“I was not aware of that.”
Wayne Campbell/Wayne's World
I didn't pay a lot of attention in school growing up. What was going on there didn't interest me much. I didn't care about the symbol for boron, how to graph a parabola or Peru's primary export. Mainly, I cared about what was going on after school.
Much of my education came from outside the school walls. I devoured Mad, National Lampoon and Rolling Stone magazines. I read books about sports and military heroes and books of humor like Jean Shepherds, Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories and A Fist Full of Fig Newtons (Thanks, Jeff). I could recite verbatim the comedy albums of Bill Cosby, George Carlin, Richard Pryor and Cheech and Chong. I had a steady diet of television and movies, and of course, there was music. Always music.
I learned all kinds of things from music - vocabulary, history, geography. I learned about the Titanic, the Civil War battles of Gettysburg and Cold Harbor, and who Jack Johnson was. I learned what karma, the Union Jack, a Farfisa a honkey-tonk and gold lame is. I learned words like incognito, pugilist and bittersweet. I learned the names of places I didn't know existed - Lodi, Sausalito and Bakersfield, CA, Galveston, TX, Winslow, AZ, Thibodaux and Delacroix, LA. And where in the world was Penny Lane? I had to know. Music made even the places I'd heard of sound alluring - Memphis, Knoxville, New York, San Fransisco. I wanted to go there.
I've continued to learn things from music all through the years. Here's a recent example. Greg Brown is a much revered veteran singer/songwriter of fifty plus years. He happens to be married to songstress Iris DeMent. Both are true originals. I'm fairly new to his body of work, so there have been some delightful discoveries.
One song that caught my ear is called Rexworth's Daughter. Foremost, the song is filled with beautiful and beguiling lyrics that should be the envy of anyone that's ever tried to express something with words. It pleases me to listen to Brown's aged bourbon baritone painting the images. And then there's this character, Rexroth. Who is he? Maybe you know, but I didn't. I do now, though. If you're not familiar, it's easy to find out. As to his daughter, well, that's on you too. Check out the song below.
Name That Movie: "First prize is a Cadillac El Dorado. Second prize is a set of steak knives. Third prize is you're fired."