Where Do You Get Your Inspiration? (the song Every Day)
Friday, August 22, 2008 at 11:55AM Where Do You Get Your Inspiration? Part Four (Everyday)
I met a woman several years ago that just spun my head around. I was completely smitten (my friends called it the Big Smit) and I could think about nothing else. I mean, I wanted to have HER baby. I was so crazed for her.
Now she had a couple of problems, but hey, nobody’s perfect and you don’t reject someone because they are not perfect, or think that they COULD be perfect …with the proper training. No, that’s not why you fall in love, that’s not why you are even looking to fall in love. It is a magical key that finds and fits into the lock you have on your heart. It opens up and that’s that. You cannot choose who you fall in love with.
So as I say she had a couple of problems, and I wish I were making this up, but nooooooooo, this is my life…evidently a string of demonstrations of God’s infinite sarcasm. 
First of all, she was in AA. Now I firmly believe that a recovering alcoholic needs all of our nurturing support and respect. It is not an easy row to how, coming back from addiction and I supported her one hundred percent in that. But the fact remains that when your mate is going to AA meetings five nights a week, and three times a week at lunch and also holding down a steady job, you don’t see much of them and you end up doing all kinds of things with your spare time, after you’ve seen every Seinfeld and Startrek (original and Next Generation).
I painted the entire house, inside and out. I ironed the sheets. I alphabetized my old vinyl record collection. I even started writing a prisoner. I mean, these things just come to you with so much free time on your hands. But this was the least of my difficulties.
She was also (and I truly wish I were making this up) going to group therapy once a week for people who are sexually dysfunctional. I’ll say it again. Sexually Dysfunctional. But here is the really stupid part. I thought, “I can SAVE this woman!” “I can reawaken the BEAST!”. I thought I was Mighty Mouse, “Here I come to save the day…”
What a bonehead, an idiotic stick, lightning bait. I don’t know why I am so slow on the uptake, but I never seem to learn from my mistakes. Everything in life I’ve ever learned…I’ve had to learn again. But this one I’ve got and I give it to you. If you take away nothing else from this blog today, take this. WHAT YOU SEE IS WHAT YOU GET.
Duh. It should be intuitively obvious to a tree, but somehow so many of us keep forgetting how it works. We fall in love with someone’s potential. We keep thinking that we can love someone into being SOMEONE ELSE. This is foolishness. This is madness. This is simply a waste of time.
You can’t love one person into being another person. What you see is what you get. Trying to love a person into being this other person is akin to buying a Hyundai and saying, “I am going to polish this puppy until it’s a PORSCHE.”
I wrote the song “Every Day” (with my good friend Rick Ruskin – www.liondogmusic.com) about six months after I swore I’d never see her again.
And this time, I mean it.
Reader Comments (6)
www.rickruskin.com is not a valid URL. My correct web address is: <url>http://liondogmusic.com</url>
Yet another JLS Classic. And again, as funny as this is to read it's that much funnier to hear! So James...you ever gonna do a recording of these classic stories?
Keep 'em coming. The storie4s are great.
Eva
i believe you once decribed that particular relationship as "My eyes were bigger than my pants"...I love that line...My first (and so far only real (or not depending on your viewpoint) relationship)....was with a fellow who was an alcoholic...not recovering...an active one...this disease runs like like a psychotic horse thru my family on both sides...I should have seen it...everytime he was drunk but I only half way paid attention hoping he would stop...well he didnt in fact he finally had what I think was a new boyfriend saying to leave who I thought was my fella alone...the long and short of it is that it hurt BAD and I still think of him and several songs have resulted...one of them is really good and it deals with men I have known friends a boyfriend or two and generally people I deeply love or have loved and they have had to move away for different reasons one was a friend in the military another was my friend Cyrus who moved when his dad died and a friend who moved to take care of his ailing mother...anyhow...I wish I could write that well always and without the sadness...but the muse is a fickle thing at times...leading to unexpected places...And what else is there to do but follow
I second that Eva...I want James to write his biography EVERYTHING...it would be the size of War and Piece but only becos there is soo much...the stories the songs James' life journey...And i'm also waiting for "the James Lee Stanley Songbook"
hey kids, thanks for the kind words. i am working on a book, it's called datamusicata right now, but as more and more of the stories evolve, i believe that i'll develop a thread. as for the song book, i am talking to someone who does tablature. when i get that together i'll start doing the song book. which songs do you all want included in volume one?
REALLY?! The song book is coming to fruition?!...YAAAAAAAAY...put "Worry Bout You" and 'Three Monkeys" and "There" and "Let the Tree Fall" "Mary January"..."This Fleeting Moment"..."YoYo Dance"..."Racing the Moon" Even Cowgirls Get the Blues" "Stolen Season" 'Too Many People"..."Two Wrongs"...oh I could go on and on...