Hello!

Welcome to The Epic! I am launching this blog as a manifesto for and a guide to living well. The title and motto of the blog are taken from the Epicureans, at least some of whom believed in the notion that not one minute of the future was guaranteed to them and that as a result they had the duty to live life to its fullest every moment.

I believe in discovering fun and pleasurable things wherever I find myself each day and I am told I have a knack for unearthing them. My hope is that by sharing in my pleasures and some of my ways of finding them you will begin to collect all the riches that lie in the moments of your life. They are there. Take them! All our lives should be.....Epic.

Friday, August 21, 2009

Saloon Friday Night

Frank Sinatra said that the purpose of a lounge singer is to sell drinks. The sadder you make 'em, the more they drink. The raison d'etre.

Tonight, I am just too far away from home to get home. Feeling the strain ACUTELY. Only Beverly Hills, Chicago or New York can make a Friday night away painless. Or mildly so.

So, I go to my favorite place in this town. Not B.H., Chicago or NYC. And they have a young lady singing in the lounge. Playing the piano. No doubt a student at the local (acclaimed) music school. I was all right until she leveled a murderer's row of tunes, including

Moon River
Somewhere Over The Rainbow
You Were Always On My Mind
Fire And Rain
Vincent
You Don't Know Me
Goin To Carolina (In My Mind)
I Want To Go Home

She drove me to the (singerless) bar of the Hilton. Frank would have been proud.

3 comments:

Ben said...

Life is not all firecrackers and crabcakes. As you point out, sometimes melancholy is Epic.

Get home soon.

Pigtown*Design said...

I love Moon River. Here's the scene: about 20 years ago... me and my neighbour who was about 15+ years older than me, and some of his men friends. sailing back down the chesapeake bay after a race. early october, harvest moon rising over the eastern shore. all of the men on the boat singing moon river. me, barely keeping the tears in check.

it's a moment i will always remember.

M.Lane said...

Ben, thanks. So true.

PD, what a beautiful scene! It should be in a movie.

ML