You Don't Know What You've Got Till It's Gone

Jimmy Page is 72.

I don't know whether he ripped off Spirit, whether he and Robert will be held accountable by the jury, but I do know there will come a time when both of them won't be here anymore. Or they will be, but they'll be too infirm to play.

Been a strange year out there, from David Bowie to Glenn Frey to Merle Haggard to Prince. With Dan Hicks and a bunch of lesser lights extinguished to boot. They defined a generation. And now they're gone.

My mother just told me she's the last one standing.

Do you have a deceased parent? It's a club you don't want to be a member of. If you're lucky, you'll end up an orphan, although I'm not looking forward to that day, when there's no context, when I realize I'm next.

Last night I had dinner at Amy's. Her son David is moving to Philadelphia to attend medical school. His UCSB girlfriend is gonna follow him. They're at the beginning, I'm at the end.

Not that anybody my age acknowledges that. That's the problem with baby boomers, they always think they'll rule, that they'll be here forever. But even Sumner Redstone is gonna pass. Ray Kurzweil too. And as much as Steve Jobs changed our culture, Apple no longer even introduces one more thing, his signature style is gone. Kinda like the bands of yore, either you saw them or you didn't. But what's even worse, so many of them have not survived into the second decade of the twenty first century. Does anybody under twenty know who 10cc was? Or even Gerardo? They're bleeding edge, they're on the oldies circuit, they become ill and then they die. Meanwhile life keeps moving forward.

Geri is in hospice. Lois's cancer has returned. My mother has always said to pull the plug, but she positively lives in the present, that's the key to longevity supposedly, along with good genes, but when she starts reflecting on her mortality...

It creeps me out.

I look in the mirror and see gray hair. I'm told I'm irrelevant every day. Even worse, I can now see the end, what do I want to do with my time, what do I want to accomplish?

Weird to pick up the Travel section and realize there are places you're never gonna go. That you're never gonna be rich. That more doors are closing than opening. You don't see yourself going over the hump, but suddenly you realize you passed it. And nobody wants to acknowledge it.

We keep hearing about an afterlife, about medical breakthroughs, as if this story is not going to end.

But it is.

I saw Led Zeppelin, twice. Back when Jimmy Page was still dangerous, before his hair had turned white. The goal was to get inside the Riot House, to become part of it. Musicians even had groupies. But in today's tabloid world nobody does anything untoward and we hear endlessly about nerd power and I don't even recognize the landscape anymore. And when they talk about the money "Stairway"'s made they never reference the cultural impact, how rock radio ruled and the tune was always number one, the most famous, the toppermost of the poppermost.

Doesn't matter whether the intro was nicked or not, it's part of my DNA. And yours. A cultural institution.

But I don't think Justin Bieber has it on infinite repeat. I don't see it on the Spotify charts. Everything meaningful fades. Whether it be Johnny Carson or Jay Leno. And when they try to keep the franchise alive it just makes you squirm. Cancel SNL. Once upon a time it was dangerous, John and Danny tested limits we didn't even know existed. And Jimmy Fallon does David Letterman's show, poorly, and the press gives him a pass. Makes me want to scream at the screen like Grandpa Simpson, but we laugh at him, I don't want everybody laughing at me.

Everybody's got something wrong with them. The body mutates and rebels and no one gets out of here alive. But when you're twenty five, you think you're immune, but you're not.

I never thought my mother would live forever, but I never envisioned a day when she was not here. We don't speak every day, but when we do I'm rooted, I know who I am. And I'll be somebody when she's gone, but I'll be somebody different.

She jumped off the phone. The ending was abrupt. I heard about everybody's illness and then she had to go before she started to cry.

I cry for Glenn Frey.

I lament my brethren going on a desert trip to see has-beens, however gigantic they once might have been. I don't want my memories tarnished, I want to remember how it once was. Thank god for Robert Plant refusing to regroup. It'd be like Magic and Bird, Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen, playing basketball. Sometimes the era passes.

But the memories and feelings live on.

Once upon a time "Stairway To Heaven" was brand new. You dropped the needle and went on an aural adventure. You enjoyed hearing it on the radio, it made you feel warm and fuzzy, it set your mind free.

But now it's just a signifier of what once was.

Who even cares if it survives, we won't.

We think everything we do is important, we build a resume, acquire assets and try to climb the ladder when the truth is no ladder exists. We're here and then we're gone. And intellectually I knew this, but today I feel it.


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