Whitney Houston

Whitney Houston died yesterday at 48. She lived longer than Elvis by about six years. Misuse of prescription medication seems to the proximate cause here, too. The early reports also had her dying in the bathroom, but instead of being on the toilet (poor E.), she may have been in the tub, and she may have become unconscious and drowned. But it’s hazy.

I wasn’t a big fan. I was awed by her vocals, the power, but her song selection generally left me cold. I mostly click with the woman because of her one hit movie with Kevin Costner, “The Bodyguard”.

In these early reports, it was noted that she had not recorded anything in years because her drug use had rendered her voice “raspy and hoarse”. Elvis’s golden voice stayed with him until the very end. I had not realized that she had been so quiet on the musical scene. Like I said, I wasn’t much of a fan.

(Source: ONTD)

Whitney Houston

Whitney Houston died yesterday at 48. She lived longer than Elvis by about six years. Misuse of prescription medication seems to the proximate cause here, too. The early reports also had her dying in the bathroom, but instead of being on the toilet (poor E.), she may have been in the tub, and she may have become unconscious and drowned. But it’s hazy.

I wasn’t a big fan. I was awed by her vocals, the power, but her song selection generally left me cold. I mostly click with the woman because of her one hit movie with Kevin Costner, “The Bodyguard”.

In these early reports, it was noted that she had not recorded anything in years because her drug use had rendered her voice “raspy and hoarse”. Elvis’s golden voice stayed with him until the very end. I had not realized that she had been so quiet on the musical scene. Like I said, I wasn’t much of a fan.

(Source: ONTD)

Write

“Advice? I don’t have advice. Stop aspiring and start writing. If you’re writing, you’re a writer. Write like you’re a goddamn death row inmate and the governor is out of the country and there’s no chance for a pardon. Write like you’re clinging to the edge of a cliff, white knuckles, on your last breath, and you’ve got just one last thing to say, like you’re a bird flying over us and you can see everything, and please, for God’s sake, tell us something that will save us from ourselves. Take a deep breath and tell us your deepest, darkest secret, so we can wipe our brow and know that we’re not alone. Write like you have a message from the king. Or don’t. Who knows, maybe you’re one of the lucky ones who doesn’t have to.”

-- Alan Watts, British philosopher (1915-1973)

I love the romanticism of this, and I used to think of myself as being like this. If there is one ill effect of the Internet, it is that it has made me more of a copy & paste kind of guy, making me more of a reader than a writer, but maybe this is what I really am and I have only become truer to myself, because just about all my old writing is such laughable posing, an ignorant naif trying to sound educated and sophisticated. It reads more like nose-picking and endless whining. Oh, I like to think that I have gotten a little better over the years, with the settling of middle-age and after a lot more serious reading, but I am still more of a reader and admirer than a writer and a thinker, and I am okay with that, most of the time.

Write

“Advice? I don’t have advice. Stop aspiring and start writing. If you’re writing, you’re a writer. Write like you’re a goddamn death row inmate and the governor is out of the country and there’s no chance for a pardon. Write like you’re clinging to the edge of a cliff, white knuckles, on your last breath, and you’ve got just one last thing to say, like you’re a bird flying over us and you can see everything, and please, for God’s sake, tell us something that will save us from ourselves. Take a deep breath and tell us your deepest, darkest secret, so we can wipe our brow and know that we’re not alone. Write like you have a message from the king. Or don’t. Who knows, maybe you’re one of the lucky ones who doesn’t have to.”

-- Alan Watts, British philosopher (1915-1973)

I love the romanticism of this, and I used to think of myself as being like this. If there is one ill effect of the Internet, it is that it has made me more of a copy & paste kind of guy, making me more of a reader than a writer, but maybe this is what I really am and I have only become truer to myself, because just about all my old writing is such laughable posing, an ignorant naif trying to sound educated and sophisticated. It reads more like nose-picking and endless whining. Oh, I like to think that I have gotten a little better over the years, with the settling of middle-age and after a lot more serious reading, but I am still more of a reader and admirer than a writer and a thinker, and I am okay with that, most of the time.