tag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:/blogs/is-it-just-me-orIs It Just Me Or...2018-08-30T17:25:06-07:00Kim Berly Groove / KBGfalsetag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/54066652018-08-29T14:38:20-07:002021-12-08T04:06:36-08:00More Smoke<p>I’ve been sitting here for half an hour wanting to write something positive, or joyful, or up lifting. </p>
<p>Oh well…who knows…maybe such a mood will evolve as we go along. </p>
<p>This year has become all about the fires, the smoke, the beach vendors going broke, burnt out lives, and millions of creatures who could never run fast enough or far enough, now just ash on the forest floor. </p>
<p>We’ve had three almost smoke free days and it has been wonderful. It’s strange but as soon as the air clears it’s as if the smoke was never here; there are no lingering effects. It’s like waking from a bad dream. </p>
<p>And maybe that’s the reason for the funk today…the smoke is thickening again and with the very first whiff all the dread rises again. </p>
<p>I’ve been reading about the fires. They have now surpassed last year to make this the most devastating fire season ever…and there is no end in sight. This is the worst drought ever, even in the normally damp northern forests. There are concerns that water sources for the firefighters will dry up…some already have. </p>
<p>I’ve heard people on the radio saying that they will stay and fight the fire on their own…they have too much at stake to leave…many have farms or ranches and large herds of animals to protect. </p>
<p>But there is no protection, especially not if the water dries up. </p>
<p>What is amazing is that, so far, no one has died. </p>
<p>I saw a graph of annual fire damage from 1955 to the present…the worst previous fire season was about one third the size of last year… and now, even that huge leap in destroyed acreage has dropped to second place. </p>
<p>So it’s got me wondering what the cycles will be. </p>
<p>How many parched, smokey seasons must we endure before we get a damp, clear one?… three?… four?… forever more? </p>
<p>And what about the sunny, hot, all around gorgeous summers the Okanagan is famous for? </p>
<p>Sigh! </p>
<p>OK, well…the smoke is not getting anywhere near the density of last week so that’s a blessing…or the absence of a curse anyway. </p>
<p>And we are still only victims of smoke…and we are still in our homes… </p>
<p>And we gotta keep the faith. If you love a place you have to stick by it…plan for the best…believe that there will be a lot of snow in the mountains this winter and an ‘old times’ normal summer. </p>
<p>It would be nice to see boats on the lake again…and people having fun.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/53973562018-08-22T11:37:05-07:002018-08-27T19:52:45-07:00Smoke<p>August is grinding to a close here in paradise. One generally doesn’t speak of glorious summer as ‘grinding’ in any way. Summer is free, fun and fabulous…generally. But this is no glorious summer. People have been cancelling vacation reservations, pulling their boats out of the water and clearing the hardware stores of hepa filters and dust masks. </p>
<p>It’s all about the smoke. The endless layer of thick, acrid smoke that has blanketed this beautiful province for the last month and shows no sign of letting up. And yet we remain grateful; we must contend with only the smoke; the fire has, so far anyway, left us alone. </p>
<p>As I write I am watching the mountain across the lake gradually slip from view. Last evening cleared up a bit. Not so much that we could open windows or step out for a longed for breath of clean, fresh air. No, not that much. But at least the moon was yellow instead of the deep orange shadow of the past week; at least the mountain was visible as a silhouette against the lights of Vernon on the other side. </p>
<p>But the wind has changed direction, as the song goes, and the heaviness of the atmosphere is again intensifying. I’ve learned that you never can tell just how dense it will get. Last years fires, even though some were much closer to us than this years batch, never produced the kind of blanket that these have. I have read that the high atmospheric air is too hot to allow the smoke to rise and so it is forced it to stay low and thick…a heat inversion. </p>
<p>It makes me think of what a nuclear winter might be like. You know, the post apocalyptic story of how the earth would freeze to death because no heat could reach the surface after a nuclear holocaust. It’s been a hot summer, mid to high thirties, but during the dense smokey periods it’s ten degrees cooler. That’s a relief in a way because hot smokey air would be even less breathable than cool but you get the point…if the smoke lasted for years all life would choke, plants would die, everything would be contaminated. </p>
<p>My mind does wander into some depressing corners as I watch the mountain fade to a grey outline. One feels like a prisoner. For many people that is actually the case. It’s not worth going outside if you suffer from any kind of lung condition. Even if you don’t currently have issues it becomes readily apparent that you soon will if you spend much time breathing cinder-filled air. </p>
<p>But hey, let me lighten up a bit. </p>
<p>I just read that there’s a strong wind blowing in from the Pacific Ocean…the entire province could be smoke free for a couple of days as early as the weekend. Enough time, perhaps, to freshen up the house and clear out stuffy lungs before the calm brings a return to the reality of the massive, still uncontained fire to the north-west, and the hundreds of smaller ones that surround us in all directions. There is rain in the forecast as well…glorious rain… which we have seen none of this summer. It will not be the Monsoon necessary to drench the fires into submission but even a little will surely help. </p>
<p>This is not good news for Albertans, Saskatchewanians and all folks to the east who will be receiving this unwelcome gift from BC. </p>
<p>Sorry. </p>
<p>Oh well… </p>
<p>There goes the mountain. </p>
<p>It’s all just grey again… </p>
<p>Light black from pole to pole.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/53796952018-08-08T13:41:41-07:002022-05-10T23:24:40-07:00The Times They Are A'Changin'<p>Well, I’ve officially entered a new phase of my life… the ‘old’ phase. I recall many years ago a man who was a decade or so older than me but younger than I am now, bemoan what he called the ‘graceless slide into decrepitude’. I remember thinking at the time, “Well, it doesn’t have to be graceless.” </p>
<p>Hmmm?? </p>
<p>Maybe not…the jury is still out on that one…but there is no doubt about the decrepitude part…I suppose we can still choose the attitude in which we live out the gradual breakdown of our bodies, but there are going to be grouchy days no matter how stoic and ‘mature’ we attempt to be. </p>
<p>I’m a bit grouchy today. Can you tell? </p>
<p>I played a gig last weekend with an extremely sore and swollen right foot. I just woke up with it one morning…as my foot hit the floor a howling pain shot through it all the way to my knee. WTF! OW OW! </p>
<p>Right away a couple of big questions flashed on my screen: first- OMG I’ve got a flight in 20 hours and a gig in 48…I can barely walk to my chair…how am I going to get around the airport? Secondly, even if I make it to the stage how in hell am I going to stand the pain of stomping on my bass drum for 90 minutes? </p>
<p>THIS IS SERIOUS! Over my fifty plus year career I have performed on no sleep, with the flu, with a screaming headache and any number of scrapes, scratches, cramps and contusions but I really didn’t know if I could take this pain. I hit the bass drum a thousand times over the course of a show (give or take a few hundred) and given the state of my foot, each hit would feel like a stomp on a rusty four inch spike. </p>
<p>What to do? Any thought of cancelling and foregoing the loot is forbidden entrance to my consciousness so I never considered it. What I thought was, “How do I get some serious pain meds?” Years ago my drummer friend Gibby had broken his big toe by ramming it into a door jamb on a midnight ramble through his apartment. He got some percodan and grinned his way through an entire evening of stomping on four inch spikes. “That’s what I need,” I thought. Now, I don’t actually know any licensed drug dispensers… let alone possessing one of my very own…so off to the hobble-in clinic I go, all the while preparing my story so they won’t think I’m just another addict looking for a legal fix. I think I’ve got it down; they can find my picture online, look up the tour schedule…in other words my story is totally verifiable…and I only want a couple of these precious little babies. </p>
<p>OK, seems reasonable. </p>
<p>But the first thing I see upon entering the waiting room is a large sign telling me that under NO circumstances are the doctors permitted to prescribe opioids or any ‘narcotic’ drug. Once again WTF. I know anything less than serious narcotic is not going to reduce the four inch spikes to anything resembling a manageable level. Still, I’ve hobbled across the parking lot and up the stairs and obtained a seven-of-spades playing card ( Hole-punched through the centre with a ‘Property of Casino Vernon” stamp) which indicated that I was seventh in the queue and could be face to face with a Dr. person within the hour. I decided that to limp away would be lame indeed so I settled in beside an exhausted looking young woman with a crying baby and a bored three year old. </p>
<p>I left with a prescription for some Tylenol 3’s (talk about a poor man’s opioid), some antibiotic (I apparently had some infection) and a requisition for some blood-work. </p>
<p>Oh Well. </p>
<p>Alright…so now it’s time to head for the airport. Lori insisted on driving me (sweet thing) and she even rushed into Superstore to buy me a cheap cane to keep me from toppling once I was on my own. Making my way the the airplane was indeed painful and I had to hobble-run through the Calgary airport in a rush to my connection. I did use the cane…kinda…it was awkward, competent cane-ing takes some practice. It was more of a showpiece really but it worked to get me in with the pre-boards when the flight was called. </p>
<p>I made it to the hotel, discussed the very real possibility that there would be no bass drumming for the pending show, holed up in my room with an ice bucket and ordered room service. I iced my foot off and on until it was time to head for the venue. By morning the swelling was down by half and with the help of some Tylenol 3’s and a big reduction in the pressure I played with I survived the set. But it wasn’t until I actually got through the first few songs that I felt I would probably make it to the end. </p>
<p>Rich and Ronnie were sympathetic, God knows they’ve got their ‘old guy’ issues too. But that’s the thing; I’ve always been the strong one, the guy who can carry their guitars when needed, the backbeat that doesn’t wimp out, the one who could run. </p>
<p>But the times they are a’changin’. </p>
<p>It’s all question of balance…and attitude…and acceptance…I guess.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/53706472018-08-01T10:42:05-07:002018-08-02T21:39:45-07:00On the Road Again<p>Well I’m back home after ten days on the road. Ten days bookended by Stampeder dates in Sault Ste. Marie and Burin Newfoundland with three a half days in between spent working with my longtime friend and collaborator Gary MacArthur at his studio in Brighton Ontario. I had hoped to have some new music to post along with this blog but we got hung up changing parts and making guitars into pianos etc. etc. etc. The bottom line being we’re still not quite ready for an unveiling of all this music. There are at least a dozen tracks…I haven’t actually stopped to count. It’s going to be a fascinating collection as some of the initial recordings date back to the late eighties and were recorded on an eight track Fostex machine, quite archaic by todays standards. Through the magic of new tech and much study Gary has been able to transform these into cool tracks…and, of course, there is much more recent stuff including some of the work David Knight and I have produced over the past while. </p>
<p>But enough on the new music. I know I have been threatening to post some for so long it’s beginning to sound as if it’s all just a figment of my imagination and doesn’t actually exist. Kinda like the Mueller investigation down south. So no more talk…I’ll just pop one up when I do I guess. </p>
<p>The trip itself was quite enjoyable for the most part; sadly, the unenjoyable time was that spent onstage. It’s always a drag when that happens and it is almost always the result of badly designed stages which cause the sound to roll around making playing a real chore. Both stages on this trip qualified as horrible. Both were shell shaped and the monitoring just couldn’t cut through the mess; so what you end up with is a super loud, ear-ringing din where it seems the guitar and bass are perpetually behind the beat. This is not happening in actuality and folks out front said it was good but for the musicians it’s an exhausting struggle. </p>
<p>In the end though, what counts is what the audience gets and it seems that was acceptable to both. Whew! </p>
<p>As much as I love living in central BC I admit that it’s not a great place to fly in and out of. My trip from Kelowna to ‘the Sault’ was via Vancouver and Toronto and saw me arriving at midnight, an eleven hour sojourn. Now the Sault Ste Marie airport was at least a thirty minute drive from my hotel and when I when I walked outside to grab a taxi and head for bed there was not a one in sight. ‘Oh no! I’ve got to call for one which will take thirty minutes just to get to me and another thirty to get me home (Oh yes, hotels become instant home when you’re on the road). Arghh! ‘ </p>
<p>But suddenly, out of nowhere, I see a man taking a woman's bag and directing her to, you guessed it, a TAXI! I immediately fell on my knees and began begging to share the ride. No, said the driver, he could take only the person who called. Thankfully this lovely lady took pity on me and allowed me to ride along. The uncertain driver had to check with his dispatcher who said “ No problem, just charge double”, which I was more than happy to pay. Over the course of the long ride in we all began to chat and I told them what I was in town to do and discovered they where both Stampeder fans and quite thrilled to have me in the car. So now I had been pegged as a rock star and, as such, felt obliged to leave an extra large tip. And so it goes. </p>
<p>Gig day was rainy…it was outdoors of course…it is summer after all. People came with umbrellas and a good time was had by all. (excepting, of course, the three of us struggling to hear what we were doing) </p>
<p>I rented a car in Toronto and drove the hour and a half to Gary’s. We worked at least ten hours a day and ate from a food truck that makes the world’s best burger. It was great! </p>
<p>Then a drive back to Richard’s house, an evening with some old friends and a few bottles of wine and an early morning flight to St. Johns. </p>
<p>The three plus hour drive from St. Johns down the Burin Peninsula was a magical one. I had done it once before a few years ago and another time in the seventies. That part of the NFLD landscape is like no other I have ever seen. Beautiful and mysterious, windblown so that the dwarf trees all lean away from the wind at ten or fifteen degrees, large rocky formations that appear as mountains but are only a hundred or so feet high, endless ponds and moss and treeless hills…a moor…to be sure. And the weather was pure Newfoundland; a Scottish mist with foggy patches and then a beautiful evening sun slipping in underneath it all. Like I said…magical. </p>
<p>The gig would have been great fun, save for the shitty sounding stage. Newfoundlanders are Canada’s party people. They have a great love of music and will let you know when they like you with endless offers of free beer. Fabulous folks. I can see NFLD becoming a solid tourist destination once word gets out to the world. There are not many places like it still around and it’s traditional fishing industry is, very sadly, no longer able to sustain the people as it has for centuries. </p>
<p>Bottom line…if you’ve never been to NFLD…go. You probably won’t need your swimming suit but bring hiking boots and a good water resistant jacket. St. Johns is a one-of-a-kind city and the food is great. </p>
<p>I do find it amazing that I can get from one end of this vast country to the other in a single day…which is about what it took to see me home on Sunday night…or, rather, Monday morning. Eighteen hours in transit… I was twenty pages short of finishing a novel I started on the St.Johns-Toronto leg. </p>
<p>It’s good to be home.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/53522722018-07-18T12:48:24-07:002023-12-10T08:45:07-08:00Summer<p>Summer has landed. A week of steady heat, raw sunshine, beer, water, friends, music. </p>
<p>Ah yes…I’ll take it. The days have been in the mid to high thirties, the breeze barely enough to rustle the leaves. It’s great summer weather if you’re able to be by a lake where you can dip freely into the cool wetness…which, as it happens, is exactly where we are. And the evenings cool down beautifully here in the Okanagan. You can usually turn off the A/C and open the windows around eight. </p>
<p>Last evening though, we had a fairly rare experience. A hot, dry wind blew in from the south turning the lake into a froth of white-caps and filling the air with all manner of fly-away plant matter. There was thunder and a fabulous lightning display…fabulous because it all seemed to release from cloud to cloud… sparing us any new fires. </p>
<p>Nothing more than a few drops of rain fell and it was all over in twenty minutes but what followed the storm was something different. A mass of humid air rolled in…unusual in these parts… which served to keep the night hot and bring out legions of bugs followed by a half dozen bats which took to swooping past our noses in a frenzy as they vacuumed up the night blood-raiders. They gorged themselves I’m sure, but didn’t make so much as a dent in the swarming invisibles. Nor did the citronella candles keep them away. We scratched and swatted for awhile and then retreated to the house where we kept the A/C running through the night. </p>
<p>A little bit of Ontario… or maybe Louisiana in our usually dry valley. </p>
<p>On another subject…I’ll be back on the road in a couple of days. The Stamps are gigging in Sault Ste. Marie this weekend and in Newfoundland the next. </p>
<p>I’m going to hole up in Ontario with Gary Mac for a few days in between. Our plan is to finish up work on a dozen or so tracks that have been in progress for the last year. So, barring catastrophe, I should be able to post some new music within the next couple of weeks. </p>
<p>I’m looking forward to getting feedback. You get to a place, when you’re working on the same stuff for months, where you lose perspective and start going in circles. The beauty of all the new tech is that we can always claw back a song and change it if everybody hates it…which is, of course, our worst nightmare…but you will let me know if you hate stuff…right? Nightmare notwithstanding. </p>
<p>So… no blog next week. I’ll be too busy and I’m not into lugging a laptop anymore. I like to fly light. I boast that I could go around the world with a carry-on and I believe it’s true…especially in summer. </p>
<p>Newfoundland can be tricky however, so I best dig out my windbreaker that folds down into a fanny-pac. </p>
<p>But then again, it will be summer in NFLD too…official summer no less…which, in case you didn’t know, encompasses the last week in July and the first week in August. </p>
<p>So I probably don’t need the windbreaker. </p>
<p>Maybe I’m being too cautious? </p>
<p>I’ll sleep on it. </p>
<p>Cheers!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/53416072018-07-11T11:35:00-07:002018-07-12T19:51:39-07:00In a Funk<p>OK… It’s one of those days when I have nothing going on that inspires me to write. It’s not that my mind is a blank or that I couldn’t just wax on…again…about the majesty of the natural world… or how cool it is that I can spend an entire Wednesday morning scribbling notions on my laptop, but I may as well just re-publish an old blog then, right? </p>
<p>No…don’t wanna do that. </p>
<p>Here’s the story. </p>
<p>I woke up early this morning and couldn’t fall back to sleep. Stuff on my mind, you know? Nothing major…no life or death, no impending disaster. Just small nuisance stuff. Annoying more than anything. But it put me in a funk. My first thought was, ‘Oh shit…that’s still going on isn’t it? I didn’t dream it away…it’s still here.’ Bummer. </p>
<p>Now, some days, I just want to get up and get busy at fixing whatever the problem is but other days…say like today…there is a part of me that just seems to want to wallow in the funk…to pout and be moody and sullen…to nurse the jerk and spread petty, pity vibes, like a contagion, all around me. </p>
<p>A perfect recipe for a shitty day. </p>
<p>Maybe it’s my old age or maybe it’s some tiny thread of enlightenment but somewhere in the middle of my second coffee another voice pipes up through the murk…a saner, quieter voice that says, ‘Really? After all this time you’re still ok with blowing a potentially great day?…look, the sun’s shining, it’s summer for Christ’s sake…you live by a lake…smarten up!’ </p>
<p>Ok. Now that makes sense and I am a sensible guy and I know I will soon heed my better angel and smarten up. But what is it, I wonder, that creates the unwelcome, unwanted, unfriendly funkiness upon waking? </p>
<p>But, of course, I know the answer to that too. I went to bed with bullshit on my mind. I fell asleep upset and woke up in exactly the same state… except with the added dimension of disappointment that naturally comes with waking up miserable. </p>
<p>Good. </p>
<p>So the moral of the story is, ‘Always go to sleep on a happy thought.’ </p>
<p>Awww. Would that it were so simple. </p>
<p>Getting rid of trouble-in-mind before nodding off is indeed one of life's most perplexing conundrums. It’s like trying to convince yourself that you believe in something you know you don’t believe in (I’m a millionaire, I’m a millionaire, I’m a millionaire). </p>
<p>I think the Buddhist monks were on to something when they began meditating on a skull…yes, a human skull. What could be a more definitive reminder of the truth of earthly existence? I’ve also heard that some enlightened folks like to envision themselves in their coffin…same thing. </p>
<p>Ultimately, Nothing Matters! </p>
<p>All is Temporary! </p>
<p>Ashes to Ashes </p>
<p>Funk to Funky </p>
<p>(We know Major Tom’s a junky) </p>
<p>Hmmm…. </p>
<p>Well, whatever… </p>
<p>I feel fine. </p>
<p>You folks are great listeners. </p>
<p>Thanks</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/53299512018-07-03T13:15:13-07:002018-07-06T17:41:00-07:00Can't Talk to the Taxman<p>Aargh! </p>
<p>I’m trying to get a call through to the CRA. Yes, the Canada Revenue Agency. It seems they do not want to accept my GST/HST filing for this past year. My accountant tried to file electronically, which is how we’ve been doing it for years, but it bounced back…with no explanation. So, not wanting to run afoul of the government, I put it in an envelope and mailed it. Last week I got a response…they tell me they cannot accept my filing …quote…“we cannot process this return because we are not expecting a return for this period.” Hmmm?? In the next sentence they ask that I, “Please file a new GST/HST return for the appropriate period as soon as possible.” Wha?…what IS the appropriate period? Did I fail to file last year? And if so why have I not heard from them? </p>
<p>Just to be sure I dug into my 2016 return and found my confirmation of filing and all relevant info. So…nothing left but to call and speak to someone and find out what to do…hence my frustration. No one answers the number provided. No one answers because it does not ring through. The service is overloaded. </p>
<p>Nothing to do but try, try again…and again, and again. </p>
<p>Aargh! </p>
<p>I recently read that the CRA has failed to collect over 40 billion dollars in owed taxes, about half of that is business tax and the rest is owed by regular folks. </p>
<p>Forty billion! </p>
<p>That’s enough to build a wall along our entire border with the U.S. Imagine if we beat them to the punch. What a piss-off for Donaldo, the great wall-maker… talk about a make work project… and we will need to make work for a lot of people now that we are at war with America. Well ok…so it’s only a trade war…but still, we’ll have lots of excess steel to unload and all kinds of unemployed manufacturers just itching for a project. And, seeing as how we are at war, we might want to take a few of those dollars to buy some used American fighter planes from the Australians (who, I assume, are buying new fighter planes from the Americans so they, too, can have a war with them). </p>
<p>The lunatics have indeed taken over the asylum…again. </p>
<p>Oh well…’scuse me…I have to redial the CRA. After all, if I can’t file I can’t pay… and the grand total of unpaid tax becomes 40,000,000,000 plus me…and I don’t want to be part of any G'damn wall. </p>
<p>They’re coming to take me away hehe, hoho, haha!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/53207692018-06-27T14:22:35-07:002018-06-28T20:49:57-07:00Birthday<p>My birthday is coming up…next week. It’s a zero year. And we all know (for reasons that make absolutely no sense) that zero years are definitely the most significant. It’s as though they usher in new eras of our lives. </p>
<p>I remember looking so forward to achieving 10 years old. Wow that was a biggie. To finally escape the single digits of childhood seemed an immense achievement. I felt so much closer to that coveted state of grown-up-ness. Sure I was still a kid, but in just three painfully long years I would be a teenager…a teenager…that magical time when the rules of kid-dom would expire and new freedoms would be extended me. It took such a long time to get there. </p>
<p>Twenty was fabulous. I was a grown-up at twenty. Newly wed, living in my own flat in the biggest city in the land thousands of miles from parents and siblings, doing the work I dreamed of and looking eagerly to a future I was sure would be filled with success and travel and fame. </p>
<p>By my thirtieth birthday I was the father of two beautiful little girls… but the ‘fame and fortune’ that actually did occur in my twenties was on shaky ground…and my marriage was shaking down with it. My thirties were dirty…the worst decade of my life, filled with struggle and failure and heartbreak and darkness. But still, as they wound down my life began to swing back up. I had a new wife and a baby boy. I could look hopefully forward again. </p>
<p>Then there was forty. Forty…when the firm realization that you have already lived half of your life first casts a serious shadow. What have I achieved? What am I doing? Who am I? What am I?How did I get here? </p>
<p>Why didn’t I think about all of this sooner? </p>
<p>(you were a musician dimwit…the idea was NOT to think about it.) </p>
<p>Ah well. </p>
<p>At forty there were no cop outs; responsibility was all mine. But even though I had a few grey hairs, I still had lots of time, I reckoned. So I dreamed my dreams and filled my days working to support my kids…and waiting. In my late forties my career came back to life…you never can tell. </p>
<p>Fifty. One more kick at the can! Yes I can Yes I can can! Busy busy busy. Gigging again, working, writing. And, oh yes, another marriage bites the dust. </p>
<p>Sixty. This will be my decade I think. Still healthy, lots of energy. I have a new love, kids are grown. Time to travel, screw it all, we’re off to Mexico…two and a half years of ‘no fixed address’, no possessions. Wanna move?…just load the car and drop off the key. Freedom…or as close as it gets. </p>
<p>A change of location…a re-settling…it was my most creative and productive time. </p>
<p>And here I am, one week left in which to be sixty-something. I’m not sure if it means anything but over the course of writing this blog my entire life has flashed before me. (insert ominous note here) </p>
<p>It’s not given to us to know just where we are on the road of life. I still have desires and plans…but fewer expectations, I think. I’m more interested in just seeing what happens. I do intend to continue being the cause of some of those ‘happenings’ of course…what fun would it be otherwise. But beyond that, things will carry on as they are…until they change…which is as inevitable as the sunrise. Should I stumble across any pearls of wisdom along the way perhaps I will share them. Then again, you’ve got to recognize a truth when you see it…and there's the rub…don’t you think? </p>
<p>So here come the seventies. </p>
<p>Strike up the band.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/52941072018-06-13T16:41:35-07:002021-06-29T03:17:55-07:00On and On<p>I'm writing this morning from Calgary. Lori and I are staying with my sister for a few days. We made the trip over the mountains this time in order to be present for two family memorials, one for my little brother, who passed a year ago and the other for Lyle, who I have written about and who was a relative by marriage to Lori. Lyle was 99, Preston was just shy of his sixty-first birthday. </p>
<p>Preston’s anniversary was yesterday and family and friends gathered at what is now his wife’s home, as we had done so many times over the years, to eat, drink, make some music and party. There were toasts and memories… he would have loved it. </p>
<p>It all sets me to wondering…yet again…about the oldest of questions…What are we all doing here?…why are some lives only moments long and others 100 years?…do we get do-overs?…would we even want such a thing?…and, of course, </p>
<p>is this all there is?…which is indeed a ridiculous question. I ask myself, ’How can I even think such a thing? How can I pose such a dumb question? How can everything not be enough?’ </p>
<p>It’s all so subjective though, so contingent upon what we think of as ‘enough’. Have I had enough love, enough pleasure, enough pain, enough money, travel, sex, friendship, struggle, recognition, affirmation, fear, fortune…ah fuck it!…maybe it’s all just TOO MUCH! </p>
<p>My living has led me to the conclusion that basically nothing matters. While I find it hard to believe that the essence of life ends with physical death I am absolutely ok with folks who can’t see any other possibility…I just think it doesn’t make any sense. It seems that I have, for reasons unknown to me, structured my life to allow for lots of contemplative time, lots of hours spent in my personal church which is the natural world…the forest, the water, the vast open spaces…and the creatures that live there. I have watched all manner of life change from living to so-called dead and then watched as new life sprang from it. An endless recycling of energy. And if this energy… material life energy… continues to transform and exist and remain alive, then how is it possible that the much faster, infinitely more sublime energy of consciousness could vanish without a trace? </p>
<p>It’s simply not. </p>
<p>I think it was in grade five science class that I learned that energy could be neither created nor destroyed (which is a pretty bold statement given our limited perspective). But if that is in fact the case, then the statement must apply to energies too fast for our current technology to detect…and there is no doubt that they exist. </p>
<p>Perhaps one day science will offer proof of life beyond the physical…a world beyond the material…but I am doubtful that we shall ever get to the end of the rainbow…to an understanding of the mystery. The more we learn the more fantastic it all becomes. But perhaps we have a deep knowing already. Perhaps that’s why we can accept our condition and carry on even when the proof of our own physical mortality pops up undeniably right under our noses. People disappear… the dead are celebrated and cherished…for awhile. </p>
<p>Then life goes on…and on and on.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/52662982018-05-30T15:01:41-07:002018-06-11T14:29:25-07:001968<p>I watched a very interesting show on tv the other night. It was a CNN look-back on the year 1968. Sixty-eight was, of course, 50 years ago and it was indeed an extraordinarily tumultuous year for the United States and the entire world. The effects of all the trauma were under our noses here in Canada just as they were for Americans thanks to the ability of tv signals to skip borders. </p>
<p>Those were the days of constant enmity between the Americans and the Russians, of daily news film, uncensored in those days, graphically showing the horrors of the hugely divisive war in Vietnam, the race riots, the assassinations and the brutality of the Chicago police clubbing and beating young demonstrators at the Democratic National Convention, of brawls and physical violence inside the walls of that very convention hall among warring factions of that same party. </p>
<p>Flailing police batons, bleeding heads, tear gas, water cannons and fire…lots and lots of fire. It seemed all America was ablaze. </p>
<p>Wow! </p>
<p>Makes todays shenanigans seem truly tame. </p>
<p>I turned twenty right smack in the middle of that mad, mad year. I didn’t really understand just how nuts it all was but the sense of impending danger was everywhere. My interest in world affairs and politics was beginning to emerge, but at that age, making sense of my own immediate life and situation occupied the vast majority of my energy, mental and otherwise. </p>
<p>By July of 1968 I had been on the road for two full years. The band was based in Toronto but we spent most of our time living in low-end hotel rooms and playing in bars, downstairs or down the street, in towns and cities all over Ontario and Quebec. We played for the young and the broken and the drunk; we backed up the topless dancers and were backlit by the oily lava-lamplight projected through a smoke haze so thick that it poured out the open doors like an inverted waterfall and saturated the night air with the reckless abandon of the young and possibly doomed. </p>
<p>And I was a newlywed to boot…just to complicate things…Georgia and I had gotten hitched in April. </p>
<p>The thing that did strike me, and I think most other young people that year, was that it seemed everything was about us. It was college students who led the demonstrations and sit-ins and building occupations. They marched in gigantic parades carrying placards decrying the War, Nixon, and the Draft. Young women burned bras, young men burned draft cards. </p>
<p>I met American draft dodgers in the same bars where I met Canadians who had gone to enlist in the US army so they could go fight in Vietnam. Some were going back for second and third tours, they were excited and high on adrenalin; some others just sat in dark corners and drank. </p>
<p>And this was Canada. I can only imagine what American bars were like in those days. </p>
<p>It was all fascinating to me and I wondered what I would have done if I had been born there…in the USA. Would I have actually gone into the army? I don’t think so. When I was a kid I loved all things military but by high school I had begun cultivating a fairly powerful anti-authority stance in keeping with the trend of my generation, and killing people or being killed by them was just nowhere in my life plan. But then again, I hadn’t been raised in that jingoistic, uber-patriotic, love-it-or-leave-it brainwash that so appealed to so many young men on both sides of the border. </p>
<p>Back then it was all just the way it was. We had all grown up waiting for the bomb to drop in our backyards so a little more existential anxiety was nothing to write home about. I played my drums and dreamed of being a star and planned my life in spite of all the noise. I could tune it out, I guess, just like so many are doing now. And the times changed and life went on. </p>
<p>And we’re all still here…most of us anyway…and I guess that’s the point that emerges most powerfully from watching a re-play of that harrowing time. </p>
<p>If the world could survive that (and it truly was a year when all bets were off when it came to war, democracy and personal freedom) then surely we can all get our shit together and get past the current avalanche of dung being hurled from high towers the world over. </p>
<p>Once again I’m betting on the young…fresh legs are needed. Reminders of past struggles are needed too…and experience and memory and perhaps even a snippet of wisdom. </p>
<p>We do go round and round…we humans. We repeat past mistakes and create deeper grooves with each pass. But like a wheel we are all moving forward even as we go round and round…it just takes a little correction this way or that to avoid the ruts. </p>
<p>ps. </p>
<p>I remember watching a Beatles press conference in the United States back in those times. A reporter asked, “Ringo, how do you feel about the draft?” To which the smart-ass Beatle replied, “It’s a little much, would you close the window.”</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/52247472018-05-09T09:04:13-07:002021-06-29T09:42:02-07:00How High's the Water Momma?<p>Man is it wet this morning, a real soaker, solid grey with a foggy haze obscuring the hilltops. The lake is up a good four inches overnight. I know because I had planted some stakes to mark my water line and last evening they were still showing that much above the surface…this morning they are underwater. The rain must be widespread and in the high mountains as well, washing the deep snowpack down…enough to lift my ancient, heavy dock out of the mud. </p>
<p>There is still lots of headroom in lake Okanagan due to a controlled run-off that’s been going on since February…the fear of a repeat of last years immense flood damage prompted the drastic drain. Still, it’ll be close for the people just above the normal waterline; last year the lake kept rising until mid June and I hear the snowpack in the mountains is even deeper this year. </p>
<p>We are not on flatland…this house stands a good ten feet above a full pond so we’re safe…for now. But who knows? I mean it seems ridiculous that lake levels could rise three or four meters above full but can it still be thought impossible? </p>
<p>??? </p>
<p>Just sayin’…what used to be 100 year weather events seem to be cycling now in a decade. And the climate folks say we’re in for another hot, dry summer. There was a time not so long ago when I would have cheered such a forecast but having lived through last summers smoke-in I now dread it. Ah well…whatchagonnado? </p>
<p>The Okanagan is still one of the worlds beauty spots and since getting home from the tour it’s been absolutely gorgeous with daily highs in the mid twenties and mucho sunshine. I’ve been working outdoors a lot and so have lost winters pallor to a vitamin D rich ruddy glow. For all the hassles that come with lakeside living, it’s still worth it. I do love it. </p>
<p>Tomorrow I spray for bugs. </p>
<p>On another note, this will be my last written blog for a couple of weeks. I’m heading for Ontario for some Stamps gigs and a visit with some old friends and my kids and grandkids. I’ll be working for a few days with Gary Mac at his studio; we’ll be putting the final touches on a couple of tunes I plan to reveal soon. </p>
<p>Anyway, I thought I’d do video blogs while I’m away instead of writing. It’s easier to ramble verbally into my phone than to lug my laptop around. So I will still be keeping in touch with all you lovelies who enjoy my blather. </p>
<p>Till then…then</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/52116722018-05-01T10:21:39-07:002021-06-21T22:36:16-07:00Foot Valve<p>It’s Tuesday morning and I’m sitting in the living room by the windows so I can look out at this shiny new day. We’ve had a couple of geese hanging around. They had taken to perching on the roof and making a lot of noise before swooping down right in front of the windows and out over the lake, honking all the way. They may have moved on though, found a more secluded nesting spot or maybe gone to another part of the lake. </p>
<p>We’ve been home for a week now, Lori and I, and as much as it would have been nice to have been able to just crash and re-coup for a few days, t’was not to be. Lori got home a couple of days before me and found that the house water wasn’t working…aahhh! You don’t realize how completely dependent on water we all are until it stops running. </p>
<p>I had her try the only obvious remedy…check the circuit breaker to make sure the juice was flowing…it was. Oh well…nothing to do but wait for me to get home…maybe check into a hotel for a couple of nights…but she said she had plenty of drinking water (we buy 20 litre jugs) so decided she would tough it out for a day but would get a room for us for when I returned so we could shower up and get ready to tackle the problem. </p>
<p>As it happens, the lake is at an all time low. Not for lack of spring run-off but because of it. There are concerns again this year of severe flooding so the folks in charge of the dam downstream have been draining the lake since January, thus making it possible to walk all the way out to our intake valve and check it out. Upon hearing of Lori’s distress our good neighbour, Larry, donned his chest waders and did exactly that. It turns out the foot valve (intake) was completely clogged and needed to be replaced. </p>
<p>As I already knew what the job was by the time I got to Kelowna, I picked up a new foot valve and assorted other necessary parts and, with the help of a friend, got into my own waders and strolled out to change it. (OK, so ‘stroll’ is a little droll…the valve is about 500 feet out and the water was hip deep and the bottom is slippery silt and you need to bring a rake to balance lest you tip sideways and drown) but we got it done. Total cost…$100.00. </p>
<p>Had this clog not become apparent until the lake was full the job could not have been done without a boat and someone to dive down and bring up the line… which would have been many times more expensive IF we could find someone up to doing it. So what had at first seemed like a bad break and a pain in-the-ass turned out to be good fortune…we had the water running by Monday evening. </p>
<p>That was day one of my relaxing return home. The rest of the week was equally busy. Spring at a cabin by the lake does not allow for a lot of down time. The next day I took advantage of the low water levels and got out in the mud to dig my waterline down into it…into the mud that is. Hopefully this will help prevent ice damage should next winter be as chilly as the last two. Whatever happened to ‘el Nino’? Did he give way to his mean sister forever or will he make a return visit next winter and give us a break? </p>
<p>Sigh… </p>
<p>Anyway…I’m starting to come around…getting a handle on the yard work, the cleanup, the hose repairs and the rapidly growing weeds and grass…catching up on sleep and eating my own cooking, which I have to say, beats the hell out of 90% of the hotel meals…make that 99%…oh, what the hell…it beats the hell out of all of them. I dressed in my work clothes yesterday but didn’t do anything…that felt REALLY good. </p>
<p>I may just do that again today…we’ll see. </p>
<p>Cheers!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/51765812018-04-11T14:32:47-07:002021-06-20T21:29:05-07:00Rock On<p>Well…only one thing I can write about today and that, of course, is the ongoing Stampeder tour of British Columbia. The thing about being a band on tour is that it’s all-consuming…you really don’t have time or energy for anything beyond the three absolutes of life on the road…performance, driving and SLEEP. </p>
<p>Sleep, for me, was hard to come by for the first three nights. It certainly was not for lack of exhaustion, I was wiped, but the niggling worry about how our three senior bodies would react to the opening six consecutive night run kept me on edge, and that certainly is exactly the wrong state of mind to be in as a lack of sleep is the ultimate enemy. It wasn’t until after the five hour drive-and-play on day four that I finally settled in for a major snooze. We were over the hump. </p>
<p>And now that’s done…Whew! </p>
<p>We made it! We did it! </p>
<p>Three old troopers put it all out there every single night and were rewarded with three sell-outs and three near sell-outs…great reviews…voices still intact and all still standing. </p>
<p>I must say we are quite impressed with ourselves…it has been 40-odd years since we have played that many in a row. We have one more five night run to make starting Sunday but no really long drives once we get underway. </p>
<p>Yesterday was a day off…of a sort…we drove seven hours from Kamloops to Nelson with the knowledge that one complete, travel-free, day off awaited us here. We’d had some trouble with our rented van on Monday just as we pulled into Kamloops so yesterday morning I was roused from a deep slumber by my obnoxious alarm at 6:30 to get the thing in for service as a swap-out wasn’t available. It turned out that we had picked up a stone in the brakes and no repair was needed so we got on the road by 10:30 and into a very nice hotel with an excellent restaurant around 6:00. </p>
<p>We had been gifted six bottles of fabulous wine by a vintner in Kelowna…all but one vanished by dinner…there are ten of us in the entourage. </p>
<p>Last night was the first big wine and food-fest since our arrival in Victoria a week ago. It was well earned and roundly enjoyed. </p>
<p>So now, as I write this, we are all free to do whatever we like. I’ve heard that Rich is watching tv, Holly and Patrick are on a hike, Dan and Dave are at the laundromat, which is what Lori and I will do when I wrap this up, and MaryLynn has found a great shoe store. </p>
<p>Oh, and Ronnie is enjoying a late, late brunch and will also be in attendance at the laundry. </p>
<p>And so it goes. </p>
<p>Rock on!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/51642612018-04-04T12:33:39-07:002018-04-06T20:01:30-07:00It's Showtime Folks!<p>Well, here I am in Victoria. Or perhaps I should say here WE are because there is a fair entourage on the road this trip. Lori is with me and Rich has his wife Mary-Lynn and daughter Holly. We have two Dans…our sound man and friend Dan Belanger and his friend, Dan # 2; they drove from North Bay, Ontario in a van full of gear to do this BC run with us. And of course we must include the one and only Ronnie King who, really, should count for two on the strength of his larger than life persona. We have two rental vans plus Dan’s truck for transportation, all loaded to the max with gear, merchandise and luggage. Ronnie, of course, has the most baggage, out-doing any of the girls by at least half…Ronnie does not do laundromats. </p>
<p>It’s 11:30 am…day one of six show nights in a row…something we haven’t done since the seventies. I’m not sure why we’re doing it now. Perhaps it’s a test to see if we’re still worthy of wearing the mantle of Rock n’ Roll…more likely it’s because of the availability of suitable venues in co-ordination with ‘not-completely-insane’ routing. </p>
<p>Sadly it’s raining today, smudging the beauty of this lovely city. It will be raining for most of the tour according to my weather app. That’s kind of a shame for the guys from the east because BC can be very beautiful in spring and I’m sorry they won’t be seeing it in all it’s sunny glory. I am hoping that we don’t run into snow on any of the mountain drives but am all too aware that rain in the low country is snow in the mountains, so it will depend on just when we hit those high stretches. </p>
<p>These are the things that go through one’s mind on day one…the concerns… the worries. </p>
<p>The big question though, is will we be able to sustain the kind of energy required to do so many consecutive shows…and will anybody crash and bring the caravan to a screeching halt? Who knows? </p>
<p>As for myself, I have noticed over the years that I tend to subconsciously conserve energy. I feel tired all through the day until show time and then seem to kick in with a big burst of juice that carries on until about midnight which, in these circumstances, is about two hours post performance. I think Ronnie does that too but Rich seems to go like the Ever-ready rabbit all day long. </p>
<p>Anyway…we shall see. I know that when the lights come up and we walk on stage that we will all be putting out everything that we have. We talk about pacing ourselves for the long haul but the fact is that never happens. Every performance is all in. </p>
<p>On the days when everything goes smoothly we can catch an hour of sleep, or at least what I call ‘zoning’, before heading for the venue. Some days that won’t work out and we’ll go from the drive to the sound check to the gig without time for a decent meal. </p>
<p>That’s another issue…eating. Timing dinner is important. A meal too late will leave you bloated and gasping for breath, especially on the high notes, so with shows starting at 7:30 (the new norm for aging audiences) it is best to be finished eating no later than 6:00. I like to be done with two full hours to spare because drumming with a tummy full is like swimming with 50 pounds of lead strapped to your waist. If time is tight I usually opt for a salad or soup, enough to fuel me for the show but afterwards I’m ready to consume anything and everything I can get my hands on. </p>
<p>So that’s how it is on day one. I must end this now because I have to go help organize the merch…then sound check…then dinner…hopefully a little zone-out and…</p>
<p>It’s showtime folks!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/51527912018-03-28T14:30:25-07:002018-03-30T22:04:04-07:00Lyle<p>Lyle died last night. </p>
<p>It’s been a couple of hours since we heard. </p>
<p>It’s been about 24 hours since we saw him last. </p>
<p>Lori and I had discussed on Sunday whether to wait until Easter for a visit or go to Kelowna earlier in the week. We chose yesterday…and so were able to see him one last time. </p>
<p>We were able to tell him goodbye. </p>
<p>It was obvious upon our arrival that he was slipping. He didn’t want company so we went away for a few hours and then returned, hoping to find him in different spirits. He was not. He looked up at each of us briefly and then dropped his gaze. Lori asked if he wanted to talk and he shook his head no. </p>
<p>It was clear that he preferred to be alone, as so many people do when they come to casting off the form that has served as the sole expression of Self for an entire lifetime. </p>
<p>I do not believe that he was afraid…or depressed…just that he had other business to attend to… and that dragging himself back to spend a few more minutes with us was a delay he could no longer abide. </p>
<p>He would pull up his shirt and make light clawing movements at his chest. </p>
<p>He wanted out…wanted to be free…was ready to be free. </p>
<p>And so now he is. </p>
<p>And now is the time, then, for us to think of him and celebrate his wonderful long life and rejoice for the freedom of his spirit. </p>
<p>I spoke last week about singing for him a couple of weeks ago. Here's that video.</p>
<p> </p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><iframe class="justify_inline" data-video-type="youtube" data-video-id="3QddtcbFYCY" data-video-thumb-url="https://img.youtube.com/vi/3QddtcbFYCY/mqdefault.jpg" type="text/html" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3QddtcbFYCY?rel=0&wmode=transparent&enablejsapi=1" frameborder="0" height="180" width="320" allowfullscreen="true"></iframe></p>
<p style="text-align: center;">copyright: Kimball Meyer, 2018</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/51401792018-03-21T12:58:35-07:002021-06-29T21:35:22-07:00Bing Crosby<p>Yesterday Lori and I went to Kelowna for our friend Lyle’s 99 birthday party. It was the second one he’s had since the weekend. For the first one, which was held on Sunday, he was treated to a belly dance from two nubile young ladies, friends, I think, of one of his grand-nieces although I’m not really certain about that. But certainly it was a great idea, however it came to pass…we watched the video…he was as charmed as he could be and no doubt deeply appreciative of the attention. </p>
<p>You may remember my blog of a few weeks back about Lyle and his struggle to make it to 100 so he could be recognized by the Queen…apparently she sends out congratulatory notes to centenarians as they come of age throughout the Commonwealth. </p>
<p>Remember the Commonwealth…as in the British Commonwealth? Does such a thing still exist I wonder. Am I still a British Subject? I remember being told in my elementary school days that I was indeed such a thing. All Canadians, I was told, were British Subjects, that the Queen of England was the Queen of Canada too… as well as of Australia and India and a collection of lands too numerous to mention, but upon which the sun never set. Yes…The Sun Never Sets Upon the British Empire…that was it…Empire…then Commonwealth…then…what? The English speaking chunk of the Eurozone? </p>
<p>No wonder they’re Brexiting. </p>
<p>Anyway, Lyle would have grown up a British Subject, and proud to be one too. He joined the Canadian army at age nineteen, right at the beginning of WW II to go fight for King and country, to be part of a great adventure, of something so much bigger than any life he had known on the dusty farm in Saskatchewan; although, to be sure, his family had done well during the dirty thirties. They had a some bottom land on which they dug irrigation ditches and were able to grow potatoes which were immediately purchased by the government. But they held back enough to feed any neighbours who were not lucky enough to have productive land during those bleak years. </p>
<p>He still likes to tell stories. You have to lean in a bit because he doesn’t have a lot of breath but it’s so worth the effort. I wish Lori and I had visited more often when he was still able to be chatty. He told us yesterday about how he had kept photographs and a personal historical record of his WWII experience. Apparently he was quite a photographer and had a very good camera and a passion for recording his life. But it was all lost in a flood caused by teenaged pranksters when he and his wife were away from home for a period. The kids broke into the basement of his house where all his photography stuff was kept and turned on the water and left. Neighbours noticed water coming out of the basement windows and were able to stop the flood but it was too late. All that history was ruined along with his camera. I guess he never had the heart to start over. </p>
<p>Lyle was born one day after my own father. My Dad has been gone for so long that it feels almost impossible that they could be the same age, but there it is. There’s no accounting for longevity really. Perhaps it’s largely genetic (Lyle’s sister is 92 and looks 72) but perhaps it has also to do with how much you like being in the world. Lyle still wants to walk again and I think probably still spends more time imagining life than death. He has bad days for sure but has, so far anyway, managed to slough them off and keep going. I doubt that I would be so tenacious were I in his position…I think I’d be asking for the ‘rubber hammer’ as the Dutch say. </p>
<p>Still, I look forward to the next visit. I’m sure there are infinite stories should he be in the mood. </p>
<p> I brought my guitar down last week and sang for him. He asked if I knew any Bing Crosby. </p>
<p>“I used to sing like Bing Crosby” he said.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/51278372018-03-14T09:29:20-07:002022-01-19T23:30:04-08:00Beware the Ides of March<p>The Ides of March. A very bad day for Julius Caesar… or so the story goes. Imperial blood on the tile, multiple knife holes in the royal toga, betrayal, disbelief, death. </p>
<p>Yup…sounds like March to me. Not that I necessarily identify with Juli C…we have, after all, but one thing in common… like Juli, I too have found March to be the most obnoxious of months…especially around the middle, when it is neither winter nor spring, when one day may be bathed in glorious warmth and sunshine only to be followed the next by a winter blast to make the teeth chatter and the tongue curse. </p>
<p>March is schizophrenic, bi-polar, multiple personality. </p>
<p>March madness…comes in like a lamb, goes out like a lion…or vice versa…either way it’s not to be trusted…could be the end of winter…or not. </p>
<p>March, bloody March. </p>
<p>When will this winter end? </p>
<p>Or will it end? </p>
<p>Or is this the year the planet tumbles ass over teakettle into a permanent Winter-World with some kind of cosmic malfunction creating an instant ice age? </p>
<p>Aagggh! </p>
<p>You get the point, right? </p>
<p>I’m sick of winter. </p>
<p>Beware the Ides of March indeed!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/51036652018-02-28T09:47:05-08:002018-03-01T22:01:33-08:00Here We Are Again<p>Well, here we are again, the end of another February. Winter lingers. More than lingers, it’s like the last drunk at the bar who won’t go home even though the chairs are being turned up on the tables and the vacuum is howling. </p>
<p>And, as anxious as I am for spring, I’m not nearly as anxious as my dearly beloved for whom each new snowfall is like a vice tightening on her sanity. I have learned that when it’s snowing and she is bemoaning the endlessness of winter, commiseration is the only acceptable response; it is unwise to mention any possible upside to this long, dark winter. </p>
<p>The fact is though, the isolation of a Canadian winter, the quiet of the snow blanket, the long nights, the icy freeze that prompts a desire to stay close to the fire, does indeed cause one to shift into a much more introspective space than the busy fun of summer will allow. Introspective and creative. </p>
<p>This winter has really exemplified that for both Lori and I. Each in our own way, we have had a very creative and productive winter. I have spent most days, aside from the shovelling and ice breaking, in my studio writing and recording and producing a bunch of new music. Lori has spent her days in her studio working on creating an online radio station which is now up and running and which provides her with the ability to do what she most wants to do which is to play her favourite music and talk about it. In fact, as I write this, she is broadcasting ‘live’ to her small but growing audience. </p>
<p>The cool thing is that when we are engaged in these labours of love we forget all about the world outside. We are absolutely present in our own little ‘happy land’, oblivious to the wind and the snow and the general madness ongoing outside of our cocoons. </p>
<p> And speaking of the madness… </p>
<p>I wonder, sometimes, if getting away from it, from the news feed, the slander and judgement, the opinions and spin, might not be the best thing I could do for my general health and well-being. The trouble is it’s an addiction of sorts, almost like Sunday football or Hockey Night in Canada. When it comes to world affairs I, like most other folks, have my favourite teams so, naturally, I’m interested in how they are doing in the day to day struggle for power and influence which may, or may not, eventually actually affect me. Sad to say it is all too often just another form of grizzly entertainment not unlike the Roman Circus in that most of us, it seems to me, end up cheering for the lions in whatever form they may appear. And in the general confusion, of course, there can be no consensus; one man’s lions are another man’s Christians. </p>
<p>But all that aside, and even though I long for shorts and tank tops, I have genuinely appreciated this winter and am pleased with what it’s chilly days have brought me.</p>
<p>And I understand it is unlikely that I will become an information hermit any time soon. Perhaps because, in my heart of hearts, I believe that all the world is just a game, or rather, a dream of a game that must ultimately be played to a draw, with no winners or losers; just a wake-up and a wondering, “What the hell was that all about?” </p>
<p>See what I mean about winter and introspection?</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/50914582018-02-21T10:26:49-08:002018-02-21T10:26:49-08:00Being There<p>The other evening, as I was putting the finishing touches on dinner and Lori was grazing through the tv menu, the unmistakeable sound of Deodato’s fabulously jazzy rendition of the Theme from 2001 burst into the room. ‘How great is this’, I thought, ‘one of my favourite movies of all time is just getting underway’ and on commercial-free TCM to boot. </p>
<p>The movie I’m speaking of is Being There, the final work of that great comedic actor Peter Sellers. If you have never seen this movie by all means seek it out. I won’t go into a detailed plot description except to say that it revolves around a mid-fifties man who has never been outside of the compound of a house in central Washington DC. His life's work has been to care for the gardens. He has encountered no humans save for ‘the Old Man’ and a black woman who was the single all-purpose servant. His name is ‘Chance’…Chance the Gardener. He watches tv and tends the garden…and nothing else. </p>
<p>The old man has just died, the house is being cleared out and Chance is put out on the winter streets of a now crumbling neighbourhood, dressed in gentleman’s clothing from the 1930’s…the old man’s. </p>
<p>Chance is an innocent, a babe in the woods, unaware of the worlds dangers and so he is completely unafraid. </p>
<p>As events unfold, he finds himself in the household of America’s wealthiest financier, who’s life is being sustained by his in-house hospital and the latest medical tech, and his much younger wife. </p>
<p>How Chance finds himself in that situation and how the rest of the movie unfolds all happens because of Chance’s utter lack of guile, complete honesty and absolute fearlessness…AND the strangely believable misperceptions of him by every other character. </p>
<p>Every time I watch this flick something new is revealed. The other night it was the idea that reality, as we think of it, is nothing much more than a projection of our own perceptions, of our own determination of what is real or true, and how those projections are contagious and thus affect the perceptions of everyone we encounter and so on and so on. </p>
<p>I admit it’s a bit difficult to wrap one’s head around that…the idea that we bring ‘reality’ to the world rather than the other way around… but the more you think about it and reflect on your own moment to moment state of mind, the more you must realize that your state of mind is absolutely your own creation. Whose else could it possibly be? No matter what happens, our reaction is completely at the mercy of our perception of the event, and as we all know, one person’s perception of the world and it’s happenings will invariably be at odds with another’s. </p>
<p>All perception is based on belief…on experience and learning and understanding yes…but those are the foundations of belief. </p>
<p>It is the belief in something…the faith in it’s truth or reality that allows for the creation of that very reality. </p>
<p>Yes? No? Maybe? </p>
<p>Well, it does help to explain the mad mad mad mad world on which we live, don’t ya think? </p>
<p>I mean, if we could all just agree, all the billions of us, on what is true…what is real…what has value… </p>
<p>Well…then we wouldn’t really need the world anymore would we? </p>
<p>Anyway, the movie is hilarious </p>
<p>Cheers!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/50792452018-02-14T10:36:36-08:002018-02-14T10:36:36-08:00Valentine's Day<p>I received two Valentine cards today. One from my number one Valentine, my dearest Lori, who has filled my life with love and fun and so much else. The other one came from an unexpected source…it came from my late mother. </p>
<p>My Mom passed away last February at age 89…or 92…or 86. No one really knows how old she actually was as her birth records were burned in a fire at the Hall of Records in Cambridge Massachusetts sometime in the 1930’s…or 1920’s…no one really knows about that either…and of course no one really cares. </p>
<p>The Valentine came by way of an email from my sister. She sent a video that two of my nieces had put together for Mom’s funeral, a kind of pictorial eulogy. The photos were chosen from the hundreds of pictures Mom had kept in her tall stack of albums, starting from her early teen years in Montreal right through to the end. There are no photos of her as a child. She was an orphan and was raised by an elderly widow who ran a small hotel in Cambridge. That hotel also went up in smoke and any childhood pictures with it. </p>
<p>But from those early days in Montreal, where she had gone with another escapee from a Boston convent after the death of her guardian, she happily posed for the camera, stylishly dressed in the garb of the early 40’s. That’s where the video starts, with solo shots of her taken by girlfriends. </p>
<p>She was just thirteen and had been in Montreal only a few months when she met my Dad, a Saskatchewan soldier on his way to war. Two weeks later they were married; shortly after that he shipped out. </p>
<p>A few months later she was to discover her true calling, her reason for being, her life’s work. She was to be a mother. The lonely days of her childhood were over; she was to become the founder and steadfast anchor for the great enterprise of her life… her family. </p>
<p>From the birth of my older brother on, the pictures almost always included her children. There would be six of us eventually. She bore a seventh but he died shortly after his birth so there are no photos…just a small baby-doll, still in it’s packaging with his name written on it, which I discovered in her ‘trunk of treasures’ years later. </p>
<p>So the pictorial journey through Mom’s life, as I viewed it this morning, is also a journey through my life and the lives of my siblings and everyone else in her family… and and a large family it has become. Grandchildren in the 70’s, and great-grandchildren in the 90’s. I can’t think of any great-greats yet, but surely it won’t be long. </p>
<p>This morning I was treated to a Valentine’s trip through an entire lifetime of love. There are grainy black and whites of a young girl posing in front of an ancient automobile, of a young woman sitting on a rugged porch wearing short-shorts that must have given the neighbours something to talk about, of the same young woman with a swollen belly standing in a field of tall grass. There are color photos of a mother decorating dozens of heart-shaped Valentine cookies, of a new grandmother holding her first grand-baby, of a mature woman in a huge hat holding a glass of wine and looking mischievously into the camera, and finally a little video of an ancient woman kissing a dog on the forehead and telling it “I love you”. </p>
<p>So I am feeling very full today…full of love and gratitude. </p>
<p>Thank you Lori, my beautiful wife, light of my life and eternal Valentine. </p>
<p>And thank you Mom for your Valentine, it is of course, a Valentine from us to you as well. </p>
<p>Valentine’s Day is all about love. </p>
<p>LOVE! </p>
<p>It’s what we write about, sing about, cry about and endlessly seek. </p>
<p>Love, ultimately, is the only thing in the world that has value. </p>
<p>Because ultimately, love is not of the world. </p>
<p>It is the definition of the eternal. </p>
<p>So…Here’s to Valentine’s Day.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/50673992018-02-07T13:28:33-08:002018-02-07T13:28:33-08:00SORE<p>I’ve been sore for a week. Sore, as in spasming lower back and aching between the shoulder blades. These symptoms are not new to me; I’ve had lots of muscle strains and skeletal misalignments over the course of my years of lugging things that were too heavy, like double sheets of gyp-rock, stacks of lumber, bags of cement and all things associated with renovating houses. Yes, there is more to me than just a wimpy musician living on sex and drugs and rock ’n roll…I have indeed lived a very physical life and revelled in my strength and fitness for the majority of it. I have never spent a night in a hospital (save for the time my young son broke his leg and I slept in a chair beside him) and have contracted no long term diseases. </p>
<p>So it is with great interest and occasional dismay that I now watch the inexorable slide from the speedy bounce-back that used to be, to the creep-back to an ‘almost as good as before’ status that is my new normal. </p>
<p>I spent Sunday propped up on the couch watching the Super-bowl with a heating pad alternating between lower and upper back and feeling totally inadequate as I watched Lori pour 40 lb. bags of pellets into the stove…normally my job (the upside being that I now know she’s stronger than she has let on). </p>
<p>Anyway, this went on for days and all because of the ***** snow. Yup…it was snow shovelling that did it. I know I know, shovelling snow is a big no-no for seniors…heart attacks and all that, but I’m careful not to over do it these days. If I get tired I rest, which is easy because it’s an excuse to just hang for a minute and take in the beauty of winter…all that thick fluffy on the roofs and trees, the silence that such a blanket lays on the world, the lung-fulls of fresh clean air…makes me feel good just thinking about it. </p>
<p>But there have been mountains of snow this winter so it wasn’t any single shovel-a-thon that did me in, it was the daily scoop and pitch. The irony, of course, is that we moved to the sunny, dry Okanagan to escape the harsh winter, to enjoy those February flowers (mythical in my experience) and to NOT HAVE TO SHOVEL *&^%$#@! SNOW! </p>
<p>On the other hand, I do still appreciate a good joke…even if it’s on me. </p>
<p>So, anyway, Lori can only shlep pellets and water for so long so on Monday she phoned a chiropractor on my behalf and I got a nice adjustment yesterday. Now, I’m not new to the world of chiropractic. In my reno days I was a regular customer and can attest to the relief gained by having my skeleton crunched back into place. I actually enjoy the sensation of my vertebrae popping…it’s way more satisfying than cracking your knuckles… and I did walk out of there nice and straight and without the sensation that my upper body was about to collapse into my pelvic girdle. Last night I slept long and well and hurt a whole lot less today. </p>
<p>Until just a minute ago. </p>
<p>You see, in order for me to set up for writing I have to shift my work space from recording mode to writing mode which entails moving my laptop from behind the drums to my desk…the one that has the nice yellow vinyl-covered regular old fashioned kitchen chair in front of it. Well, a couple of days ago, in order to accommodate my sore back, I had moved my nice yellow vinyl-covered kitchen chair into my recording space. At the same time I had moved my drummers throne in front of the desk in case I needed to sit there. Now some of the more high-end thrones have a back…my does not. </p>
<p>So there’s the set-up, which brings me to yet another annoying aspect of aging…absent-mindedness. </p>
<p>When I came into my studio today, intent on writing my weekly blog, I noticed that I had left unfinished the copying of some lyrics to a clean sheet of paper. Immediately I decide to finish that simple task before diving into my blog… so I reach down between my legs and grab the seat of what I thought was the yellow vinyl-covered old fashioned kitchen chair and pull it forward and drop my ass onto it. </p>
<p>Except it’s not the chair that greets my rear as it drops, it’s the drum throne…which is much smaller than the chair…and which I miss almost completely. I catch just enough of it to turn my fall into an angular back-flop, legs flailing upwards to knock my desk sideways sending my lamp crashing to the floor as my newly straightened spine regains its previous subluxations (I don’t actually know what that means but it’s a chiropractic term for fucked-up). </p>
<p>Oh well. As I sit here I don’t feel too much worse for the fall…just an increasing tenderness between the shoulders…and the awareness that it sometimes takes awhile for the pain to kick in. </p>
<p>I used to pride myself on my ability to take a fall… even did a few pratfalls in my theatre days…yes, on purpose. </p>
<p>I remember talking years ago to a radio jock who was quite famous in the 60’s; he was twenty years older than me and was bemoaning what he called ‘the graceless slide into decrepitude’. At the time I thought, ’Well, it doesn’t have to be graceless.’ Overall, I think I still believe that…then again…. </p>
<p>The chiro suggested that I book an appointment for next week just in case…so I did. </p>
<p>She must have a few older clients.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/50544132018-01-31T14:20:22-08:002018-01-31T14:20:22-08:00What's Up Today?<p>Let’s see now…what’s on my mind today? Hmmm…? </p>
<p>Nothing much really…I mean I did watch the Trumpster on tv last eve and I admit to being somewhat perplexed by the circus that the State of the Union address seems to have devolved to. It took me back to my childhood and the many Sunday mornings spent at St Josephs Catholic church in Dawson Creek; stand up, sit down, stand up, sit down. Of course at church we didn’t applaud…Jesus apparently does not require applause… and we did do a lot of kneeling in between all the standup-sitdowns. Which has left me wondering; will there be kneeling rails installed for next years SOTU if saint Donaldo is still hanging in? It seems to me that kneeling in supplication may be the only sycophantic symbol of adoration left for Republicans to turn to. For never have so many aging faces shone with the rapturous glory of gazing upon their dear leader as he enumerated the stunning achievements and countless victories of his first year of making America groan again; never before have they cheered so enthusiastically for the master as he clapped endlessly for his own banal bullshit, never before have the victims of heinous crimes been put on display as evidence of the evil nature of immigrants…in a nation of immigrants. </p>
<p>Ah well… </p>
<p>It’s all showbiz folks! </p>
<p>On the other side of the room the Dems sat stone faced except for the obligatory salute to the nation’s warriors and other randomly selected heroes. </p>
<p>So today it feels good to be a Canadian; to be a member of a small quiet society that does not generally get a lot of attention from America’s big boss man. That being said, we are having some issues over NAFTA because, apparently, the Don thinks we are much smarter than Americans and have scooped them on trade while quietly slipping under the protective cloak of their mighty military FOR FREE. </p>
<p>Tee hee hee…I think he’s right. </p>
<p>But really, I haven’t been thinking about all that at all today, at least not consciously. It’s often surprising to me what comes up when faced with a blank page. </p>
<p>So anyway, we’re back to me having nothing on my mind. Nothing on one’s mind is a much sought after state…just ask anyone who’s attempted to meditate. Perhaps I ought to suggest, as a new meditation technique, that one way to empty the head is to sit down in front of a blank page with an intention to write something. In the wee space between the intending and the movement of fingers there will be a space of utter emptiness, a recognizable emptiness, when every chattering monkey in the tree has it’s hands clamped tightly over it’s mouth. Aah…silence. But silence is not the mind’s natural state, in fact, it abhors a thought vacuum and will usually fill it instantly with the nearest piece of mental detritus it can grasp…in my case today, the great yankee clown. I apologize, but on the other hand, my blank page now has writing on it, which was my objective when I sat down. So…. </p>
<p>Or you could watch a stinkbug walking, like a fossil come to life, for an inch or two.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/50431052018-01-25T09:02:28-08:002018-01-25T09:02:28-08:00Ninety-nine<p>Lori and I went to Kelowna yesterday on the news that an old friend/distant relative of hers had taken ill and was in hospital. We had gotten word that it was serious and so we headed out first thing. </p>
<p>Hospitals are not one of my favourite places but neither do I find them dreadful or scary, and when someone is wounded or pitifully sick it seems like a good idea to be in one. </p>
<p>We arrived at about 10 in the morning. The five level parkade was completely full with half a dozen cars making their way up and down searching. As luck would have it, as we were making our turn around at the top, a young woman emerged from the elevator and proceeded to her car and we slipped into her spot just as the procession of ever circling space hunters once again rounded the last turn. As I slipped coins into the ticket machine a man beside us commented on how lucky we were to only be buying only one hours worth of parking…he was paying for six. I guess that’s why the lot was so full; many people visit for hours…and often do so on a daily basis. </p>
<p>We found Lyle sitting up on the side of his bed finishing some juice and taking a shot of oxygen with help from a young woman. He didn’t look great but then again Lyle is six weeks shy of his ninety-ninth birthday so, as he would say, just to look alive is to look great. The fact that he was sitting up and able to talk to us seemed a good sign indeed. You see, last time we saw him he had announced his longevity goal to be one hundred and five and so we are naturally pulling for him. He had told us that at age one hundred he would receive a note of congratulations from non other than the queen herself…unless of course, she croaked in the meantime, in which case a note from the king would have to suffice…he would prefer the queen though. </p>
<p>As we were chatting, a woman came in and introduced herself as his niece. She lives in Kelowna and has taken on being his ’go-to’ girl. She said she was planning a long visit so left us with him while she waited in the lounge. After a minute or two Lori excused herself and disappeared for twenty minutes or so. Lyle and I carried on. As it turns out his date of birth was a mere two weeks before my fathers. My father died in 1988 a few weeks shy of his sixty-ninth…younger than I am now…and he was a veteran of WW2 as was Lyle. I like to think that if my dad had lived to be Lyles age I would have gotten to know him better. </p>
<p>So we had a good chat. He asked me how I was holding up and recommended taking vitamin B-12 ‘because your kidneys stop producing it right around your age.’ He demonstrated how he still worked at getting his arms over his head, something he’d been having trouble with since this latest annoyance. ’They say it’s my heart’ he said, ‘But I’ve never had any heart problems…I don’t believe ‘em. Still and all, I can’t go home until I get my strength back. I just get so damn tired for no reason.’ </p>
<p>I suggested that being on the cusp of ninety-nine might have something to do with it. ‘Hmm, I suppose,’ he said with a smile. </p>
<p>Lori came back in and we stayed until it became obvious that he needed some rest. </p>
<p>On the way out she told me that she had gone out to get a full report on his condition from his niece. It was sad to hear. He has congestive heart failure. He won’t be going home again. He can go into a care facility when a space becomes available. Until then he’ll be in the geriatric wing of the hospital. He won’t like that. It is strange to think that just six months ago he took both cognitive and road tests in order to maintain his drivers licence…he passed. But now things have changed and this lovely man, so strong for so long, will decide just how much he really cares about congratulations from the queen. </p>
<p>We’ll be visiting again soon.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/50287082018-01-17T14:02:03-08:002018-01-25T08:59:51-08:00White<p>White. </p>
<p>That’s all I can see out my window. A wall of white from shoreline to sky, unbroken, no shades, no interruptions, no variation. A fog, thick and gloomy, obliterating the snow covered lake and the mountain across it and the sky above it. Blinded by the white. But it’s not really white at all. It’s a dull grey, cold and forbidding, daring me to go out and poke around in it, discover it’s secret, test it’s authority. </p>
<p>What if it goes on forever? What if I am to spend the rest of my life wandering in this omnipresent mist waiting and watching as things materialize mere feet in front of me allowing no time or space for reaction or avoidance? A bear, a wolf, a hole in the ice…terror…all of my senses are on high alert, listening and sniffing, praying for the breeze that never comes to blow it all away. </p>
<p>Then a sound, faint, distant but unmistakably human. I turn toward it, moving faster and faster until the sound becomes music and the music becomes laughter and the laughter becomes a party and I hear singing and the stomping of feet and the clinking of glasses and a murmur of romance and it’s all around me and I spin around and around racing back and forth in the fog but I can’t find it. I can’t find anything…or anyone. I stand there, sweaty from running, my chest heaving, my mind reeling as the sounds drift away, slowly, until silence once again reigns. </p>
<p>And then…and then… </p>
<p>And then I don’t know. But it was a fun little romp…kinda like writing a Twilight Zone episode…except for the hard part, which would be to resolve the mystery of my fog-world and fill another twenty pages…which I’m not into right now ‘cause this is my blog…which, to be sure, is free form so I can do anything I want but I have a feeling that doing any actual writing would require long periods of sitting and waiting for input from ‘who-knows-where’ and I’m having way to much fun recording and playing around with a new song to get into that space. So…someday maybe. </p>
<p>Still, there are a few places to go from that opening scene. I could shift around and talk about how it may be that most of us live in a Fog-world right now but aren’t aware of it. I mean terrifying things do pop up without warning on a regular basis. And quite often we don’t actually see the party we’re attending because our minds are are too busy sniffing and listening for warning signs of the impending disasters we imagine await us. </p>
<p>Or, let me see, what else? It could always just be a nightmare but that’s such an easy device…unless, of course, one were to wake up to a world even more terrifying than Fog-world. Now that would be true Twilight Zone. </p>
<p>Speaking of which…are you watching the Black Mirror series on Netflix? T’is a worthy successor to TZ. Every episode is a stand alone piece, all set in a relatively near future and centred on technologies which we all know are on the verge of existence…if they aren’t already here. Check it out. </p>
<p>Got to run. It’s 2 o’clock and I want to get in some work on the bass part on my new song before I have to knock off to make dinner(I’m no bass player…that’s for sure). I’ve constructed a simple line but my sloppy fingers have left me with some patching to do. </p>
<p>I miss David…he was the real deal.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/50059752018-01-03T19:51:53-08:002018-01-03T19:51:53-08:00Here We Go Again<p>Well here we go again; another new year takes its first infant steps. Nothing better than a fresh start eh? OK…maybe not so fresh but still, there is always a feeling of renewal that comes with every new year, don’t you think?… a reboot of our battered hopes that humankind will wise up fast enough to counter the onslaught of the utter freaking madness that fear on a rampage spawns. </p>
<p>Then, on the other hand, the rich are gettin’ richer, so what’s the problem? </p>
<p>Well, the poor are gettin’ poorer, that’s what… and the middle class is stressed to the max, acutely aware that most do not have enough cash to carry them for two weeks should an income dry up. And political life in the worlds most powerful, and therefore most dangerous, nation has degenerated to theatre of the absurd…no, not absurd…insane! </p>
<p>It all makes a highly volatile concoction set to explode should a couple of raging assholes rub too hard and make a spark. </p>
<p>When there is fear in the air people get afraid and they act and react as if they are fighting for their lives. Fear lashes out. It attacks blindly, cruelly, carelessly and stupidly. Bad things happen. </p>
<p>But on the other hand… </p>
<p>it seems to me that there is another more powerful energy extending itself in the world. Suddenly we have this new ability to share our stories, our hearts and our knowledge, to participate in everything. Our new tech is facilitating a great coming together of people from random tribes all over the world. </p>
<p>Minds are changing, hearts are opening, an awareness that new rules are in order is blossoming. New rules that allow for actual freedom, not enslavement to the dead idea that those who have for so long held the wealth of the world somehow have earned the right to absolute power. </p>
<p>We are beginning to imagine that we really are the creators of our experience… and that ultimately no experience is greater or lesser than another…that we are, indeed, each other and all others and thus there is no ‘other’. </p>
<p>A bit much to wrap ones head around without some serious contemplation…but hey, it sure feels good. </p>
<p>The world is a den of thieves and night is falling. </p>
<p>Get out your flashlights. </p>
<p>and Happy New Year!!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/49868812017-12-20T15:39:45-08:002017-12-21T20:53:42-08:00Winter<p>Woke up this morning to a chilly house. The pellet stove was burning on low as it has been for a month now but one look out the window told me that it would be running a lot higher for the next while. </p>
<p>Winter has landed. </p>
<p>As I write this I’m looking out at the waves, blown to a good roll by a stiff nor-easter. A wet snow has smothered my two deck chairs and by evening I expect they’ll be buried in six or seven inches of fluffy white. This storm is supposed to last all day. It’s getting colder too. My weather app tells me not to bother wishing for a melt in the foreseeable future, daily highs will stay below freezing until the new year. </p>
<p>Sigh! </p>
<p>As you must know by now, I’m just not a winter guy. Sure, when I was a kid in Dawson Creek I was all about winter. I had to be, we all had to be, winter was the longest season, and there was no tv. Hard to imagine a time before tv, but the flickering screen didn’t come to Dawson until I was nine years old. From my perspective now, I’m so glad to have lived my formative years tv free. But it was a loooong winter; we would go ‘trick-or-treating’ in foot deep snow and would not see the mud again until late April. </p>
<p>I was a pretty good skater and loved to shoot a puck around. The gravel road in front of our house was usually so snow packed that lightweights like us kids could skate on it, which was definitely rough on the skate blades. So much so that one winter Dad flooded the backyard into an actual rink. Now that was cool. It attracted so many kids that actual hockey teams could be formed. </p>
<p>We also had, of course, sleds and toboggans and pieces of cardboard and old inner tubes with which to brave the steep hill that doubled as the Soap Box Derby track in summer and ran down right to the creek itself. There were a few spots where, if you aimed your craft just right, you could hit an embankment and and catch an exhilarating instant of air before landing on the iced-over creek. On occasion the creek ice would be thin and it would give way and some unlucky rider would be treated to a splashdown and a wet ass. Fortunately the creek was no more than a foot deep so the penalty for bad timing was nothing much more than having to go home to change your pants or, if you were having just too much fun, it was possible to ignore the stiffness and carry on. But it’s a long walk home when your pants are stiff as a board and crunch at the knee with every step. </p>
<p>Certainly we were no strangers to frozen body parts. Fingers, cheeks, toes and noses were regularly brought home for thawing over the heat vents in our old house. The pain of thawing toes I will never forget, the heat was comforting on the one hand but hurt like hell on the other. Yet, in spite of knowing what awaited us, we could never bring ourselves to give up the game and head inside. I don’t think we even felt our feet until the skates or boots came off and then it was too late, a rush of pain would sweep through your tender tootsies… nothing to do but sit on the floor with feet stretched out over the heat register and moan. If we were particularly pathetic, Mom would kneel down beside us and give brisk foot massages to help get the blood moving. We would then limp to the supper table, eat our hamburger with cream corn and mashed potatoes, then bundle up and go out again. How strange and wonderful was life before tv. </p>
<p>I survived eleven Dawson Creek winters, going to school before sunrise and returning just as the northern night settled in. Then the family moved to Calgary. I had imagined that heading south for seven hours would result in a balmy winter…ah the innocence of youth. But…there was tv and not just the one crummy channel we had in DC that came on at three in the afternoon with sucky CBC kid shows. No indeed. I was in the big city and we had two channels which were both up and running by the time we got home for lunch…Lipton’s chicken noodle soup and white bread slurped while mesmerized by ancient movie serials like Hop-a-long Cassidy and Roy Rogers. </p>
<p>Oh sure, there where still toboggans and skates but not so much; tv gets to be a habit. </p>
<p>So maybe I’ve done my share of winter after all…and I know that the secret to loving winter is no secret at all, you simply have to go out and PLAY in it. </p>
<p>And, to be honest, there is no comfort quite as exquisite as a settling back with a drink in front of a blazing wood stove after a winter’s day outdoors. </p>
<p>Nothing like the silence and mystery of a full moonlit snow-covered night in the Ontario woods. </p>
<p>Hmmm? </p>
<p>So maybe I am a winter guy after all…and in fact, later this very day I will be hunkering down with a hot drink in front of a blazing pellet stove…watching tv </p>
<p>after having shovelled the driveway, the landing and thirty-one steps. </p>
<p>Well…at least I won’t freeze my toes. </p>
<p>OK…the snow is already two inches deep on the deck chairs</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/49532702017-11-28T16:34:48-08:002017-12-02T16:27:52-08:00Rooms<p>Rooms. </p>
<p>How many rooms have I worked in, lived in, stayed in? Thousands is my guess. If you take a decade on the road at two hundred nights away per year that’s 2000 hotel rooms, give or take a few hundred, and that’s only one decade. That’s my story. But there are many people, so I’m told, that remember every single room they’ve ever lived in, or at least every house. Either they have exceptional memories or they haven’t moved much, as in from house to house…room to room, town to city to bigger city and back. </p>
<p>The rooms of childhood I can feel still ; the rickety walkway to the back door, which I think was the only door we used. That’s the first house I remember, standing with my chin level to the seat of the kitchen chair, tasting some buttery substance I found on a spoon on the floor. I can see it in front of me, hair and dust and god-knows-what, I remember it was wretched, I remember crying. </p>
<p>The living room was dark brown linoleum., shining under the gaily wrapped gifts covering it on Christmas morning…and my Mother’s shimmering red house coat, her kimono she called it. And I remember standing looking out the screen door with my mother, a summer rain and the smell of the old wood pile, damp and organic. </p>
<p>I remember playing in the backyard when angry voices drew my attention to the screen door just in time to see a salesman come exploding out of it, my Dad’s right hand launching him from the collar. Mom never had the heart to turn them away…Dad, on the other hand, thoroughly enjoyed bouncing them out the door. </p>
<p>Yeah, rooms. </p>
<p>I’ve seen a lot of them. </p>
<p>I seem to have been on the move most of my life. That little four room house gave way to The Pink House when I was five, I think. It was no larger, just a different shaped space… square, and instead of offering indoor plumbing it offered an outhouse and a rain barrel. That living room floor leaves a reddish hue in my memory, maybe paint, maybe old linoleum; it was partitioned with a curtain to form separate sleeping quarters for me and my two brothers. My Dad fashioned an indoor potty in the only closet, which was in my parents bedroom. There where piss-pots under the beds in the kids room. </p>
<p>She had him paint it Pink, the house that is, (I capitalize because that’s the shade of pink it was), a bright hot Pink…with white gables. It was on a huge corner lot next to Dr. Watson’s house. </p>
<p>One more move in Dawson Creek, more rooms, three upstairs. To the left were two sets of bunk-beds, all occupied, to the right Lil’ Albert, now a teenager, finally got his own room… and in the middle was an actual play room. The living room was dark blue paint, more dark brown linoleum, Mom still wearing the same satiny red kimono. The kitchen walls were bright yellow masonite panels of fake tiles, the four burner gas stove had an oven. My mother’s quarter-pound christmas doughnut was conceived and brought forth from that very stove; my parents still kissed in front of us. We lived there until I was twelve.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/49434412017-11-21T16:33:11-08:002017-11-21T16:36:26-08:00Not So You'd Notice<p>OK, so here’s how it went down with The Phone Co. </p>
<p>(If you haven’t read last weeks blog you’ll need to if you want to keep up) </p>
<p>I can report today, much to my relief really, that no sculduggery was happening with TPC…well,hardly any. </p>
<p>What I found was that, other than the cash that I may (or may not) put down on the phone when I upgrade, I don’t pay anything for it. Nothing, Nada. Basically, what’s going on here is that TPC makes so much money on my monthly service fee that they can afford to give me a $500.00 iPhone for just two years worth of my business. So… I don’t get a reduction in my bill when my phone is paid for because I was never paying for it in the first place. It’s a gift from Big Daddy Telus for the pleasure of my company for another couple of years. </p>
<p>Let’s dance. </p>
<p>Admittedly there’s a little vigorish there for TPC if I don’t immediately roll over for a new model on the expiration of my contract but, as was so elegantly stated in ’The Grifters’, not so you’d notice. </p>
<p>It seems, however, that I am not the only customer to have inquired about this mildly murky practice. </p>
<p>A new plan has just been introduced (so says the ever-so-pleasant female voice that’s been laying out for me just exactly how the dippsy-doodle does work) to satisfy those of us feeling somewhat misled. It’s for people who wish to continue using their antiquated technology, for those of us who tend to become personally attached to expensive devices that are paid for but still work, indeed, for all of us who want to use our old phones until they completely crap out. Old Phonies, that’s what we are. </p>
<p>Anyway, the plan is called BYOP…Bring Your Own (or old) Phone. The idea is that, if you raise a fuss, they’ll give you a discount on your rate of from 5 to 25 dollars. The $25 is only for those who have ‘premium’ contracts. </p>
<p> I could have saved $5. </p>
<p>Still, over a year and a half, that’s ninety bucks. </p>
<p>But what’s a man to do? You see I have three phones on my bill, all expiring at different times. Do I shell out or sell out? </p>
<p>…aww shit! </p>
<p>I wish I’d never asked. </p>
<p>It’s not that I feel ripped off…I’ve been gently torn that’s all. </p>
<p>A little here, a little there…not so you’d notice. </p>
<p>T</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/49327972017-11-14T16:50:00-08:002017-11-14T16:57:23-08:00Phone Pholly<p>So, I just got a new phone. The battery on my three and a half year old iPhone 5C was discharging all too quickly so I went into a phone kiosk to see about getting a new battery. 'Sure,' said the young man, 'but it’s not worth it. The battery will cost you about $200 so you may as well just get a new phone, you're eligible for an upgrade.'</p>
<p>Hmmm…well then…an upgrade it is; the ultimate cost to me being nothing more than a $5.00 increase in my monthly bill, no upfront cash, no nothing but a new iphone SE and five more little dollars a month to the phone co. 'So my $55 a month plan goes to $60 and I get a nice new phone...that's it?' </p>
<p>Hmmm? Curious George that I am, I ask what the life expectancy of the iPhone, or smart phones in general, is. He says, ‘These days it’s a year and a half to two years.’ ‘Wow…then I got a pretty good run out of my old phone.' ‘Yeah, they're just like cars, sometimes you get a really good one that lasts a long time, but mostly not.’</p>
<p>Okay…So every two years on average I can expect to have to upgrade my phone. Strangely enough, that’s the exact amount of time it will take me to pay it off. Which reminds me, I also learned today that the price I pay includes the cost of my phone EVEN AFTER MY PHONE HAS BEEN COMPLETELY PAID OFF…unless I notify my service provider. Really? If such a practice is not illegal it is at the very least sleazy. I’m going to check this out later (I have to post this blog soon… so tomorrow) and if it turns out that they’ve been billing me for a phone I finished paying for a year and a half ago I intend to make a fuss…or at least tell you about it…or call up Marketplace…or Justin Trudeau…or… </p>
<p>Shit </p>
<p>So, the phone co raises my rate every two years to the tune of 7-8% on the pretext that my old plan no longer exists, and hooks me into a two year contract to boot.</p>
<p>Jeez!</p>
<p>And I went for it! </p>
<p>Well, I have fifteen days to return the phone and switch servers OR I can call the bastards and whine about the sleaziness of their business model and get my rate slashed, maybe even get some free movie tickets ...with a popcorn voucher. </p>
<p> Hmmm?</p>
<p> </p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/49236392017-11-07T19:09:22-08:002017-11-07T19:09:22-08:00The Great Gestalt<p>I’ve just read a few highlights from an interview with Ray Kurzweil. Ray is a guy about my age who’s been one of the leading lights in computer technology from the very beginning, he worked on the very first multi-million dollar, size-of-a-house computer ever built. In his book, ‘The Singularity Is Near,’ he lays out his observation that the rate of development of todays technologies has passed the knee of the Bell Curve and is heading straight up at an ever-accelerating clip. This seems to me indisputable even though there are still some scientists who have not jumped on the hyper-speed bandwagon. </p>
<p>I remember seeing a robotics expert on tv only 6 or 7 years ago saying that humanoid robots were no less than 50-100 years away from becoming a part of everyday life. Well, this very day, at some hotel in Tokyo, a humanoid robot is functioning in the role of concierge; smiling with a supple face and making polite conversation…and…she’s learning on the job. Indeed, AI (artificial intelligence for you tech cretins) is becoming exactly that…intelligent. </p>
<p>So, back to Ray…the subject of this interview is the role technology is playing in extending life. He predicts (and he has made many accurate predictions over the years) that what he calls ‘longevity escape velocity’ (the point at which, for every year that you’re alive, science is able to extend your life for more than a year) is only 10 to 12 years in the future for the average citizen. Nanobots (little tiny-wee robots) will cruise through your body taking care of all the things your failing immune systems can no longer do, such as repairing tissue and regenerating diseased organs, sharpening up your brain and spicing up your sex life. </p>
<p>Woo-hoo! </p>
<p>Given all of this it is easy to believe that technology is, in fact, replete with nanobots and AI, about to invade our very own minds, or at least what we think of as ‘mind’…our thinking process, from random monkey-mind chatter to brilliant flashes of insight…all being informed and/or influenced by an external hard-drive…living, not on Cloud Nine, but in it. </p>
<p>Just imagine it. In the future one of our big tech security issues will be ‘mind-hacking’…“Don’t believe a word I say, man. My mind has been hacked…I’m not sure who’s in control.” Aagghh! </p>
<p>Well, that’s the dark side. </p>
<p>On the other hand, we would all have perfect memory, and be able to access endless information just by asking a mental question. And we would all be ‘linked’…we would all know each other. We would become ‘Humanity’, a single entity, a great gestalt ( a unified whole having specific properties that cannot be derived from the summation of it’s parts). </p>
<p>This would solve a lot of problems would it not? Just think, if we all really knew each other, had access to each others thoughts and feelings, we would love each other. We would be incapable of attacking in any way simply because we would immediately recognize that ‘the best solution for all concerned’ is, in fact, the only thing that would actually work to keep us all happily trucking along through this brave new peaceful world. </p>
<p>Heaven…Utopia. </p>
<p>Could it be possible that we could create that? </p>
<p>Maybe. </p>
<p>But we’d all have to want it… </p>
<p>And there’s the rub</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/49140162017-10-31T16:41:24-07:002017-10-31T16:41:24-07:00Top Dollar<p>Looks like we’re standing, yet again, on the cusp of winter. So soon. Remember when summers lasted so long that you were anxious to get back to school? Ah but we were all in a hurry to grow up, weren’t we? </p>
<p>Living in a cabin on the lake seems to be irresistibly conducive to such reflexion. Must be ‘cause I do a lot of it. It’s a luxury, I know, and I do appreciate that my wandering has brought me to such a situation. It’s a mystery to me but what the hell. I do love to look out and watch the ever-changing mountain-side across the lake. Today is overcast with intermittent showers so there are no shadows on the hillside. It’s a grassy hillside, or mountainside depending on ones notion of what constitutes a mountain. I mean, to a Saskatchewan native it would undoubtedly be seen as a mountain but to a Calgarian, with a view of the snow capped Rockies from her kitchen window, it would doubtless be called a hill. </p>
<p>It rises at about forty-five degrees out of the lake for seven or eight hundred feet. There is a flat shelf directly across from me where cattle and horses can be seen grazing peacefully, an occasional bellow from a moody cow echoing across the water. All very, very rural. </p>
<p>There’s been talk of another exceptionally cold winter. A woman who works with forest fire rescue told me that the scientists working with BC Fire expect heavy snowfall this winter and another flood in the spring. I think there must be some substance to that notion because the lake level is lower now that I have ever seen it and it’s still dropping, which means the water-gate keepers to the south of us are hedging their bets and letting the lakes drain longer in order to accommodate the spring runoff...which seems like a good idea on the face of it but which also means that my waterline, and likely many others, may be exposed to freezing because the protective water will be too shallow. Bummer! </p>
<p>So what I have to do then, as the water recedes, is to get out my shovel and dig the line deeper into the ground. I know what to do, but am not at all enthusiastic about the prospect of actually doing it; digging a trough into the sloppy, cold, rocky mud is simply not something I can visualize as being an adventure anymore. I used to get a real buzz from conquering natural resistance…man vs nature…sweating in the cold from ultra-exertion…triumphantly returning to a fire and a mug as the early darkness settles over the land…all that jazz. But things have changed. I’m just not up for it anymore. But…we can’t just let the water-line freeze up can we? No water no toilet flush, no shower, no laundry, no nothin'…just a very unhappy woman wondering why she didn’t marry somebody her own age. </p>
<p>So…I need to hire a shlepper. You know? Some young dude who will dig,dig,dig while I regale him with stories from my rock ’n roll life (with little aside admonitions not to drive the pick through the water line). Yes, it looks like I’ve come to that place in my life when the socially responsible thing to do is pay somebody else to do the actual work. Lots of people do that, or so I’ve been told. I’ve always been a do-it-yourself kinda guy but ’tis time indeed to gracefully surrender the things of youth…or middle-age even. So, tomorrow I shall begin my quest to find a willing shlep. I’ll pay top dollar…whatever that is???</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/49047862017-10-24T13:42:01-07:002020-08-20T02:59:34-07:00I Like To Watch <p> </p>
<p>(This blog was written on October 9th but I forgot to post it.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I did something yesterday that I haven’t done in years…I spent the whole day watching tv. </p>
<p>I awoke in a funk, a leftover dream perhaps, an unsettled feeling, like a slight nausea wafting around the kitchen. Lori was getting ready to drive to Banff to spend a few days with her daughter. I got coffee and settled in to CBS Sunday Morning; it was 6:00 am. </p>
<p>Sunday Morning is an arts and letters show and not at all a bad thing for a man in a funk…but it only lasts for ninety minutes…and then comes what is usually my single weekly indulgence in news saturation…my thigh-slapping, tooth-gnashing rehash of the weeks best trump antics…or trumpantics. </p>
<p>(trum pan' tix): noun: bizarre, or unintelligible behaviour by an American president. </p>
<p>Yesterday morning, however, the screen was full of images of screaming people running for cover, of guns scattered on a hotel room floor, of talking heads describing what happened or opining on what would or would not be done re the Las Vegas horror of the previous weekend. </p>
<p>Aagggh…not great for a guy in a funk...but habits die hard. </p>
<p>Lori was leaving so I helped her load out, kissed her goodbye and continued to consume the grim rehash without even a handful of trumpantics for levity.</p>
<p>As per my habit, I hung in to the bitter end wrapping up my Sunday news-fest with Fareed Zakaria on CNN…still in funk…an even funkier funk than the before funk, thanks to my greedy intake of pain and suffering. </p>
<p>I had planned to spend part of the day writing this blog but couldn’t even think about it…couldn’t get myself going at all. </p>
<p>'So fuck it!' I say, 'I’m just going to have a toke and watch football! '</p>
<p>So I did…all day. </p>
<p>I grazed from game to game looking for the close ones and marvelling at the magnificent physical specimens so enthusiastically pulverizing each other for the edification of the eighty-thousand or so cheering football freaks present in each and every gigantic American stadium…and the millions of other me’s lounging in front of tv screens all over the continent. Even when I moved away from the tv to get some lunch the sound of Sunday Afternoon Football filled the house...a comforting sound...carefree...an autumn sound on a gorgeous autumn day. </p>
<p>Sometime around mid-afternoon I went outside, took a big lungful of crisp, fresh air, looked out over the lake and realized that I was at ease...the funk had flown somewhere in the middle of the second half of game one. All this lead me to conclude that watching football is much better for ones mental health than watching the news. Well goody goody! So I got a glass of wine, a tray of cheese and crackers and settled in to game two. There was an hour break after that one which I filled with '60 Minutes' and then returned to the Sunday Night game. Whew! That's a lot of punts, passes and penalties...not to mention a dozen or so car commercials and a stream of grim warnings about obnoxious viruses that might be lurking in my aging bloodstream. </p>
<p>But football wasn’t the end of it. I was feeling somewhat punchy but had a hankering for some popcorn so I made some and put on a movie which I struggled to stay awake for (but I do have a vague recollection of an unsatisfactory ending). </p>
<p>And that wrapped it…my marathon tv day. </p>
<p>I had made it…I had done it…I had watched at least fifteen solid hours of tv. </p>
<p>Whew! </p>
<p>Men do such weird things when left home alone all day.</p>
<p>I’ll have to tell Lori... </p>
<p>or maybe not.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/48837992017-10-09T12:19:09-07:002017-10-09T12:19:09-07:00Refections on a Hard Week<p>It’s been a hard week. Well, ‘hard’ is not an adequate descriptor. It’s been a soul-searing, heartbreaking, depressing week. None of it of my own doing. </p>
<p>Or perhaps it’s all my own doing… not that I feel responsible for the madness of the world (other than my own little corner of it) but I do realize that I could tune out…I could turn off my devices and simply BE in my own personal NOW where there is no murder, no fear and no Donald Trump…where there is love and kindness, simple chores and natural beauty. </p>
<p>But instead of opting for sanity and stillness, I bite on that addictive racket-of-a-reality-show known as the NEWS, that endless parade of tragedy and stupidity, of hopeless opinion and dark projections. I willingly enter this arena where I know the emperor is sitting, grinning, with his thumb in the air, listening intently for cheers from his hapless, pissed-off, hell-bent followers before gleefully turning his chubby digit down on yet another bit of American social progress. </p>
<p>So, it is in that regard that I accept responsibility for my own state of mind. </p>
<p>I must say it takes weeks for me to recover from some of the bloody horrors I subject myself to; last Sunday’s Las Vegas murders being this week’s challenge. I have by now, to my credit, at least enabled my thumb to quickly move along when I graze by yet more ‘discussion’ by endlessly baffled talking heads about what America is to do about itself. I can’t help…I know it, and like countless people the world over I must watch in despair as the lights of the ‘Shining City on the Hill’ go dim and flicker. </p>
<p>Free, fun loving, fabulous America, refuge for the oppressed, safe haven for those who would stand up to injustice, peaceful, generous, powerful, reliable, sane America is flirting with becoming a global nightmare; a powerful, dangerous, unpredictable, bully nation capable of extreme reaction to perceived slights, a nation capable of suppression of the press and the manufacture of a completely false world view, a dysfunctional dystopia where mass murder is accepted as ‘the price of freedom’. </p>
<p>And I guess that’s why I watch…why we all watch… in spite of the fact that devoting time to this ‘watching’ diminishes the quality of our lives, disrupts our sleep and brings forth a cynicism about the durability of the democratic notion itself. </p>
<p>And yet we all must realize that we are living and watching a historical battle for the very idea of a free society… and as America goes, so go the rest of us. </p>
<p>Heavy…yes? </p>
<p>Now for the good news. I have found an antidote to the cynical view that The US is doomed. Just a week or so ago, after noting it’s many Emmy nominations, Lori and I decided to have a look a tv show called ‘This Is Us’. It’s appeal is that it paints a completely believable picture of what is still daily life for the majority of Americans. The show is about the common yet intense and fascinating drama that is the daily experience of the many kind and loving people that fill up the houses all over the United States… American people. </p>
<p>This Is Us states it’s case in the shows title and I am either naive enough or faithful enough to believe it to be a true statement. I believe that the vast majority of Americans live quiet, decent lives and want to keep it that way. </p>
<p>The show is simply about real people and their struggles and triumphs. So far there have been no killings and no guns, no secret agents or super-heroes, no lionized police, doctors, lawyers or politicians. The heroes are Just Us. </p>
<p>This show has brought home to me the recognition that every life, no matter how nondescript or seemingly unimportant, is brilliantly written, directed and acted out by the very minds that experience it. It is helpful to consider then, that the power in each individual mind to effect it’s own circumstance, must be extrapolated to the general well-being of the world. </p>
<p>Perhaps this new take on Americans is just escapism and the horror show will eventually darken all of these lives…but maybe not. We all know that light will always displace darkness…darkness being nothing more than the absence of light. </p>
<p>Perhaps humanity is at the critical stage of it’s re-birth…and let’s face it, making the process as painful and messy as possible is only human…and peculiarly American.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/48749782017-10-03T06:56:34-07:002022-03-10T22:20:30-08:00Confucius Say<p>The last week and a half has been tough. The KBG is in crisis. We’re having to re-examine our way of being. David Knight has had to return to the daytime working world. That deprives me of a writer/producer partner that I can work with in person during the day. It will also cut deeply into opportunities to rehearse as weeknights are now out of the question. And yet we all want to keep it alive. </p>
<p>I’m the only member of KBG that is able to make a living as a musician. I’m by no means the best player in the band…we are all just damned good…but I make a living at it. Then again, if they all had gigs like me we would hardly ever get together because we’d all have different travel schedules. ’Tis what it is. </p>
<p>Damn. </p>
<p>So…I’ll be setting up my drums in my studio and making tracks to send to Dave. It’ll be an interesting experiment at worst and a workable second option at best. When David and I lay down tracks we play them together and without time reference (click track). We won’t be able to do that so the feeling and feeding off each other will be reduced to just one feeding off the other….me laying down a drum track and building a version of the song where I play guitar, drums and sing, and Dave adding guitars etc. to that. This technique is common enough, much of modern music is perfectly metered so there are no fluctuations in the groove, but playing with other people, in the same room, without a click, with fluctuations, that’s what I want. </p>
<p>Anyway, the disappointment is still showing I know. The other side of all this is that David and I have both realized how much this thing means to us, and I say ‘Dave and I’ because we are the guys who birthed the band but Bob and Murray are still in too. </p>
<p>But it’s set my mind to wondering what I can do. I can keep the website alive and keep doing all the social media stuff…probably more even. I can keep writing songs… or writing whatever. </p>
<p>Just the week before the shit hit the fan I posted a Quote from Confucius …’Doesn’t matter how slow you go. Just don’t stop.’ </p>
<p>That says it all.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/48542702017-09-17T15:44:07-07:002017-09-19T16:16:25-07:00A Special Day<p> </p>
<p>Today is special…it’s our wedding anniversary, Lori and I…it’s a significant one too…one year. We’re taking an overnight getaway on Saturday to a hotel in the mountains where we stayed years ago on our first travel adventure. We had only known each other for three months and lived in cities seven hours apart as the wheels turn, so we had really only spent a dozen or so days together all tolled. Passionate days they were but we were still a long way from understanding each other; we had really not even begun delving into the depths. </p>
<p>We took a road trip through southern British Columbia, starting in Nakusp and moving though the Okanagan. We did the wineries, drank the wine, swam in the warmest lake in Canada, lay freezing in a blanket watching an all Canadian film festival on the beach at Penticton. We explored and drove and talked and made love, finally wrapping up our romantic adventure at Three Valley Gap before heading back to the prairie. It was there she learned that I could still hang upside down from the monkey bars and I saw that she could still swing higher than any fully grown woman of sound mind ought to do. It was wonderful trip. </p>
<p>And yet, as we said our goodbyes in Calgary (she was heading home to Moose Jaw), I had the feeling that I might not see her again. She told me later that, on her drive home, she heard a little voice in her head say, ‘Move on,’ and she too imagined I was just a passing fancy and we might not connect again. </p>
<p>Well…. so much for little voices and ‘maybe not thoughts’…here we are eleven years later…we’ve been married one whole year and I’m looking forward to our return to Three Valley Gap with a sense of delight and desire that is incredibly and intensely greater than that first trip. </p>
<p>We have, by now, plumbed the depths of each others psyches and souls; we’ve ridden out some severe storms and survived roads rough enough to shake the crap out of any relationship lacking that undefinable ‘somethng’ that just won’t let you quit. </p>
<p>We’ve been eleven years together, one of them as a married couple, and it must be said that it has been the best year of all. Something about the quality of the marriage commitment makes a lot of points of friction redundant; it no longer serves any purpose to not accept what is. Ya had yer chance brother/sister…what ya see is what ya get… or got. The secret is that if you look with a loving eye, you’re sure to like what you see. You forgive generously, or better yet, don’t take offence in the first place. And if things do get tense from time to time, give a little space…’cause everybody knows that the best part of breakin’ up is when you’re makin’ up. </p>
<p>Love, of course, is the bottom line, the reason for everything. I am so grateful for the mysterious twists and turns that have brought me and my love here to this first anniversary… and more than ever, I sure like what I see.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/48435392017-09-09T08:30:40-07:002017-09-12T17:53:58-07:00Brothers in Arms <p>Aug 3, 2017 </p>
<p>I heard the news last night that Skip Prokop, drummer and sometimes vocalist for the band Lighthouse, had died. That’s two Canadian musical stalwarts gone in the past couple of months, Skip and Kenny Shields, Skip was 74 and Kenny just 69. </p>
<p>It’s that time of life. My peers are disappearing. Last year it was many icons of my teens and now it’s people I have, at very least, shaken hands with and in Skip’s case, spent some time out on the road with. About a dozen years ago Stampeders and Lighthouse co-billed a tour of Ontario casinos. That gave us the chance to get to know the musicians we had, for so very long, viewed primarily as competition. </p>
<p>That’s how it was in the 70’s; Stampeders, Lighthouse and April Wine all touring nationally for the great Montreal promoter Donald k Donald. </p>
<p>Common to the three bands was Donald’s ‘man on the road’, Keith Brown, known to us at the time as ‘Reckless Eddy’. Keith was a man of many talents. As well as being in charge of counting the cash and dividing up the spoils, he could also fill in as opening act if circumstances required. He played guitar and sang and billed himself as, you guessed it, Reckless Eddy. </p>
<p>Keith knew better than anyone what made these bands tick and had personal relationships with literally all the players. I retrospect, he must have also been a great diplomat because he was grilled endlessly, by all of us I’m sure, for inside dope on the competition. We wanted to know where we stood in the hierarchy of bands…who was making the most money…who was an asshole and who wasn’t …what did so-and-so’s rider demand…etc. He gave away just enough to shut us up but never enough to incriminate anyone, especially himself, then he would roll a fresh joint and pass it around. </p>
<p>We were out on the road with him just after the April Wine tour got busted for marijuana in Kirkland Lake, which was no small deal back then, it could get you barred from entering the US (the big prize market) and put you under the suspicious eye of law enforcement coast to coast. We had all seen the news when it broke and our immediate reaction was, ‘Oh man, they’re screwed’, but no, no, no; Reckless informed us that as soon as the story broke ticket sales went through the roof and set new records for Donald K tours. Shit!! Why didn’t we think of that? </p>
<p>But that was then and this is now. All these guys, whom we once battled to best, are now recognized as brothers in arms, to use the language of my Dad’s generation, and when one of us departs we all must take a few moments to remember and reflect, shed a tear and maybe stream and old track. </p>
<p>So farewell Kenny, Goodbye Skip. </p>
<p>I raise a glass to you both…and thank you for the music you’ve left for us.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/48354162017-09-02T05:44:27-07:002017-09-05T07:13:27-07:00American Refugees<p>I’m heading out with the Stamps for a couple of weeks…first to Moncton, then back to Southern Ontario for a family visit and then east again to Fredericton. Back home on the 10th. </p>
<p>So I have two days to get together all my social media posts, my blogs, videos, and general silliness for the period when I’m away…’cause I know I’ll never get it done from the road. Some videos for sure, but sitting down to write is a ‘home’ thing. </p>
<p>And so the lost summer is winding down. The fires rage on, albeit with dwindling enthusiasm, and the smoke comes upon us less frequently and less dense. Of course that’s me being optimistic… the days are still hot and the land is still parched… a new monster could arise anywhere, anytime. </p>
<p>Speaking of monsters, it’s just now that the killing power of Harvey the Hurricane is beginning to show, and it will be days or weeks before the number of dead even begins to be known. </p>
<p>I let my imagination roll and put myself in Houston. I bet a lot of you are doing that too. The heart aches for the suffering going on there. For the masses who will be living for weeks or months as American refugees, sleeping on cots in giant, stinking convention centres, lining up at the toilets and showering once a week… if they’re lucky. And eating what? White bread and peanut butter…canned, bottled and packaged food. Remember the Super Dome scene in New Orleans 12 years ago…the exhaustion, the fights, the claustrophobic containment of thousands of people caught in a nightmare with no wake up? </p>
<p>And this monster will suck up sweltering tropical air, creating an enormous petri dish for all manner of bacteria and insect to flourish in. Have you seen the pictures of the floating fire-ant colonies? The first wave of them drown but the dead ones float and carry the rest to safety on little islands consisting entirely of fire-ants, dead and alive. </p>
<p>And who shall inherit the earth? Fricken fire-ants. </p>
<p>An alligator sanctuary is in danger of flooding above the fence-tops. Imagine hungry alligators trolling the urban water world. Talk about the wild kingdom. </p>
<p>On the political end, it’ll be hard for the trumpster to get any billions for his wall with all this going on. The potential for a major presidential screwup is looming…donald T could step right up to the hip in a gumbo-goo southern shit-hole. Maybe it’ll swallow him up…or he could open up the cash drawer and come out smelling like a late blooming rose. Who Knows? </p>
<p>We’ll see.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/48284362017-08-28T07:16:48-07:002017-08-28T07:42:21-07:00Sunday August 27 2017<p>I think the entire world must be watching the United States now. I mean, we always do anyway, but now that the ratings have shot through the roof, I think it’s become a global addiction. My own Sunday morning ritual is perhaps typical. I like to start easy with coffee and CBS Sunday Morning (mostly an arts and letters show), then on to grazing the various Network news shows, finishing with the calm rationality of Fareed Zakaria. But Fareed wasn’t on today because of live coverage of Harvey the Hurricane who/which is in the process of creating a huge physical wound in the soft underbelly of America. </p>
<p>Today is a hell of a day, we have the minute by minute unfolding of a natural disaster in Texas, we have yet more palace intrigue, we have a presidential pardoning that’s deepening the already infected fracture in the American self image, not to mention her international image, and what else?…oh yes …donald trump says Canada is being very difficult in the nafta talks, so he may have to terminate. </p>
<p>I say, ‘Go team Canada!’ </p>
<p>I feel both lucky and cursed to be living in an age where I can, if I want too, get constant updates as world events unfold or (and this scares me) spend all day and night watching the moment by moment creation of the ‘ultimate drama’ that is taking place south of the border and which is of concern to freedom loving folks everywhere. </p>
<p>Here we are now, in 2017, living in a science-fiction tv show from the nineteen-fifties. As the story goes, an entire society watches, on tv, in real time, it’s own self-destruction. </p>
<p>Heavy! </p>
<p> I do sometimes wonder, though, if we don’t all have some kind of deep programming about our species' inevitable demise…some deeply planted suspicions about our worthiness to exist. </p>
<p>Oh wait a minute…of course, I forgot, we have religion. All (or most) of us, here in the west, have been raised in, or subjected to, the belief systems of Christianity, Judaism or Mohammedanism (Islam). </p>
<p>The ‘end times’ theme is common to all three of these religions… you know, judgement day, when the unworthy get their comeuppance, (a very comforting idea for the perpetually pissed-off). </p>
<p>So my concern is…my question is… given that so many of us are operating, even if subliminally, in support of an ‘endgame’ scenario, will that cause us to actually create it? </p>
<p>Let’s face it, all the destructive power necessary exists, it is in place, armed and ready, and it is predominantly in American hands. Now that used to be a comforting thought. America was the good guy, standing tall for the oppressed and forgotten. But aren’t we all watching, with a cryptic intrigue, as a seemingly perfect cast is assembling for what might well be a grand, insane, final performance? Would this cast of characters not be totally believable in the roles of men gone mad…of power gone mad, of cowardice and corruption and collapse? Great egos abound, perceptions of reality clash, omnipotence and ignorance reign. </p>
<p>I imagine it would go down in ‘not history’ as a brilliantly conceived and carried out production of the collective human fantasy movie “End Of Days.” Not to mention an absolutely stunning exit for a shit-head species. </p>
<p>Religious scholars (if there were any left) would say, “See, gotcha….we’ve been right all along. The lord has dun torched his beloved creation.” </p>
<p>But why? Just for spite ? </p>
<p>It makes no sense. God, whatever our limited conception may be, is generally assumed to be of an infinitely higher nature than man and possessed of a much expanded level of perception…. not some low-life who gets pissy and murders an entire planet. </p>
<p>Hey…it’s a possibility. </p>
<p>Or we could just grow up instead. </p>
<p>We could save, from our programming, all that is built upon love and life …and forego the rest. Forego doomsday and judgement and suffering and sacrifice. We could re-program ourselves with a ‘no-endgame’ scenario, convince ourselves that humanity has a brilliant and eternal destiny and that we are magnificent extensions of God, as like to whatever-that-is as our earth children are to us. </p>
<p>We could do that. </p>
<p>And besides, I truly doubt that terminal nuclear war is much of a possibility. What I don’t doubt, though, is that nukes will be used again on earth, and that it will be catastrophic. But it might take watching the murder of 20,000,000 Koreans (or whoever else might choose to bait the devil) live on tv to bring home the utter shame and disgrace that any user of these monstrous weapons would necessarily bring down upon themselves. T’would be a crime of unimaginable consequence. A moral outrage from which there could be no recovery. </p>
<p>Don’t do it Don! </p>
<p>What happens in America will eventually happen everywhere; she is the canary in the coal mine. It is possible that all the ruckus and pain in the US is exactly what is needed now to make her confront and conquer her demons. America must eventually abandon war and seriously re-think it’s version of capitalism if it is to regain the confidence of the rest of us. </p>
<p>If America can heal herself, if Americans at every level will be brave instead of afraid, then all the world can relax and have a REALLY BIG party. </p>
<p>Now I don’t expect to be at that party and likely not my children but… maybe the grandkids? </p>
<p>Now that would be something to write home about.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/48214232017-08-21T23:15:00-07:002017-08-22T08:08:41-07:00The Lost Summer<p> </p>
<p>Ah summer. Here it is late August, two-thirds of summer already gone. The leaves on the trees have that dried out, dusty look that let’s you know the end is near, some have even turned color after a long hot, dry and oh so smoky couple of months. </p>
<p>This might be remembered as the lost summer. </p>
<p>There are still only a few boats on the lake and very few swimmers. I guess most people really don’t feel like coming to the lake. </p>
<p>Strange thing about about the smoke. At first it’s intolerable, eyes water, sinuses get irritated, the throat dries up. Complaints are everywhere. But now after so many weeks of living with it, the smoke has become the norm. Sure there are days of respite when a wandering south wind blows through, but the breaks have averaged a day and a half; you might wake up to clear, fresh air but by dusk the next day the prevailing winds have indeed prevailed and smoke from the forest fires to the north-west has once again settled upon the land, turning the full moon into a giant, dimple-less orange. </p>
<p>But, I have noticed just recently, a change has come upon us. Most people, it seems, can only whine for so long before it all becomes just too monotonous. I have noticed, this last week or so, that we have all begun going about our business without making much noise about the smoke. Nor are we devoting much breath to complaining. We are ‘whined-out’. Our throats may still be raw and the sinus passages inflamed but because those conditions have become the norm we no longer think of the subject as worthy of lip service.. </p>
<p>Maybe it’s Beijing Syndrome; the choking smoke is nothing more or less than ‘the way it is’ and there isn’t a damn thing any of us can do about it anyway so we say wtf and roll along. </p>
<p>One begins to understand, a wee wee bit anyway, in times like these, just how it is that people can settle into living under circumstances that would, in kinder times, be deemed totally unacceptable. </p>
<p>Anything and everything will become normal if it goes on long enough. Despicable dictators hold power for generations, religious dogma keeps people suffering in fear, individuals live out their lives indebted to a system designed to enslave them… without the slightest awareness of it. North Koreans, the most striking example of a tightly controlled populace, claim to accept as fact that a little fat man is their god and they believe that he is their benefactor rather than their jailer. They must offer up their labor and lives to this evil twerp. That’s the way it is. </p>
<p>It seems to me that those poor folks are to be pitied rather than held in contempt. They are the pathetic victims of a regime that has held sway for generations, developed a comprehensive mind control game and restricted the flow of information to such a degree that no-one can know anything beyond their daily experience. So it is reasonable (and no doubt good for one’s health) to just play along. </p>
<p>But how do we rationalize what’s going on in America? How can this great nation of freedom worshipping, educated, informed, enlightened, rich people be on the verge of civic disintegration? </p>
<p>A couple of decades ago, I heard what I now recognize was an answer to that question. I was watching people on tv attempt to predict the future effects of the internet. Most people foresaw positive changes relating to the dissemination of huge amounts of data, but one Englishman suggested that the preponderance of information and misinformation available to everyone would, rather than make the world more informed, lead to massive confusion…too much conflicting information, he said, would make all of it unreliable…unbelievable. </p>
<p>Seems to have come to pass. Seems we’ve all got too much head-stuff going on…too many points of view, too many groups we can join, too many scams we can feed, too many gurus to follow and just way, way too much bullshit to wade through. </p>
<p>There is currently a variety of ‘alternate realities’ available to be examined. What is a young mind to do? </p>
<p>Whadaya believe? </p>
<p>Muchas chaos, amigos, Muchas Chaos! </p>
<p>So that seems to be what’s happening now in America and, no doubt, in your home town wherever you happen to live on the planet…(with the exception, of course, of DPRK). </p>
<p>It’s all so fascinating. It is sinister, it is comical, it is exhilarating, it is depressing, it could get deadly, messy, bloody, stinky (all the things boys like). </p>
<p>Time for the girls to take over lads! Yer made a right mess of it! </p>
<p>Whew!…I’m out of breath…and there are far too many doors opening here to walk through right now. </p>
<p>We will, no doubt, pick up the theme at a later date.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/48129542017-08-13T15:34:47-07:002017-08-13T15:36:56-07:00Indigo<p>Sunday morning, August 13, 2017 </p>
<p>I’ve been watching tv…all the morning news shows that I used to use to catch up on the weeks events; now I have apps that notify me when Trump farts. </p>
<p>I admit to having been drawn into the drama lately, the daily unfolding of events, the rapid acceleration shaking the foundations of social structure and scaring the shit out of a lot of people. We have a situation where the leader of the most powerful, and therefore potentially the most dangerous, nation in the world is not trusted by 70 % of his countrymen. Of course those polls are fake, so says the donald trump, and it’s not difficult to see why a lot of people believe him when he says that, a lot of people just need to believe in something, a lot of people who used to have a good fistful of the American Pie but now find themselves living in trailers, if they believe anything, it’s that they’ve been had, they’re faith is up for grabs. </p>
<p>At this time then, when a great general sense of chaos is afoot globally, Mr. T seems a natural catalyst for a shit-storm of biblical proportions. </p>
<p>In response to this quest, he has created the world’s most fascinating reality show and he wants, above all else, to keep us watching. William Shakespeare never wrote a plot half as complex as this one. We’ve got secrets and lies, palace power struggles, leaks and lawsuits and creepy guys all over the set, we’ve got nepotism and cover-ups and an entire staff who’s only job is to publicly deny the obvious. And as if that wasn't enough to flesh out a compelling story, we also have a potential nuclear war, possible impeachment, an ice-queen for a first lady and a kid named Baron. Baron. How many working class heroes have you ever heard of who’ve named their sons Baron? …perhaps a small insight into the expectations of dear old dad. </p>
<p>In the meantime the show must go on, and you know, nothing sells like action…with explosions, of course, the whole world loves big flashy explosions… as long as they are in somebody else’s backyard. </p>
<p>But there’s the hook, you see…it’s so easy to add an element of real danger when you’re the president…it need only be a remote one, just enough to get the fear and adrenalin flowing, don’t want to get the lefties any more stirred up. A president’s number one job is to keep the huddled masses safe…and out of his now platinum hair. </p>
<p>Yes, a little Sunday morning update can leave one a tad anxious. The times they are indeed a’changin’…and fast. </p>
<p>There is no doubt that we are living in an age of massive transformation. The question is, I guess, how can we minimize the pain of it’s delivery? How do we not tear each other apart? </p>
<p>I believe I have an answer… </p>
<p>Watch America’s Got Talent! </p>
<p>Seriously. </p>
<p>You will see young people, teens and children, performing with the poise and technical ability of thirty-year-olds, kids whose understanding of what they are doing is astounding. They exhibit physical and musical skills that normally take twenty years to master. </p>
<p>Their innocence and the power of their aspirations inspired me and lifted me up…and it got me thinking that if these highly gifted people exist in the field of entertainment then surely they must be present in all walks of life…in all the arts and professions and philosophies; they must be everywhere. And to me, they indicate that perhaps the human species may be able to evolve at a much faster rate than we have been…fast enough, perhaps, to keep up with the rapid changes in technology and society. These kids may be able to grasp larger ideas and win over fear by demonstrating that there really is enough to go around; enough food and enough money and, most of all, enough love and compassion. </p>
<p>The antidote to fear is, and has always been, love and compassion. I am counting on this new generation to be the one that brings us to the tipping point, to the understanding of the hopelessness of violence, to the realization of it’s absolute uselessness as a tool for achieving anything beyond the most temporary cease-fire. Violence begets violence, hatred begets hatred and we humans have taken this lunatic cycle as far as it can go. We’ve placed ourselves in a position where we must evolve or perish. </p>
<p>Evolution seems the prudent choice, yes? Be ye left or right, liberal or conservative, dippsey or doodley, yinny or yangy, etc. etc. We all win as long as we can keep the ball rolling. </p>
<p>So I’m putting my faith in the kids. May they truly be better and smarter and kinder than us. May they seize their moment when it comes and may we, who work the levers of power in the present moment, keep them alive until then.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/48051872017-08-07T07:38:04-07:002017-08-07T07:42:09-07:00Yes It Is<p>I heard a woman today on the radio, she said she was thirty-five years old and that, from her perspective, virtually all young people today are feeling heavy, burdened by some un-named anxiety…some existential angst. </p>
<p>Ah yes! </p>
<p>I remember it well…the existential angst I mean. I grew up with it, missiles and giant jet bombers and constant nuke testing by the U.S. …or should I say US…and the Russians. (The Chinese weren’t into nukes yet, they were still melting down woks to produce steel for export so they could afford to make some.) </p>
<p>Then there was the great Communist paranoia; the arrests of American writers and intellectuals, politicians, anyone who had ever said a kind word about a Russian. </p>
<p>There was a hit tv show that impressed me as a kid called, ‘I Was A Communist for the FBI’. </p>
<p>And, of course, there was the usual parade of spineless-position-seekers taking advantage of the fear rampant in the society. </p>
<p>We had the Cuban missile crisis, the shooting down of the Korean Airlines passenger jet, Boris and Natasha, the arms race and the space race and racial violence and graphic violence and the fuckin’ Vietnam War (which is known as the American War in Vietnam…natch) and yes, </p>
<p>we, too, had a president who kept wandering in and out of a parallel universe. </p>
<p>WHEW! </p>
<p>So how did we get here? We should have been dead in the sixties, certainly the seventies and ABSOLUTEY by the nineties. The threat of war was constant. Kruschev banged his shoe on his desk at the UN and shouted ‘We’ll bury you!’ There were incidents and accidents and daily close shaves. </p>
<p>During the Cuban missile crisis, launch officers on both sides, American and Russian, erroneously thought that they had been given orders to launch but decided to defy them. So, twice nuclear war was avoided by insubordination. </p>
<p>WHEW! again. </p>
<p>Yes, we have been that close. </p>
<p>But here we are, still bitching about the weather and the smoke and getting old and a myriad of other worldly wonders. The point is WE’RE STILL HERE! So it seems to me that humanity has collectively changed it’s mind about self-annihilation and I suspect that we will be around for quite awhile longer, though certainly not without tribulation. </p>
<p>So relax. </p>
<p>Now, I don’t think the problem for the young is worry about being vaporized in a man-made sunspot…what I think they must be dealing with is more like utter bewilderment about what kind of personal moral compass to create, or to embrace, in order to get some kind of footing in a world where everything is spinning, happening, changing, all the time, faster and faster. A world where to express belief in anything leaves one open to ridicule from other ‘believer’ factions. And I’m not just talking about religion or politics ( although they are far and away the main culprits) but damn near every aspect of living is being called into questions as to it’s own authenticity. Is it what it says it is?… is it what it appears to be?…are the two of those the same? </p>
<p>And truth, or what we used to call fact, is being actively challenged by the presentation of alternate truths, or what we used to call lies. </p>
<p>This is truly a mindfucker so it does not surprise me that many young people feel they are living on the razors edge. Many may, I suppose, choose the example of the president of the United States and engage in the pursuit of wealth at all cost by methods fair or foul. But many more, I think, will see the chaos, eschew the fear and do their best to move their little part of the world to a place where what is real is apparent and what is unreal is obvious. Really folks, when you take a step back, bullshit is always obvious. </p>
<p>Truth, by definition, remains true in spite of obfuscation, compulsion or delusion and will eventually rise into view. </p>
<p>And we, having decided to stick around and work on it for a few more millennia, will muddle through. </p>
<p>Time is on our side…yes it is.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47897282017-07-23T16:03:32-07:002017-07-23T16:03:32-07:00Oh What A Lucky Man <p>I’ve just entered my seventieth year, that is to say, just celebrated my sixty-ninth birthday. I have, I understand, already out-lived most of the people, men anyway, that have ever walked on this planet. Earlier this year my mother passed away at the age of eighty-eight or eighty- nine (no-one was really sure) and just last month my youngest brother died days before his sixty-first birthday to be followed just last Monday by his lifelong friend, Mark, who I’d last seen laughing and smoking just two weeks ago at Preston’s wake. He was also just shy of sixty-one. Preston died after a long illness and Mark of a massive heart attack while on the job. Both men had done a lot of damage to their bodies over the years with cigarettes and booze and one has to wonder at what point in their lives, if ever, did they truly become aware of the slow suicide they were committing. </p>
<p>I knew them both and feel that they were,in fact, well aware of the likely consequences of their ways but neither chose to make any alterations, they didn’t choose life, or at least not a long life. And yet they had great loves, great talents, they were social, they liked being with people, they loved a party. But, like so many of us now, I think, they both suffered from bouts of broken-hearted sadness, they were gentle people but the world was not…so they partied, drank, smoked, and in Mark’s case inhaled a small warehouse of reefer. </p>
<p>Now, I have spent my life pondering the mystery of being; it seems something I was born to. Even as a child I remember being so curious about the drowning of a playmate…where did she go? It made no sense that she wasn’t anywhere. She’s in Heaven they said, and by the way they said it, it seemed like a good place to be, and everyone was in agreement that all children went directly to Heaven…so I was safe for awhile. But I was bound to grow up… then what? Apparently all adults did NOT go to Heaven, directly or otherwise, rather, they were more apt to wind their way, via their natural yearnings, to the pits of Hell from which there was no escape…ever…no parole, no good behaviour and no possibility of dying to another realm. </p>
<p>Yikes!…So Heaven was full of children with nobody to look after them?? </p>
<p>And it just got more confusing from there. </p>
<p>Over the years I’ve read and studied a raft of philosophies and religions, I read the books of the mystics, the clairvoyants, and the channellers, practiced meditation for years and spent countless hours alone in the woods… listening. I even tried, during a period of great guilt, returning to the Catholic church, the same church that had so alienated me as a young boy with it’s demons and sermons of fire and brimstone and it’s admonitions to grovel at the feet of an apparently ruthless deity if I wished to avoid damnation. Yes indeed… the same Catholic church that I had gleefully dumped as a runaway musician in my late teens. That move didn’t work out either, nothing much had changed in the attitude of the church since my youth. The light that Jesus had lit had been totally covered in dogma shit. Nevertheless, religious indoctrination is powerful programming and it is not easy to dump years of it. I don’t think I would have been able to had I not stumbled across other thinkers and other philosophies, ways of considering the unknowable, that which is, so far anyway, beyond science, beyond proof. </p>
<p>So anyway, here I am in my seventieth year, the vast majority of my scenes for this particular movie have been shot. And I admit that I too have had many hours and even days of feeling that same broken-hearted sadness, despairing of the future, not just for myself but for everything and everyone. </p>
<p>But when someone dies, someone close, someone loved, as odd as it sounds, a reverence for living returns. I feel oneness with these people, these brothers/sisters, as it were, who have just disappeared. I feel vigorous and joyful and fully alive. I can be here now…for awhile anyway. </p>
<p>For all my walking in the woods and pondering, I admit I am no closer now to knowledge or to proof than I was on the day I was born, but for reasons I can’t explain, my fear of dying has, for the most part, buried itself at the bottom of my drawer of old T-shirts; out-of-sight-out-of-mind. Perhaps one day I’ll need to dig down and exhume it for one final perusal…or not. </p>
<p>I have no ‘knowledge’ or proof of any kind of post Earth-life existence. What I do have is a ‘knowing’ that all is well…no matter what. That the dazzling energy that is consciousness, cannot not be. It will appear and disappear in accordance with the limits of perception. </p>
<p>Just like Las Vegas…What happens in the world…Stays in the world.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47813042017-07-16T12:56:07-07:002017-07-17T19:37:06-07:00CONUNDRUM<p>I’ve just entered my seventieth year, that is to say, just celebrated my sixty-ninth birthday. I have, I understand, already out-lived most of the people, men anyway, that have ever walked on this planet. Earlier this year my mother passed away at the age of eighty-eight or eighty- nine (no-one was really sure) and just last month my youngest brother died days before his sixty-first birthday to be followed just last Monday by his lifelong friend, Mark, who I’d last seen laughing and smoking just two weeks ago at Preston’s wake. He was also just shy of sixty-one. Preston died after a long illness and Mark of a massive heart attack while on the job. Both men had done a lot of damage to their bodies over the years with cigarettes and booze and one has to wonder at what point in their lives, if ever, did they truly become aware of the slow suicide they were committing. </p>
<p>I knew them both and feel that they were,in fact, well aware of the likely consequences of their ways but neither chose to make any alterations, they didn’t choose life, or at least not a long life. And yet they had great loves, great talents, they were social, they liked being with people, they loved a party. But, like so many of us now, I think, they both suffered from bouts of broken-hearted sadness, they were gentle people but the world was not…so they partied, drank, smoked, and in Mark’s case inhaled a small warehouse of reefer. </p>
<p>Now, I have spent my life pondering the mystery of being; it seems something I was born to. Even as a child I remember being so curious about the drowning of a playmate…where did she go? It made no sense that she wasn’t anywhere. She’s in Heaven they said, and by the way they said it, it seemed like a good place to be, and everyone was in agreement that all children went directly to Heaven…so I was safe for awhile. But I was bound to grow up… then what? Apparently all adults do NOT go to Heaven, directly or otherwise, rather, they were more apt to wind their way, via their natural yearnings, to the pits of Hell from which there was no escape…ever…no parole, no good behaviour and no possibility of dying to another realm. </p>
<p>Yikes!…So Heaven was full of children with nobody to look after them?? </p>
<p>And it just got more confusing from there. </p>
<p>Over the years I’ve read and studied a raft of philosophies and religions, I read the books of the mystics, the clairvoyants, and the channellers, practiced meditation for years and spent countless hours alone in the woods… listening. I even tried, during a period of great guilt, returning to the Catholic church, the same church that had so alienated me as a young boy with it’s demons and sermons of fire and brimstone and it’s admonitions to grovel at the feet of an apparently ruthless deity, if I wished to avoid damnation. Yes indeed… the same Catholic church that I had gleefully dumped as a runaway musician in my late teens. That move didn’t work out either, nothing much had changed in the attitude of the church since my youth. The light they say Jesus lit had been totally buried in dogma shit. Nevertheless, religious indoctrination is powerful programming and it is not easy to dump years of it. I don’t think I would have been able to had I not stumbled across other thinkers and other philosophies, ways of considering the unknowable, that which is, so far anyway, beyond science, beyond proof. </p>
<p>So anyway, here I am in my seventieth year and the vast majority of my scenes for this particular movie have been shot. And I admit that, I too, have had many hours and even days of feeling that same broken-hearted sadness, of despairing for the future, not just for myself but for everything and everyone. </p>
<p>But when someone dies, someone close, someone loved, as odd as it sounds, a reverence for living returns. I feel oneness with these people, these brothers/sisters, as it were, who have just disappeared. I feel vigorous and joyful and fully alive. I can be here now…for awhile anyway. </p>
<p>For all my walking in the woods and pondering, I admit I am no closer now to knowledge or to proof than I was on the day I was born, but for reasons I can’t explain, my fear of dying has, for the most part, buried itself at the bottom of my drawer of old T-shirts; out-of-sight-out-of-mind. Perhaps one day I’ll need to dig down and exhume it for one final perusal…or not. </p>
<p>I have no ‘knowledge’ or proof of any kind of post Earth-life existence. What I do have is a ‘knowing’ that all is well…no matter what. That the dazzling energy that is consciousness, cannot not be. It will appear and disappear in accordance with the limits of our perception. </p>
<p>Just like Las Vegas…What happens in the world…Stays in the world.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47726722017-07-09T10:51:12-07:002017-07-14T13:43:09-07:00there Is A Crack In Everything...and Everyone<p> </p>
<p>There is a crack in everything…that’s how the light gets in. </p>
<p>A Leonard Cohen line…and I think it’s true. </p>
<p>I think we’re all cracked. </p>
<p>The trouble is most of us suffer from hairline cracks, tiny little things, dainty and easy to miss, cracks that allow nothing through save a few lonely photons, random sparks in the dark. </p>
<p>But cracks never heal and over time, many lifetimes perhaps, the crack widens and the light breaks through and, as with a stream of water, the force of it eventually breaks us open and as we fill with light the world can be seen as it’s never been seen before; it loses solidity, begins to be flexible, spacious, so spacious in fact, that it’s easy to imagine a being of less density passing through it with little or no resistance, as if through water or air. </p>
<p>Long held certainties, unquestioned realities, stand now on shaky ground. The mind can go anywhere it wants; into your hand through tissue to cell to molecule to atom to…. what’s this?…the electrons and protons are popping in and out of existence, here/gone, here/gone, here/gone. Half of the time the particles are pure energy, matter doesn’t exist, and then it does, and then it doesn’t and so on to infinity, (another inconceivable conception…or non-conception). </p>
<p>Time is the trickster here and space his inseparable companion, they are the picture frame and nothing can exist but within that frame. Except that now you are outside of the frame, you must be, because there it is in front of you, and now even those fundamental pillars of ‘reality’ become something to be explored and, like a Marvel movie hologram, can be twisted inside out, re-wound or fast forwarded at a whim, moved through instantly at the speed of thought…no, not thought, consciousness…that which is beyond ego… your own personal little flake of God. </p>
<p>There is no place but here, no time but now. </p>
<p>Reality is what you decide it is. </p>
<p>Look for the light…expand the crack.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47639842017-07-01T15:40:16-07:002017-07-01T22:35:36-07:00A Soulful Send-off and A Southern Heat<p> We gave our little brother a soulful send-off. There were tears and laughter… and music and story and poem. </p>
<p>And then, of course, there was the party at Leah’s house. </p>
<p>In the garden. </p>
<p>We got a perfect early-summer day. </p>
<p>There was food and drink and the fragrance of marijuana. </p>
<p>More stories, told here in small klatches… more eruptions of laughter from this corner or that. And of course there were guitars and singing…we had competing stages at one point… and there were memories and clues and hugs in abundance… all very special moments of connection that seem, somehow, to be allowed into being only through the presence of the departed. </p>
<p>There is, or was that day in any event, a sweetness to the shared recognition of the presence of Preston, to the acknowledgement of his completed life, to the embracing of the mystery. </p>
<p>He was thanked by all who spoke, for inspiring them in one way or another. </p>
<p>It meant a lot to hear their memories…they filled in gaps for me…for the fifty years when I lived away and usually got to Calgary for only a few days a year. </p>
<p>But the time away ultimately never mattered. We knew each other at a soul level…indescribable but you believe it completely just the same. </p>
<p>And we stay in touch, I mean seriously. </p>
<p>We heard from Mom via automatic writing and from Preston in a poem… the messages came through two different mediums, both women in Preston’s immediate family. It’s a gas having clairvoyants in the clan. </p>
<p>———————————————————————————————— </p>
<p>So we’re back at the lake now. It’s summer hot today…the kind of day when normally I would certainly have been swimming. But alas, the lake is taking it’s own sweet time to settle down. Some septic beds were flooded at the head of the lake and the gunk has slowly moved southward. </p>
<p>There is an amusing side effect to all this swampy water though. I got looking around at the jungle surrounding me, tall reeds growing in such abundance, the lushness and fullness of the foliage and the weeds…and the way the cottage at the point is still on the verge of sinking. </p>
<p>It felt like Louisiana…I imagined this house on a bayou, weedy and overgrown, with a pirot tied to a flimsy little dock… and a sweaty house with a big slow fan on the ceiling. (I didn’t imagine Lori though, because she would have dumped me long before the sweaty house.) </p>
<p>So, anyway… I let the heat soak in, feel the light sweat form on my skin, and suck a slow lungful of air, moist and heavy, with just a whiff of tropical decay. </p>
<p>Yeah, that’s what makes it feel like ‘Looosianna’, the smell…and it’s night, and the scene is hot… and still… and sticky </p>
<p>…and in black and white. </p>
<p>Ok, so it’s not really Louisiana and we do have air-conditioning and are as addicted to modern creature comforts as anyone, but I must admit…every now and then I do like it a little swampy…a little too hot for most Canucks. I like to find a shady spot, get a tall cool what-ever-they-drink-in-the-movies, and read ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ over and over. </p>
<p>Dave and I have finished a new song…so I’m once again looking for clues. </p>
<p>‘These are the days of miracle and wonder’…so says Paul Simon…and I believe him.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47492282017-06-18T19:08:38-07:002017-06-20T14:30:51-07:00Have You Lived In Too many Rooms?<p>Rooms. </p>
<p>How many rooms have I worked in, lived in, stayed in? Thousands is my guess. If you take a decade on the road at two hundred nights away per year that’s 2000 hotel rooms, give or take a few hundred... and that’s only one decade. That’s my story.</p>
<p>There are many people, so I’m told, that remember every single room they’ve ever lived in, or at least every house. Either they have exceptional memories or they haven’t moved much, as in from house to house, room to room, town to city to bigger city and back. </p>
<p>The rooms of childhood I can feel still... the rickety walkway to the back door, which I think was the only door we used... that’s the first house I remember... standing with my chin level to the seat of the kitchen chair, tasting some buttery substance I found on a spoon on the floor. I can see it in front of me, hair and dust and god-knows-what, I remember it was retched... I remember crying. </p>
<p>The living room was dark brown linoleum., shining under the presents covering it on Christmas morning…and my mother’s shimmering red house coat, her kimono she called it. And I remember standing looking out the screened back door of that house with my young mother beside me... a summer rain and the smell of the old wood pile, damp and organic. </p>
<p>I remember walking towards the back door as a salesman came exploding out the screen, my dad’s right hand launching him from the collar. </p>
<p>Yeah, rooms. </p>
<p>I’ve seen a lot of them. </p>
<p>I seem to have been on the move most of my life. That little four room house gave way to the Pink house when I was five, I think. It was no larger, just a different shaped space... square... and instead of offering indoor plumbing it offered an outhouse and a rain barrel. That living room floor leaves a reddish hue, maybe paint, maybe old lino, partitioned with a curtain to form sleeping quarters for me and my three brothers. My dad fashioned an indoor potty in their bedroom closet... there were piss-pots under the beds. She had him paint it Pink (I capitalize because that’s the shade of pink it was), a bright, intense Pink…with white gables. It was on a huge corner lot next to Dr. Watson’s house. It was the only pink house in town.</p>
<p>One more move in Dawson Creek... more rooms... three upstairs. The one to the left held two sets of bunk-beds... all occupied...to the right my big brother, Lil’ Albert, now a teenager, finally got his own room. And in the middle was an actual play room. The living room was dark blue paint and more dark brown linoleum... Mom still wearing the same satiny red kimono. The kitchen was bright yellow fake tiles... the four burner gas stove had an oven. My Mother’s quarter-pound Xmas doughnut was conceived and brought forth from that very stove;... my parents still kissed in front of us. We lived there until I was twelve. </p>
<p>Calgary was six moves in six years. </p>
<p>My first room, when I left home, had a two burner hot plate and a swayback bed with incredibly squeaky springs, Georgia and I were together then, she never stayed over but the bed got a lot of use. I lived on pancakes, that was all I knew how to cook. The guy upstairs who was a few years older than me invited me up for dinner...he could cook…he fried up some bacon, heated up some canned beans, put the bacon on the beans and dropped in a couple of slices of Velveeta process cheese. That was the second thing I learned to cook.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47415172017-06-11T19:25:36-07:002017-07-05T09:14:48-07:00Do You Like Exclamation Points?<p> KBG Blog June 10/17 </p>
<p>I’m playing at being a writer…sitting down at the keyboard with the intention of communicating…of reaching out…entertaining…perhaps even learning how to punctuate. </p>
<p>The motivation for my doing this is to draw attention to my band and our music; I wanna know if you like it, if it moves you or if you don’t know wtf I’m saying. It’s all stuff I wanna know. </p>
<p>There is so much going on creatively within the band and I have some new songs to bring to David. I must say that bringing in new stuff is my favourite part of the process. I’m always excited to hear where he’s going to take them and I’ve come to have great faith in his taste. Songs take on a new dimension when Dave and I get together on them. When I get on drums and he on guitar…we can groove…it takes only two to set a groove and, for me, groove is fundamental. If you can ice the groove you have a chance at making a song fly…if not, no matter what you do, the thing is lame. Dave may change an arrangement, chord progression, whatever…he’s a huge part of the end result. And, of course, he plays bass and all the guitars you hear on our stuff. </p>
<p>Anyway, back to the playing at writing idea, awhile ago I found myself sitting here, staring at the screen with absolutely no idea what I was doing thinking, ‘I have nothing to write about today, no fucking idea’. And then it occurred to me that what I was experiencing must be a very common experience among writers…which brought forth a chuckle and the thought, ’So this is what it feels like to be a writer’… et voila!…I’m having FUN! And that’s important because if this work turns into a drag or a chore it will doubtless fall by the wayside…I’m just too long-in-the-tooth to be purposefully aggravating myself and besides, I tend to be lousy at doing things I hate doing. </p>
<p>A little aside… I heard just the other day that the most commonly used punctuation mark in the textisphere… (Taa-Daa! and a new word is born, at least in my mind)…is the EXCLAMATION MARK!! Yes! </p>
<p>Now you must admit, as far as punctuation goes, you can’t mistake it’s intention…it’s a Whoooshhh-bang…or… Whoooshhh-bang! And there it is. I can see why it’s caught on, it’s the ‘no-bullshit!’ sign. Just think of what that sign in the wrong hands might do…If one were to grab it by the bottom of the vertical stroke it becomes a baseball bat ready to bash that tiny period right into the middle of your eyeball. …! (lest we forget) Ouch!! </p>
<p>So here I am writing about not being able to write …but somehow I’ve managed to get three-quarters of the way down the page. (Now, to be sure, I am using a rather large font BUT!…only single spacing.) And this is where the fun is, this kind of strange magic of the mind…where does all this shit come from? The same place as my songs I guess. It’s there because I insist that it be there…and I insist that it be there because it’s such a rush to create something…and if I create enough stuff some of it may rise to the level that I can get some cash for it…and that’s the circle of life isn’t it?…we’re all just trying to get along as best we can using whatever skills or talents we have. </p>
<p>So now, back to the KBG…we were not getting in the rehearsal time needed to get this show on the road, at least not at the level it has to be at, anytime soon. So, we took some time Wednesday night to renew our vows, so to speak. The plan now is to stay in the closet until October. We want to debut the show and have an album release party at the same time. I have an idea for the venue; we’ll see how it works out. </p>
<p>In the mean time Dave and I have a large order to fulfill. We want another three to five songs recorded and I want some of them to be from the stuff that Dave hasn’t even heard yet. Soooo…let’s get to it! </p>
<p>Ok then… enough for now </p>
<p>!!!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47326562017-06-03T15:37:53-07:002017-06-03T15:37:53-07:00...Are you lulled by the water?<p>It is so quiet today… Saturday…early afternoon. I’m sitting looking out at the lake…almost no wind…just a light ripple on the water. The clouds are starting to move in but it’s been deliciously sunny and warm all morning. The only sounds I hear are distant highway sounds…hardly even a voice. No music, no sea-doos, no splashing and laughing…in short, none of the normal noises. Just the rocking of the dock and the occasional birdsong. </p>
<p>For a month now I’ve been watching the lake rise…watching anchored buoys slowly being pulled under…watching the wall at the bottom of the property disintegrate, the vertical stone becoming a slope. Every day there is some new bit of flotsam making it’s way to the end of the wind…and then back again. There are full size logs, all kinds of crap and a few whole sections of dock. </p>
<p>On top of that, because of the late Spring, all manner of plant life is rushing to catch up and the world is covered in pollen. The shoreline is green with it, the deck furniture needs to be brushed off every day and the cars look like they’ve been raced through a pale pea-green desert. </p>
<p>So no one is coming to the lake…which means I have it all to myself on this warm, still, Saturday afternoon. It is hard to believe that some of the cottages already have water at the doorstep… just waiting for a stiff westerly to blow into the living room. </p>
<p>We’re good here, about six feet higher than the current water level…those who know about such things tell us that another 10-12 centimetre rise is all we should expect. </p>
<p>The thing is, the flooding has been so undramatic. No rushing water, no dams bursting, no people scrambling for their lives…just this slow, relentless, utterly benign wet mass threatening to swallow our stuff… and there’s nothing, short of building a wall of sandbags, that we can do about it. Now, as I’ve said, I’m not among those who have to sand bag and I’m ever-so-happy to say so. I get to watch and marvel at the force and the power of these billions and trillions of gallons of water…this one single thing…an infinite attraction of molecules. </p>
<p>I love it, of course, the lake in all it’s forms. I’ve always thought I might live by the water one day. They tell me I’m a Cancer, so it’s perfectly natural. </p>
<p>I could go for a swim…might be cold though…all those icy torrents tumbling from the mountains into my private lake………. </p>
<p>So… that’s how it is here today… as you can see I’m slipping in and out of reveries…quite perfect for a still Saturday afternoon, don’t you think? Especially considering I have this whole beautiful lake all to myself. </p>
<p>Well…I’ll share with my girl of course…what fun would it be otherwise?</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47256222017-05-28T16:36:11-07:002017-05-31T14:08:52-07:00Is It All Just A Mystery?<p>The real cop-out is to say that the universe has meaning but that we ‘mere mortals’ are incapable of ever knowing that meaning. Mystery is part of nature’s style, that’s all. It’s the Infinite Goof. It’s meaning that is of no meaning. To look for meaning—or the lack of it—is a game being played by beings of limited consciousness. Behind everything in life is a process beyond meaning. Not beyond understanding, mind you, but beyond meaning. </p>
<p>There…I’ve hooked you…. by quoting Tom Robbins. </p>
<p>Lori and I just got back from Calgary. We had rushed there after being told that my little brother was in the last hours of his life. He had been airlifted from Radium BC, where he has a cottage, to Foothills Hospital in Calgary. He was bleeding so much internally that it was impossible for the medical staff to detect the source. They did what they could but after a couple of hours told my sister-in-law and my brother, that the staff could make him comfortable, but that they didn’t expect him to survive the night. </p>
<p>We arrived at the hospital just after noon to very good news indeed. The bleeding had stopped. His vital signs were weak but steady. He was still with us. </p>
<p>To look at him was heartbreaking. His face was bloated, there was a breathing tube down his throat, he was yellow, his body slumped, his mouth distended by the tube …he was plugged in and sedated. His wife, Leah, was there as was our brother, Blair. They looked wasted, especially Leah. After Preston was airlifted out, she had made the three hour drive from Radium to Calgary at night and in the dark about his status…she didn’t know if she was rushing to take care of him or to arrange his funeral… and she hadn’t yet slept. She had cried herself out she said. </p>
<p>And yet, in spite of all that, in spite of a frightening and tense 16 hours, the emotion that filled the room was one of relief and cautious joy. I think we were all sure he would make it, and with only the thinest thread of evidence, we let ourselves believe. </p>
<p>Over the course of the day family came and went. Lori and I visited with nieces, nephews and siblings and shared stories, hopes and expectations. We stayed with my sister and her husband and had a wonderful talk, as we always do, and ate Chinese delivery. </p>
<p>The improvement by day two was a surprise, especially to the doctor that had pronounced him a-gonner. It’s amazes me that a human body can heal so quickly…especially given the state of heath my sweet bro had been living in. The bloating was down by half and, most significantly, he was breathing on his own… the awful tube could come out. He was in and out of sleep but recognized everyone and was a bit teary-eyed. Once again the whole clan showed up so the family room was a-buzz with conversation. </p>
<p>When we arrived on day three he was off being bathed and shaved…they left him with a little moustache …a new look. We were able to speak to each other, that is, he could speak to us, and Lori gave him his first sip of water. </p>
<p>Out in the family room, Leah said he told her that Mom had been with him that first night. Right there in the room, at the end of the bed. ( Mom left us just a couple of months ago) I’m so curious to hear all about that. </p>
<p>Today we hear that he is coming out of ICU and is even taking a few steps with a walker. </p>
<p>It has been a rollercoaster few days but I think that all of us, all who were there and were with him, are feeling at peace. We know Preston could have another failure…we know the facts…but the ‘facts’ told us that I’d be writing a eulogy now…so ho… how sweet it is to be blogging. </p>
<p>For some reason— one that no doctor could suggest beyond a shrug and a, ‘Well, you just never can tell’—Preston’s body reversed it’s spiralling nosedive to death and began a rapid recovery. Miraculous? Absolutely. </p>
<p>It is my feeling that Preston will leave when he’s ready…..or… maybe when Mom is ready…? </p>
<p>We are beings of limited consciousness. </p>
<p>Behind everything in life is a process beyond meaning. Not beyond understanding, mind you, but beyond meaning. </p>
<p>The thing to understand, I think, is that it’s all OK…love can move mountains…and clot a bleeding wound. </p>
<p>Cheers!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47158412017-05-19T15:38:10-07:002017-05-23T08:30:30-07:00Do You Ever Wonder...Am I Nuts!?<p>A beautiful day here, my weather app tells it’s only one of many more to come…wow…no rain in sight. I’ll be moving outside in a minute…to a shady spot where I can see my screen. </p>
<p>Now…What’s new with the KBG? </p>
<p>Well, David and I recorded a bed track for ‘The Necromancer”; it’ll be his task now to lay down some of his usual guitar magic. That’s one step closer to our goal of completing 10 songs by this fall. </p>
<p>What occupies my mind most these days though, is this whole thing about coming up with content for social media, at once the blessing and plague of the current music business model. For those who have been looking in, you know I’ve been making little ‘chat’ videos. It’s kinda fun but at the same time it feels quite bizaare…I look at them and think, “Am I nuts? What am I trying to do here?” A good question. And the answer is…I’m trying to sell you something…yup…that’s the bottom line. I want you to buy KBG music and come and see us when we tour. </p>
<p>So, two things must occur for that to work. First I have to reach a lot of people and second, a whole bunch of those people will have to like the music. All the ‘social media’ work, then, is to get you to LISTEN …the rest is up to you. </p>
<p>What is up to me, it seems, is to somehow keep you interested enough in what I post that you will check it out regularly, which will then allow me to keep presenting new music (and you’re gonna get hooked by something eventually…I swear it). </p>
<p>Anyway, THAT is no trifling task. </p>
<p>I am a performer…it seems I’ve been drawn to showing off since childhood so all this is kind of ego satisfying (which brings up another point of internal confusion … and perhaps next weeks blog) but… I don’t want to be putting up boring shit ...and what makes this even more difficult is that I don’t have any idea what ‘not boring’ looks like. The natural conclusion, I suppose…if I don’t manage to gather a following… would be that I am (oh no) ..boring. But I have an idea…you could save me a lot of time and just tell me. Please. If I’m boring you, write ‘boring’ in the comment section. I may become known as the most boring blogger/video head/etc in cyberspace. It’s the ‘becoming known’ part that counts… y'see?</p>
<p>The one thing I’m sure of, is that I’m going to keep this up for awhile just to see what happens. All the gurus say the secret is to be consistent and persistent and really, what the hell have I got to lose? That’s the big upside of getting old… you don’t have to give a shit…you no longer have your whole life in front of you, most of it is over your shoulder, so any glory or embarrassment will be seriously temporary. </p>
<p>So there you go…it all boils down to being here, now, and pushing your personal envelope…because that’s where the FUN is…and this is all great fun!.. AND it keeps me from hanging around the shopping mall (or whatever it is that geezers normally do). </p>
<p>Then again, in a timeless eternity, everything that ever was …IS </p>
<p>And anything that is real cannot be threatened. </p>
<p>Hmmm….… it is such a lovely day. </p>
<p>Cheers!</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47109382017-05-16T11:22:52-07:002017-05-17T16:00:07-07:00Is It Just Me Or….Have you ever wondered….Is This All A Dream?<p>The world, I mean. Is it any more real than our sleeping dreams?…or is it just a different reality? Certainly our so-called ‘awake’ state is is more organized than our sleeping dreams but is that because we actually understand what’s going on from moment to moment because ‘awake’ is what is REAL?… Is the dream somehow not real or less real? </p>
<p>All of us have awaked from sleeping dreams with profoundly ‘awake’ sensations coursing through us…a full range of emotions from joy to terror often accompanied by physical effects….paralysis, screaming, sweating, tears or sexual stimulation. We’ve all experienced this type of dream reaction…it’s universal among humans and I’ve certainly noticed that animals act out physically while asleep. </p>
<p>So…Is our day to day world all there is?…all that’s REAL? What if the sleeping world is, in fact, the REAL one? Or maybe it’s another of many realities… And let’s face it, under the best of circumstances this ‘awake’ world is real for a limited time only. Hmmm….a temporary reality…just like sleeping dreams. </p>
<p>Row, row, row your boat gently down the stream <br>Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily <br>Life is but a dream </p>
<p>Yup…maybe if I stay in this dream long enough I can write something as succinct as that. </p>
<p>In the meantime, however, I have written “Sleepwalk”. A lot more words than Row Your Boat but also a lot more images to tickle your imagination. If you haven’t heard the song you can find it at <a contents="KBG Sleepwalk" data-link-label="" data-link-type="url" href="https://soundcloud.com/user-819488698/sleepwalk">KBG Sleepwalk</a> And here are the lyrics: </p>
<p> SLEEPWALK </p>
<p>Walkin’ in my sleep <br>Walkin with my eyes wide open in my sleep <br>I’m in a solid dream <br>How does it get so solid as it seems </p>
<p>Every night I wonder <br>Why do I come here when I want to fly <br>But I can only run here <br>Walkin’ in my sleep <br>Walkin’ with my eyes wide open in my sleep </p>
<p>Everything is now <br>You can’t deny it everything is new <br>Nothing to endow <br>No past or future there’s no time at all <br>Skippin’ on a cloud lookin’ up at the ocean <br>Surfin’ down a seamless beam of emotion <br>Walkin’ in my sleep <br>With my eyes wide open in my sleep </p>
<p>Do you hear your name? <br>Are you game? <br>Are you insane too? <br>Pick your own disguise <br>Try it on for size <br>Then you wear it to school <br>You got to know the rules for <br>Walkin’ in your sleep (5X) </p>
<p>I heard a rumour that there was only one of us <br>If only one of us was all there is <br>I must have come up with this <br>Must have dreamed of a kiss <br>I must have made a mind that listens to itself <br>Now there is something I am dying to remember <br>I have it right at the tip of my tongue <br>It’s just out of reach but I swear it’s a peach <br>I can feel the sweetness run down my chin <br>Walkin’ in my sleep (4X) </p>
<p>Did you hear your name? <br>Feelin’ game? <br>Now you’re insane too <br>Pick your own disguise <br>Try it on for size <br>You can make up new rules <br>And don’t it feel so cool <br>Walkin’ in you sleep (3X) </p>
<p>Walkin’ in your sleep <br>Walkin’ with your eyes wide open in your sleep <br>In a solid dream <br>How does it get so solid as it seems <br>Every night you wonder <br>Why do you come here when you want to fly <br>But you can only run here <br>Walkin in your sleep <br>With your eyes wide open in your sleep <br>Sleepwalkin’ You’re sleepwalkin' </p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/47002042017-05-07T21:15:32-07:002020-08-23T23:57:58-07:00Have You Ever Thought...Holy Shit...I Think I'm Having A Heart Attack?<p style="text-align: justify;">It happened to me last Wednesday. </p>
<p><br>Now, let me preface this by telling you that I like to think of myself as robustly heathy. <br>Granted no one my age is completely free of some noticeable deterioration but <br>generally speaking I remain flexible, reasonably strong and functioning well physically in <br>all the important zones (hell, I’m still a newly-wed).<br> <br>So…Wednesday morning, alone at home, I get into my yoga togs, throw my mat down <br>on the floor and begin my routine (which varies a lot depending on how energetic or <br>lethargic I feel). ’Not bad energy’, I think, so I push a bit…work up a sweat… go a little <br>deeeeper. <br>An hour later I’ve packed it up and am heading for the shower when I feel a tightening in <br>my chest and a swirling nausea in my gut and a sudden draining of energy, like it’s <br>flowing out of my feet. Whew, I think, I gotta eat. So I do and that calms things down <br>enough that I forget about it and decide to take care of a few chores around the yard. <br>It’s spring after all, but the weather has been so wet that not much of the cleanup has <br>been done. Now our place has a lot of exterior stairs. The house is on a fairly steep <br>hillside that tumbles right into Okanagan lake so doing a couple hundred stair steps in <br>the course of a cleanup day is unavoidable. </p>
<p>Now I admit that I don’t hustle about like I once did but on that day the first trip up to the <br>garage leaves me winded…the second and I have to sit down. I flop into a muskoka <br>chair to catch my breath. It’s about then that I feel the tightening begin again…and the <br>nausea and, of course, the complete lack of energy…even of the will to get up. Huff… <br>puff…pant. Shit…I sit in the silence of the late morning with all of my attention focused <br>on my chest…my breath…I haven’t felt this before…a large stone seems to have placed <br>itself in the middle of my body. It seems to be getting worse…I break out in a cold sweat <br>and… </p>
<p>SHIT!… I THINK I’M HAVING A HEART ATTACK. </p>
<p>I’m supposed to go to Kelowna later in the day for a band rehearsal which I don’t want <br>to miss BUT…this is getting scary. <br>Maybe if I go lie down it’ll pass. I crawl into bed. I lie there exhausted thinking that Lori <br>may find me lying in this position…dead as a doornail…when she gets back. No… I’m <br>ok…but shit, something’s going on in my chest…what if I’m not ok…I’ve heard many <br>tales of heathy males dropping in the middle of their morning jog…massive heart <br>attacks…aneurisms…a thousand and one ways to die in the West. Arghh!…<br> <br>Just about then Lori comes in and, seeing me in bed, knows something is seriously <br>amiss…I will lounge on the couch if I’m lazy or feeling low but I never go to bed in the <br>daytime (not without an invitation anyway). <br><br>About ten minutes later she’s racing me towards the Vernon hospital, which is a relief in <br>an odd kind of way because suddenly my fear of dying from heart failure must take second <br>place to my fear of being killed in a car crash. (Seriously, she’s a good driver…I just <br>never knew she could take a corner like that). </p>
<p>Now, if you’ve ever checked in to a hospital emergency you know the wait times can be <br>extreme…(I once waited at Toronto General with my six year old son with his broken leg <br>for two and a half hours before seeing anyone). Well, should you find yourself heading <br>for The EMERG …let me recommend displaying symptoms of heart failure. Within sixty <br>seconds of sitting down in the waiting area a male nurse was strapping a blood <br>pressure band on my arm and plying me with questions. “Why did you decide to come <br>to the hospital?” he asks. I mumble something about never having felt this way before. <br>“Yeah, but what made you come in?” he repeats. “I made him come,” Lori pipes up. “Ah, <br>says he, “That’s what I was waiting for…that’s what they all say.” <br>The blood nurse shows up next and expertly extracts a vile and I’m hustled into the <br>EKG room. All the while the 'rock' remains securely imbedded in my chest.<br><br>Sticky little suction cups are applied to various spots on my chest to which a <br>dozen or so wires are clamped….a little action by the tech in charge and… “Well, that <br>looks pretty normal” she says. “Normal?” “Yes, it doesn’t look like you’re in <br>immediate danger.” Oh…good…I guess. Except now I feel like an asshole for terrifying <br>my wife and causing all these very busy people to be even busier. “Shall I go then?” I <br>ask. “Oh no, we’ll have a bed for you in a half hour or so. We’ll want to monitor you… <br>maybe overnight.” Oh shit…not overnight…the only time I’ve spent a night in hospital <br>was when my son broke his leg and I stayed with him. I don’t want to spend the night! <br>But on the other hand, the rock is still in my chest and I need to know what’s going on… <br>and more to the point, Lori is not leaving until she knows what’s going on. </p>
<p>So I’m bedded, wired up, x-rayed, more blood, and I even catch the last stress test of <br>the day. Things are going well they say...heart looks normal.<br>By now I’m feeling pretty good…and damn hungry... but I’m told they’ll need to <br>keep me at least a couple more hours for one last blood test…just to see if anything has <br>changed. I insist that Lori go get some food because she’s looking a little pale <br>and I want her to get out of the worlds most uncomfortable chair in which she’s been <br>squirming for the last two hours. </p>
<p>Finally the last blood is taken, I receive one last visit from the doctor who releases me <br>but tells me I should come back tomorrow for a CT scan because, even though my <br>heart seems to be in rather good shape, something else…say my liver or pancreas or <br>gall bladder may be causing my grief. </p>
<p>The next day I go in for the scan…another new experience for me. It’s not bad…doesn’t <br>take long and consists (for those of you unfamiliar with such things) of being placed on <br>a table located in the hole of a giant steel donut. An IV is placed in a prominent vein <br>and what feels like hot acid is injected through it. A siri-like feminine voice tells me to <br>take a deep breath and hold it while the table shuttles me back and forth through the <br>donut hole. Two minutes and it’s done and the hot flash induced by the injection <br>subsides. </p>
<p>I proceed to the waiting room for results. </p>
<p>GOOD NEWS!! All of my vital organs still work and have no lumps, bumps, contusions <br>or blockages. I have simply been the victim of a poorly chosen breakfast and a fearful <br>imagination. <br><br>Wow! It’s amazing how full of vim and vigor I feel…twenty years younger in the course <br>of a few sentences.<br> <br>Now I suppose that the above scenario plays out daily in hospitals everywhere and <br>everyday people like me walk away feeling ever-so-much better because we feel safe <br>again in our own bodies. </p>
<p>For me it’s especially reassuring because I’m runnin’ down a dream here…and it’s going <br>to take all of my skills and energy to keep the ball rolling. </p>
<p>Heath is a most precious possession…I still have it. </p>
<p>Fear, on the other hand, is a painful and destructive mental state…and it’s showing itself <br>in such abundance in the world these days that avoiding contamination takes conscious <br>effort and a good amount of self awareness. The best remedy, I think, should you <br>become infected, is to take action. If you’re afraid for your heath…go to the ER…do it… <br>I’m glad I did. </p>
<p>I am not one who spends much time with doctors or medications…never really became <br>a believer. And I did, after all, create my own symptoms. Nonetheless I want to express <br>gratitude to the very competent and friendly staff at the Vernon Jubilee Hospital. I <br>actually had a good experience there. </p>
<p>‘Nuff said….back to band stuff next week.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBGtag:kimberlygroove.com,2005:Post/46890622017-04-28T08:44:10-07:002017-05-02T13:13:11-07:00... do you have trouble explaining yourself ?<p> </p>
<p>Here we go… </p>
<p>This is my first blog entry for the KBG….The Kim Berly Group. </p>
<p>Kim Berly…that’s me…or at least the extension of me that you may or may not know as the drummer... and singer of many songs... in the Stampeders. Many of you who are reading this are likely doing so because you know the history… and I thank you for being here. </p>
<p>For those who do not know about the Stampeders here it is <a contents="www.stampeders.net" data-link-label="" data-link-type="url" href="https://stampeders.net">www.stampeders.net </a></p>
<p>Off the top, I am still and will continue to be a member of the Stampeders. I will be onstage with Ronnie and Rich whenever the Stampeders play. We’ve been together 50 years…what an amazing statistic…maybe we’ll do 60. The Stamps have been a huge part of my life. Having said that it must also be said that their schedule leaves me with a good deal of time on my hands. And you know what they say…the devil makes work for idle hands…(which is ridiculous…but we can get into that later)…and as much fun as it is, being in the Stampeders, there is really no collective impetus for doing anything new; so there's pretty much no chance of me getting any of the songs I am currently writing recorded and presented live with the Stamps. So… as much as I love my brothers…this is my time to shine…and I’M ONLY 69! </p>
<p>Well I’m coming up on sixty-nine…July 4… and I’m starting a big new adventure and I’m going to write about it. The reason I’m going to write about it is two-fold. Firstly, because a blog can be a big deal…if nothing else it’s a ton of content…and , as we all know, CONTENT IS KING. Well, maybe we don’t all know that. I know I didn’t… but now I do…kinda. Anyway, it became clear to me that if I didn’t get into the selling of this project no one would. </p>
<p>The other reason for writing about the adventure is because it’s a public commitment. I know this will be hanging around out there as a ready source of embarrassment should I cop out. </p>
<p>So there you have it…Now I don’t mean to suggest that the progress of the KBG will be the only thing I’ll write about…I mean I may well fall down on my knees and beg for your help from time to time…in fact it’s likely…but the hub of it will be the band and the music… then again that will be the hub of my life now won’t it? </p>
<p>But here’s the thing. It’s already so much fun. It’s fun seeing songs come into being. It’s amazing fun to play them in a band, sitting behind the kit at the center of all this present moment energy where all musicians become ageless. Ultimately that’s why I keep doing it …when many of my generation are tabulating how long they can live given the cash they’ve managed to stash. </p>
<p>This is new territory for me. </p>
<p>I’ve always had a manager or agent to do all the stuff that I need to do for myself now. I need to make the calls and do the online stuff…It’s almost like a day gig but until cash starts to flow…I’m the Man. ‘I’m up for it’, he said, all the while messing his pants. </p>
<p>But we do have some promotional possibilities, don’t we… at least in the ‘human interest’ category… I mean how many geriatric new rock bands are there? </p>
<p>We’re a garage band with a mean age of 65…we’re Grand Punks… or Grampunks…yeah, I like that as a band descriptor…not much competition in the ‘key word’ battle. Maybe we should change the name?… Grampunks… </p>
<p>Lemme know what you think </p>
<p>So… so far we have social media more or less in place, the website up and running (but I know I need to work on it), we will be a few months finishing our first album (but there are six songs to listen to or download on the music page), we have a half-assed bio (tomorrow, tomorrow), and now… by god…we have a blog! </p>
<p>Oh and I just sent out our first press release…so far Capital News in Kelowna has picked up on it. </p>
<p>And oh yes…the band is getting bloody good. </p>
<p>Hmmm…not bad ..not bad.</p>Kim Berly Groove / KBG