Ask Your Doctor if it’s Right for You
It’s Complicated: Lit Up & The Writing Cooperative Contest
To: cary@cavale.com
Subject: Request from your old assistant
I know. The ghosts come out late. And it is late. So late that I just saw your old pal Sarah McLachlan’s ASPCA commercial. It jarred loose that story you used to tell at those big client dinners. Always while I was staring at something awful and fancy like… bone marrow soup. It went — you and Sarah were playing your then collaboration, “Building a Mystery” at a label show and within the sounds of silence (your words, not mine) after the applause, Art Garfunkel came through the crowd put his hands upon on your shoulders and said, “You’re going to be famous young man.”
Once, I snapped at this and stated, “You weren’t that young and it’s not like Paul Simon said it to you”.
The whole table exploded, laughs so real the silverware bounced. You pulled me in real tight and whispered loudly in my ear, “I could just, just kill you — with love”.
Anyway. Let me get down to it — I’m writing because I want to be paid for my song.
You know the one. The one that you premiered in San Francisco, at the soft opening for that concert dinner series we worked on. That debacle. When our company relented and gave you a performance slot — but then volume constraints meant you couldn’t turn your amp on at all and you — HAD A FIT. I missed a big chunk of this because I was fighting to get your hotel room upgraded. But you found me after. Striding up to me as I tried to hail a bartender, you snagged my raised wrist.
“Where the fuck were you?”
Annoyed — I lied and said I’d missed it completely but then you walked away. And I mean really walked away. Walked away like a dad in a Bruce Springsteen song and I couldn’t fucking take it. I burst, shouting at your back that I saw our song. You stalked back. Someone asked me if I needed ice for my whiskey and you shouted that I was fine, stopped at a cooler, plunged your hand into it and threw a fist full of ice into my cup, “Don’t you fucking lie to me again.”
Do you remember this?
It was after your wife returned to New York — at that Mexican restaurant where everyone was very drunk and we were very bored. I was trying to remain social and when there was a lull you’d say, “Can we leave now?”
And, finally after the fifth time, I turned and looked at you. An old Prince Eric. Shaggy salt and pepper hair that was still jet black in all the Billboard Top Executives in Music Marketing photos. Those soft bloodshot blue eyes soaked in insomnia and perpetual booze.
I took a sip of my endless whiskey.
“Yes, let’s go.” I replied.
We walked back to your room. I laid down on the floor, you took out your guitar and handed it to me. I cleared my throat and sang your words.
“I’m a pragmatist so you do not exist/I shout this as I bow to your lips”
I changed your female pronouns to male, you laughed when you noticed. After about four songs, you came down to the floor to lay with me, peeling your t-shirt off.
“I can do light touches.” I skated my fingertips on your bare back.
“Or, I can — ” I used my nails.
“Light touches, please.”
Eventually, you fell asleep. I returned to my room, crumpled down on the linoleum of my kitchenette and cried.
Let’s say you remember none of this. That it has all flowed down the lazy river you could call denial. BUT you SHOULD remember that that the song I wrote with you is currently being used to shell anti-anxiety medication at 1:43am EST on Time Warner Cable channels 35 and up.
Did you not think I would notice? Just thought I’d never see a national TV advertisement? You know, I caught the tail end of it last week super late but couldn’t believe it. But you did the same thing to it that you did to all those terrible C-list Disney star extended EPs you wrote for that didn’t gain any heat. You sold the music.
“Sometimes the only thing that’s salvageable is a profit.”
You told me that once and now I’m telling you that. Art Garfunkel would demand the same of Paul.
-Anna
Sent from my iPhone
