, where the food is SO legendary, 2 regions merged to take equal claim in the pride of it!

We sought, then found the main residence of Verdi, a smoky yellow villa ensconced deep in the gardens of its own reclaimed woods, with a grand man made lake engineered over 200 years ago, and many winding paths through which to meditate on the profundity & effluvia that earned his master's coin & reputation worldwide.

I was impressed also by his garage where he kept at all times, 6 Phat Whips (his horse drawn carriages), one for each occasion which might upon itself to him.

I then spoke to a guide who worked the grounds that it would be a Very Cool Idea (to paraphrase my old Malibu smoking buddies) were the Verdi family to consider selling seeds & cuttings from the immense 'Giardino' of the Maestro & marketing them as 'From The Garden Of The Great Master'.
Something along the lines of 'Gingko Biloba' was mentioned by the tour guide, cryptically, and nothing further ventured was either gained or said.

Cheekily, I was allowed to take some cherry blossom tree cuttings to replant, that possibly with a little luck, I might have a chance to witness the blooming of an actual, physical connection between the great master & a humble, yet diligent disciple.
If at times yet distaff, dubious & dull I am (Still, the gist goes like this, I may not be Van Halen but at least I'm still IN HALEN Something, You Dig ?).

After saying goodbye to our good friend 'Ralph Weidersehen' (himself a good friend of our close acquaintance Chasen Ketchenegger), we then determined that settling into our restaurant reservation at a nice local establishment renowned the world throughout for palate sensitive seekers was the option that Maestro Verdi would have agreed upon most heartily.

But only AFTER having first briefly lit a few candles at the church where the infant Giuseppe was baptized & saying a prayer for my soul, my family & the conclusion of Prometheus & Pandora.

Me & Francesca, still overcoming the mild shock of being independent & free of our sons Francesco Mingus & Federico Elvis, both in school, removed our outer walking apparel and proceeded to order at least half of what the restaurant had readied for service.

It seemed as if forever since I last ate out & enjoyed just as much as I could before departing with a view towards stopping off into a tobacconist and purchasing a smoking pipe the style of which might have been employed by master Giuseppe.
( To complete the pose, naturally) !

Although never a heavy drinker, after the demise of maestro Prince I, taken advance notice of my own biological father's death at the tender age of 56, gave up all alcohol, even the good stuff.
And although I was indeed a very occasional & light smoker, after buddy George Michael's swan siren sounded I also resolved to forego tobacco, which I also concluded dependency of forthwith.

I did not however stop smoking the 'Medicinal'.

I wanted to give up my vices, not my BRAIN (or my common sense).
In a crazy world, that would be very crazy indeed.
And I am a Catholic now, we do not have to die empty handed like the Protestants, poor things.

Gains are gains, and in my worldview, a man NEVER gives up gains.
What is earned is kept. If not close to the vest, then closer to the verse if not the purse.

I had been asked a while ago whether or not I still managed to smoke 'Recreationally'.
A question I found cute as well as quaint.

I am living in Italy as a reluctant ex-patriot, as one who has literally been on 'lists' my entire life for one bland or banal reason or another, as a writer, an artist, composer/musician, businessman, publisher, husband & the father of 2 precocious young Turks passing themselves off as Milanese, and as someone who has had to grow used to the idea that nothing I do will matter UNTIL or UNLESS another profile is doing it & getting away with it, a condition of a particularly pernicious servitude that indeed Master Prince took pains to warn me of at the very beginning of my sojourn in these wilding fields on the winding roads of ruin & apathy.

He confided in my eager ears That primarily the existence of the likes of which we were was about providing inspiration that essentially other appropriate, more suitable profiles could take advantage of.

Thereafter, upon convenience We Are Phased Out to make room for more of them who would be us but are not yet need to appear so to be what they are not.

He told me that My Love For Them & Embrace of Their Culture would NOT be reciprocated after the initial flattery had worn off. That they were incapable of feeling the truth & quantity of our love.
Diggeth ?

So you might understand that at THIS point in my timeline, ALL Of MY SMOKING IS MEDICINAL !

Both me & the good Lord will both rejoice upon the time when I can exhale and find at the end of it, a most innocent recreational response awaiting. I promise you I am looking forward to it.

And my embrace of anyone's culture is not my own but the will of God.
Unless I bring a Universal culture, I do not have nor claim a culture. It is simpler that way & beyond dispute.

Uplifting YOURS matters much more to me.

So, Heavier by some Verdi merchandise, some stuffed gifts and even more stuffed gullets & laden with aromatic cheeses & the fabled 'Culatello Di Zibello', we arrived safely back in Milan where we picked up a cake for my birthday, gathered our sons from school & recounted to Mingus & Elvis why if Verdi was so super great, they hadn't seen his videos on YouTube like their heroes Michael's Jackson & George.

I was odds to patiently explain that ABSENT THE MOONWALK or A VIDEO WITH ICONIC SUPERMODELS, most composers languish in obscurity until accidentally discovered by Turtleshell rim wearing acolytes who then take it upon themselves to post videos on YouTube for their master's benefit, hopefully furthering the erstwhile knowledge of those who cannot otherwise be bothered by an act as trivial as searching for groundbreaking composers who couldn't get it together to perfect dance moves.

I cannot begin to tell you how astonished I am that a minor pop figure, who debuted 30 years ago this summer, and who was summarily (career) murdered roughly 28 years ago for the benefit of Babylon, still manages to somehow connect with more than a few brave souls from all over the planet all these baffling years after the fact of my professional demise, whereby I was consigned to the bargain basement of 'Obscuria Paraphenalis' & assigned as a craven footnote thereof.

And after this very brief break to celebrate still being alive, I will resume the finalizing work of Prometheus & Pandora. I will be doing a few songs of my own AND with a very dear good friend of my families, the gifted & most beautiful Madame Luisa, who will provide the voice of Pandora.

Most of the songs will not come out until after mastering when the entire project is ready for proper digestion into our body politic.

Or as master Walt Whitman might imply, THE BODY ELECTRIC.
Though A couple tunes may arrive sooner to 'tease' somewhat the hair of it all.
(Hair Today, Gone To Mara's Pub for a drink).

But first proper respects must be paid to St. Patrick's day.

Coming but 2 days after my own birthday, I've always considered that my honors didn't end until St. Patrick's did.
So in effect March 15-17 is what I have always reckoned to be my 'week of announcement' if you will.

A long unending birthday to prove my stealthy Irish blood.

Me & the TreeHouse Squirrels will make sure to keep you abreast ( & a thigh if that is your thing;-) of developments. Otherwise, we'll 'wing' it & see what transpires.

I thank God for you & your interest as always. I am more than blessed to know how faithful so many of you have remained to a new life & miracle.
Know that I am FOR you absolutely until even after the bitter end, if ends bitter that bodes not well.

I am FOR your chances All The Way Through The Game, 150%.
And where you bitches are, I AM.
KNOW THIS & Feel It !
May Your God & Spirit continue to keep you in good hands, enlightened, healthy & amused.

More as it pertains to time's comings & goings while it gathers its branches & leaves.

Most Sincerely & Gratefully,
Sananda Francesco Maitreya !

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Thank You For The Birthday Wishes!!

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