Jamming

Today I was out on the street corner playing the violin and singing songs from my new album, Brooks Takes His Time, when an elephant came by and stood and listened. It's always nice when someone stops and takes their time with the songs.

The elephant said, "Do you mind if I join in?"

I said, "Sure!"

The elephant took a harmonica out of it's pocket and began playing the harmonica with its trunk. The elephant was wailing away which draw in a nice sized audience. Some people were actually dancing. I think it will help with album sales.

Brooks Takes His Time

I like writing words. But I especially like writing words with music. It's definitely a peanut butter and jelly moment for me.

So I made an album of songs. It's called "Brooks Takes His Time." I sing my catchy alternative folk tunes with my soothing voice and simple melodies. The lyrics reveal philosophical and humorous insight (what else would you expect from me), backed by an old Gretsch guitar, harmonicas, and whistles. I recorded these songs in my low-fi home recording studio so you can feel like you're there.

"Brooks Takes His Time" is available as a download from iTunes and CDBaby

I'm Back

Creedence Clearwater Revival felt bad about leaving me out on a deserted highway at night in 1969 and came back and picked me up. I understood them leaving me out there in the first place. Musicians are sensitive and things that wouldn't bother most of us can make them go crazy. But then they write songs about it and become millionaires. It's actually the most ideal kind of recyclying.

We pulled into the parking lot of the Poughkepsie Civic Center. CCR let me join them for sound check. John Fogerty stopped mid Fortunate Son and asked his brother Tom to temporarily let me take his place as rhythm guitarist. I merrily joined in.

I was having a great time when I felt the air wobble. There was a loud humming sound. Parts of me disappeared-reappeared-then disappeared. I recognized this as the familiar in-between place of time-travel. I was moving forward through time as I passed my eight year-old self falling back into 1969. We smiled at one another and high-fived.

Then I was back in today mid-strum of Fortunate Son with John Fogerty and his traveling band.

John looked over at me and winked. He knew what was going on. We musicians seem to have an affinity with another when playing music. It's an amazing feeling that I have nowhere else in my life. This makes up for the low tour pay, lousy road food, and trying to sleep on the tour bus' bunk beds.

Travelin' Band

Okay, so here I am still in 1969. If this sounds confusing, take a look at what I wrote yesterday so you can catch up.

I left the lake where I was hiding and went to the freeway where I hitched a ride. A tour bus pulled over. I hoped in. It turns out they were a band traveling down the road to their next show. I asked them their name. I couldn't believe it. They were Creedence Clearwater Revival. But then when I thought about what had happened recently, it made sense.

I couldn't believe how quickly I thought on my feet. I told John Fogerty that in the future, he'll be performing onstage in Poughkepsie, New York and his rhythm guitarist will instantly turn to eight years old. I said, "He might be confused, so don't be angry at him. But you might want to inconspicuously unplug his guitar and let him wail away thinking he's making beautiful music." Because it was 1969, he accepted what I said and told me he was looking forward to it.

John said, "You're from the future, right?"

I said, "Yes."

John said, "What's it like?"

I said, "People still complain, there's plenty of war to go around for everyone, Nixon gets kicked out but then becomes a guru, everyone's got their own computer but they use it for porn -

Tom, John's brother, interrupts me and says, "Are we still a band?"

I said, "You'll break up in a couple of years. It's messy. You remain estranged."

They stopped the bus and let me off. I gotta stop thinking that everyone is into rock and roll trivia.

Fortunate Son

I got a job as rhythm guitarist for John Fogarty's traveling band. John was the lead singer for Creedence Clearwater Revival back in the 1960s. I loved them as a kid. I had a black light felt poster of the band on my bedroom wall. So I was thrilled to become a new member of John's band.

Tonight we were performing at the Poughkeepsie Civic Center. We launched into Fortunate Son. That song meant so much to me as a kid that I was transported back in time to when I was eight. There I was standing in my childhood bedroom in the midst of a C major 7th chord. My eight year old self was sitting on the bed reading a Hardy Boys Adventure book.

The current me said, "Don't be alarmed, it's me! The me that's you later on."

I was a fantasy kid so the younger me got it and said, "Cool! Wow, look at the guitar!" I took the guitar off and handed it to the younger me who strapped it on and strummed a big G chord. The thing is, it was such an electric amazingly connected moment that the eight year old me was transported to the stage of the Fogerty concert in Poughkeepsie and I was left alone in the younger me's bedroom.

My parents came into the room and said, "What's all the ruckus?" They saw me and were alarmed. My dad said, "What have you done with Brooks?" I knew better than to tell them, so I jumped out the window. I ran for a mile and hid down at the lake.

Luckily I have my iPhone. These things are pretty powerful because I'm writing you this blog post from 1969. Anyway, I was hoping you could send this to Concord Music Group, Fogerty's label, so it can help unravel the mess of me as eight onstage with John. I was wearing Scooby Doo PJs and all my eight-year-old self knows is the G Chord.

Helpful Information

This morning the ghost of Clarence Darrow joined me for breakfast. Mr. Darrow was the big deal lawyer who in the 1920's successfully defended John T. Scopes who was arrested for teaching evolution in schools.

Mr. Darrow said, "Mankind will always be resistant to apes being their precursors."

I said, "Have you ever seen 'Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp'?"

Mr. Darrow said, "No, what is it?"

I said, "Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp was a TV show that I watched as a kid in the early 1970's."

Mr. Darrow said, "What's TV?"

I said, "TV is a technology that was created in 1948 that allowed movie like images to appear on small screens in people's homes. But unlike the cinema, everything on the TV was true. Lancelot Link was a TV program that starred actual chimpanzees. Lancelot was a secret agent who worked for the Agency to Prevent Evil (APE). Their nemesis was an evil organization called the Criminal Headquarters for Underworld Master Plan (CHUMP). This show proved that apes were not precursors to humans but were equals with genetic malfunctions that caused them to have excessively hairy bodies. As a result, courts in the late 1970's ordered the release of all apes from zoo and science lab jails. And schools were ordered to stop teaching evolution."

Mr. Darrow was in tears. He said, "How could I have been so wrong?"

I said, "Don't worry about it. I used to think the ghosts were just in stories."

Opps Part 2: When I Was Tired

Last night I heard a mouse scamper across my bedroom floor. I got out a mouse trap and added a piece of cheese. I set the mouse trap on the floor. The thing is, they are delicate. The trap snapped closed on my index finger. I tried to open the trap and pull it off my finger, but anger and the dark mixed and I tripped over my shoes and landed on the floor.

I was in a daze. I feel something soft on my cheek. I opened my eyes and saw the mouse's face right in front of mine. The mouse said, "Are you okay?"

I said, "I don't think so."

The mouse put it's shoulder into me and I was lifted up into a sitting position. The mouse said, "Let's get you up so you can lay down in bed and rest."

I leaned on the mouse for support and I made it up and I fell back into bed. The mouse was tucking me in when it saw the mouse trap on my finger.

The mouse said, "Was this for me?"

I felt badly. I said, "Yes, I'm sorry. I was tired and made a rash decision. Can you forgive me?"

The mouse sprang open the trap, pulled my finger out, and popped the cheese in its mouth. The mouse smiled and said, "Thanks for the cheese!"

Shhhh - Art Opening

Last night I had my big art opening at the Unicorn Cafe. The thing is, the cafe didn't know about the opening. I did it at one am. My girlfriend is the janitor and she got me in with her key. We had to be sneaky because we couldn't turn on the main lights. So we wore miner helmets. I love them. I actually use mine at night to read in bed. Miners are smart people because their life depends on it.

After we got all the art up on the walls, my girlfriend said that it wasn't an opening unless people came to see the art beside us. We went to local homeless shelter to recruit openers. The great thing about homeless people is they are up all hours of the night. It's hard to relax enough to sleep when you don't have a home of your own.

When we got back to the cafe we decided to document the showing since in the morning the cafe owners would see what we'd done and ditch the art. We turned the lights on and took some quick shots.

Thursday Night's Escapade

I love M&Ms. My friend Foster bet me that I couldn't eat two-thousand five hundred of them in one sitting. I asked him what he bet. He said that he would give me a life-time supply of M&Ms. But if I couldn't do it, I would have to quit eating M&Ms and substitute mandrakes. I took the offer. I couldn't imagine saying, "Enough, no more of my tasty friends."

Foster went to Target and brought back 125 bags of economy-sized M&Ms. I'd never seen so many at one time. It was like a beautiful field of lilies, but M&Ms. I proceeded. I couldn't believe how much of a sucker Foster was. I felt a little badly for him. How could he afford to supply me with M&Ms for the rest of my life? What if he were to die soon? Would I inherit the money it would take to keep me in my chocolaty paradise? What's a mandrake? Then I remembered Harry Potter 6 when the kids pull the live mandrake roots from the potting soil and how loudly they screamed. I imagined the mandrakes in my body, punching the inside of my stomach, trying to get out. I felt dizzy. I passed out.

When I came to I was in the emergency room. They had to pump my stomach. Supposedly when you eat more than a tenth of your weight in chocolate, your stomach collapses and they have to hook it up to a battery charger. The emergency people showed the battery charger to me. It was a Sears Die-Hard battery hooked up to a generator.

Thank You for Being a Friend

I have a job where I paint fire-hydrants. They come down the assembly line and I spray paint them bright red. But the thing is I'm not good with repetition. I remember when I was a kid and my teachers would get upset at me for miss-spelling words. I'd say, "It's the same word, just a different shade."

So I started painting the fire-hydrants yellow with purple polka-dots. I added the purple because it's yellow's complimentary color. In other words, it looked good.

The shift supervisor came over and said, "What the hell is this?!?"

I said, "Personally I feel it's going to make the fire-hydrants easier to see. It will allow the fire-fighters to do their job more quickly. Overall, isn't that the point here?"

The shift supervisor said, "Confoundit!" I was fired and I went outside and started walking back home.

A mutt street dog joined me. The dog said, "How come so down?"

I thought, "Why can't I just do what I'm asked?"

The dog said, "My person used to yell at me to try and get me to sit. The thing is, I didn't want to sit. So I left. Food's a little harder to come by, but it's nicer without the leash."

I felt better instantly. The dog and I spent the day walking down alley-ways. We even chased a cat.

Perhaps Some Change

I got a Venus fly-trap on Friday. I set it up in my living room. I was so excited at the prospect of it devouring flies. I waited for the feast to begin. Flies buzzed around the fly-trap. One landed right inside the mouth. I was shaking in anticipation. But the fly-trap didn't eat it. The fly flew away.

I said to the Venus fly-trap, "What's wrong?"

The fly-trap said, "What do you mean?"

I said, "How come you didn't eat the fly?"

The fly-trap said, "I don't care for flies."

I said, "What do you mean? It's in your name. It's what you do."

The fly-trap said, "Your name is Brooks, but you're not actually a flowing stream of water."

I said, "This is very disappointing. What is it then that you eat?"

The fly-trap said, "I prefer sunlight and water."

I was so angry that I wanted to throw the Venus fly-trap out my window to the street below which I'd done last week with a sunflower that wanted to live in the darkness of my closet. But like my girlfriend is always saying, "You out to really develop a sense of compassion."

So I said, "Okay." I put the fly-trap near the window where the sunlight falls. I watered the plant. Then I sat and waited to see if my heart would grow.

Deana Bish

When I was seven, I went on my first date. It was with Deana Bish. We were in first grade together. I asked her if she wanted to walk down the hallway with me, from our English class to History. She got nervous and turned tomato red. I thought something was wrong with her medically. I asked if I should get the school nurse. She said no in a kind of painful sound.

We stood there in silence. We were both trembling. That was nice. It was my first feeling of togetherness. I blurted out,"I love you." She said, "What?" I said that I had just sneezed. She said bless me.

Deana said she thought she was going to throw up. I showed up in my manliness by giving her my lunch bag. The thing is, I didn't think she was actually going to throw up. When she did I had the surprise feeling of being there for her and wondering what I would do for lunch. She handed me back my lunch bag. She was embarrassed and looked down.

I got the confidence to start walking towards History class. I grabbed the sleeve of her shirt. I was so excited to feel the warmth of her skin on the sleeve that I dropped my lunch bag and she stepped on it and slipped and fell and I came with her.

I saw flashing lights and passed out. I woke up in the nurse's office. The nurse said she called my mom and she was going to be there any minute. I was so excited to tell my mom about my first date!

Tears?

Last night I was watching The Road Warrior with my pet raccoon, Dusty. It's her favorite movie. At the end when Mad Max takes on the marauders in an intense highway battle, Dusty would always stand up on her hind legs, waving her front claws, and go, "Cla-Cla-Cla!!" Even though I knew what would happen, I'd get caught up in her excitement.

The thing is, last night, as the marauders crashed head-on into each other and died, Dusty keeled over and dropped dead onto the living room floor. At first I thought she learned a new trick. I actually thought that I would video the next time she did that so I could share it with you. But then I realized. I was so sad.

I went out to the garage and got out a shovel and went and dug a hole in my backyard. I went back into my house and wrapped Dusty up in a sheet. I carried her out to the grave and dropped her in. I tossed in her favorite toys. I thanked her for being a faithful friend and then I filled in the hole with dirt.

I went back in and cried. I was embarrassed that I was so emotional. I like to think that I can be a strong person who can rise above feelings. But I think that's because I have a good imagination.

Opps

My grandmother on her death bed pulled me close and whispered in my ear that part of my ancestry is pelican. I left the room and went outside. I walked across the sand and stood at the water's edge. My heart opened wide and I thought, "I have another home."

I saw a carp zip through the water. I lept in the air and landed in the water face first with my mouth wide open. I caught the fish in my mouth. The fish thrashed around. I chewed the fish and swallowed it whole. I felt alive.

I went back inside. I knelt next to my grandmother and whispered to her about my fishy meal. She said that she was just joking about being part pelican. She said that everyone was so depressed about her health that she felt the need lighten the room.

I felt like an idiot. But I also realized it had felt good to be outside and swim in the lake. Plus I wasn't hungry.

Found a Way to Help

This morning I went to the well. I drew the bucket up and was surprised to find it filled with Mountain Dew. Normally I would be upset at the well and ask why and demand that it gives me fresh water. But I sensed a gentler approach would be helpful.

I said, "What a nice morning."

The well said, "Whatever."

I said, "Yes, I love the sunlight shimmering the dew on the grass."

The well said, "I hadn't noticed that...I guess it's kind of nice."

I said, "Did I ever tell you how much I like the sound of your voice?"

The well said, "Really?"

I said, "Yes, it's my favorite part of the morning."

The well pulled the bucket back down to the water. The bucket came back up with fresh water. I unattached the bucket.

The wall said, "You have a great day!"

I waved and said, "You too!"