Day 996: What’s the story?

What’s the story?

What’s WHAT story?

One story at a time. On my way to work, yesterday, I saw this …

… and I wondered,  “What’s the story?”

Whenever a story has parts unknown to us, we make up stories to understand, make meaning, and move on. When I saw those abandoned baby shoes lined up neatly outside of Boston’s Fenway Park, I thought

What’s the story I would make up about that? And what stories would other people make up about it?

For the rest of the day, I thought about stories.

What’s the story with that?

Well, since I’m

• a psychotherapist,
• an English major, and
• somebody who loves to read and write

… stories are very important to me. No mystery, there.

What’s the story, with these other photos I took yesterday?

What’s the story you might create, about any of those images?

What’s the story with today’s music?

What’s the story with “Aja” by Steely Dan?

I chose “Aja” today because

1. I heard it on my walk home, when I was looking at some of the above images,
2. I’ve never included it in a blog post before, and
3. people tell lots of different stories about that song, including these (from this web page):

The song is pronounced “Asia,” and was inspired by the continent. Steely Dan have several songs with a Far East influence, since Donald Fagen believes it is a symbol of sensuality. He told Rolling Stone magazine that the title came from a high school friend whose brother was in the army and came back with a Korean wife named Aja, although he wasn’t sure how she spelled it.

I thought it very obvious that the song is about a fictional Bordello on the California coast, perhaps San Francisco area. That’s why you hear the police whistle. The part with Wayne Shorter’s is where the police raid the place.

Yet another subtle drug reference in their music: “Break out the hardware, let’s do it right.” Hardware is another name for the needle, spoon, flame used for shooting up, mainly heroin.

When they refer to the folks up on the hill how they don’t give a damn. It’s CAPITOL HILL….. duh?

Louis Armstrong called jazz “Chinese music”, you can guess along with me why (my guess – that jazz is not rational and western, it’s intuitive yet has its own definite yet different kind of logic). So this song is about playing jazz for people who often don’t get it or don’t care.

Since I live near San Francisco, I interpret “up on the hill” to be wealthy bored people on Nob Hill. Coincidentally, someone wrote that Kid Charlemagne” also had a reference to “up on the hill”, and that song was about Owsley Stanley, the guy who (among other things) synthesized acid for the acid tests in SF.

The story goes that Steve Gadd walked into the studio in NYC – put on the cans – and 8 minutes later – he was finished – one take ! Had the privilege of seeing him in Johannesburg with Joe Sample and Randy Crawford. AJA is the perfect number !

The lyrics of Aja paint a picture of a man, perhaps a heroin addict or drug dealer whose only salavation day after a day is running home to the arms of Aja…which lends credence to the lyric of “when all my dime dancing is through, I run to you”

While Donald Fagan wrote the song about a friend’s South Korean wife, named Aja, you cannot help but think that the courtship began as a man knowing where to get his ultimate fix.

The model on the cover of the album “Aja” is not Korean but Japanese. Her name is Sayoko Yamaguchi, whom Newsweek chose her one of the top six models in the world in 1977. She passed away on August 14, 2007.

i was named after this song, and i have great appreciation for its perfection and character, but my middle name is Victoria, and 8 out of ten people ask if that is a porno name…

What’s the story with that?  SO many stories, about just one song, from just one website. And, I’ve told stories to myself about that song, for years, that are different from each one of those stories above.

What’s the story you might create about “Aja”?   Please listen to it, if only to experience the story of its brilliance.

Finally, what’s the story with all the various stories in this post?

Here’s my story. I believe that

1. being as much as possible in the present moment,
2. being present with all your senses,
3. letting go of fears about the future and regrets about the past, and
4. telling the story of your life, in new and illuminating ways

… can help us all heal, learn, and grow.

Gotta go hear some more stories at work, dear readers.

Thanks to all the people, places, and stories that helped me create this storytelling post and thanks to you — of course! — for reading all the stories here, today.