It is time for another entry celebrating my upcoming 72nd birthday on May 29th. I can’t ever remember this annual event not causing an internal fuss, but always as a positive experience. I woke up this Sunday morning, thinking I’d better get something to pop out because this unique ring around my life trunk is about to join ends, completing another cycle for me, before slowly disappearing into the growing mountain of memory.

The creative motor started making its familiar purring sounds yesterday, when I received a photograph of my grandson, Shane, and his BFF, Nina Marie. In the first eight years of his life, I think they have been a couple for around half of it. The few times I have seen them, they are completely at ease with each other and it is delicious. I don’t know how many times I came back to that picture during the course of the day. It set me on a positive track for whatever was coming in the way of a story.

This morning, the sky looked like the home of the Gods, absolutely magnificent, sharp, bright, a clear blue, with electric, white clouds delicately moving across a perfect canvas.

I have hundreds and hundreds of favorite pieces of music, many of which will stop me dead in my forward motion. I will respectfully wait until it is finished before getting started on whatever is next. In the era of the pause button, it still never feels right to cut them off before their full time has played out for me. I have my own platinum club of music that pulls me away from wherever I am and draws me into the perfect circle of their sound.

On this optimistic morning, I heard two of my all stars. Peter Gabriel’s Biko is a full on chicken skin experience for me, no matter how many times I hear it. Stephen Biko was one of those rare people who valued a cause more than his own life, a black man standing up to the brutality of the Afrikaner in apartheid South Africa. Rising above the dirge like music, there are lyrics of sadness and hope.

Aside from Sunday being the time I roll out to ride my motorcycle with The Sons of Kauai, it has always been my one day break, when I bust free from the yoke of my morning routine. I have been running at least a half hour a day for over forty years, just as predictable as the postman, weather rarely an obstacle. Around twenty-five years ago, I added a Zen inspired sitting time, with a little prayer corner thrown in. Oh, I also bow three times, forehead to floor, when I manage to survive each bout with stillness. I have a pretty well thought out, half-hour yoga practice filling out my morning dance card. Yoga came into my life a little after the sitting business. In the absence of the traumatic trio, I am flooded with an avalanche of unfettered time every Sunday.

Music has always filled the spaces in my life, smoothing out the edges between moments. Sunday mornings have been a time when the music is just a bit louder and I am more strongly connected. It is like oxygen for my soul. The second musical lasso was Richard Thompson’s 52 Vincent Black Lightening, the story of a young outlaw, his classic motorcycle and red haired Molly, painted into her black leathers. It is a short, wild ride for James and Red Molly and the moment before his last breath, they kiss and he gives her the keys to the 52 Vincent.

With some of the remaining non-musical time on my hands this morning, I gave Flaming Lips, my motorcycle, a bit of a polishing. At the appointed time, I got into my costume. Everyone who rides a bike has their individual bullshit when it relates to their appearance. On a magnificent Kauai day like today, every rider shares a kind of perfection of experience that is our secret, silently shared with each other along the way.

In the midst of today’s ride through the lush, green belly of deep Wailua, my favorite piece of music soundtracked me and I was beside myself with joy. There is something about Rhapsody in Blue that makes me feel like a conductor, owning the elegance of this incredible composition.

We rode to Hanalei Bay and by the time we got there, I was thinking about getting home and writing, but in no hurry. My son, Andy, called and we spoke for a while, mostly about his busy world. Shane had gotten out of his nightly shower and Andy put him on the line. In the midst of telling him about Hanalei and how I really liked his picture with Nina Marie, he blurted out, I love you. I wasn’t even sure he said it and somehow got him to repeat it. I have no idea what possessed him to share those three words with me, but it felt like our hearts touched each other, only the way blood can.

In seeing his picture with Nina Marie for the first time, I immediately decided joy would be the theme here. Our phone conversation a day later locked me into its cross hairs. Sharing this with you also brings me joy, just like the handful of days before my birthday. There are endless things I could bitch about, now more than ever, but not right around this time of year.