FLOATING IN MIND & MUSIC

Sometimes I wonder about the way my mind works - I really do. I know I've been imaginative ever since I was a child, but my associations know no end. Perhaps it's like this for everyone? It's fun and it's exciting, but you often forget what started the associations in the first place! (I'm afraid I'm a little bit like this in conversation too).

The photo above could be me when I've finished the last lap of my 1000 metres swimming. I simply float while I breathe out and relax. Alas - it's not me... (I wish it were...) It's Joni Mitchell, on the inside cover of which album? Maybe this blog post could become a kind of pop & rock quiz?

Every time I float around like this I think of Joni and this photo from "The Hissing of Summer Lawns." There is not a time spread out in water that I don't associate with it. And the title! So brilliant!

So guess who's my favourite artist? My all-time unsurpassed favourite singer? Above are my eleven LPs. And just to be sure that I'd have two of the most loved ones - "Blue" and "For the Roses" - with me at all times and easily accessible, I got the CDs as well:

I can be a slow learner and I was with Joni really. But I have two vivid memories of my discovery of her music. One was in April 1974, when my friend Anne-Kari and I were cramming for exams and she pulled out "Court and Spark" - on cassette of course - and said "Let's listen to this while we study." Okay. We didn't study. We listened. (By the way she's the one who gave me the CD on the bottom left - "Both Sides Now," performed with an orchestra. The last Joni-CD I got. Full circle)!

I had Joni in mind for a few months, until I moved to Kuwait later that year. Nineteen going on twenty and with a weakness for American guys with big moustaches (loved that Mark Spitz!), I fell for one of the teachers at the American School (Wow, suddenly I remember that he was from Milwaukee, Wisconsin - I'm truly impressed with that hard disc we call the brain...).

Kuwait 1974-75

Well, my teacher boyfriend would put on a cassette called "For the Roses" and it would turn itself over and over again automatically while we were making ourselves busy. Accompanied by Joni. No wonder this became one of my favourites...

If you're driving into town with a dark cloud above you
Dial in the number who's bound to love you
Oh, honey, you turn me on, I'm a radio
I'm a country station, I'm a little bit corny
I'm a wild wood flower waving for you
Broadcasting tower, waving for you
And I'm sending you out this signal here
I hope you can pick it loud and clear
I know you don't like weak women, you get bored so quick
And you don't like strong women 'cause they're hip to your tricks
It's been dirty for dirty down the line
But you know I come when you whistle, when you're loving and kind.

Kuwait 1974-75

My greatest concert moment ever was when I went to see Joni Mitchell in Oslo in May 1983, her one and only concert in Norway, as far as I know. I was alone. I was pregnant with my first baby. I remember what I was wearing - a red coat. I can't remember why I was alone, but it was probably for the best. I had entered into another world, lost my power of speech, not being able to communicate anyway.

And I learnt that this is exactly what happened to my brother after the concert. At the time he worked for a music paper called Puls and was granted an interview with Joni. His boss, the late and legendary Tore Olsen, consequently had to write the article instead - "Our young reporter (my brother) grinning stupidly at Joni Mitchell and not being able to utter a single word, let alone conduct an interview." (I know I taught him about Joni - though he'd never admit it)!

Was I trying to look like Joni, or did all blondes look like this in 1975? (Salisbury Cathedral, England)

I have one big problem with Joni Mitchell. I can't really ever use her as background music. Because she compels me to listen. 

And if you wonder if I've managed to choose my favourite song - yes, I have. Here it is:  A Case of You. 

Today is my 79th blog post. Yes. I honestly wonder where it all comes from.