Donate to Chris Chandler and Paul Benoit’s fifth album together
Hey Y’all,
Here is all the big news in Chandler land. First and foremost Paul and I are working on a NEW ALBUM!!!!
We are well into the process. We don’t have a title. We don’t have a final song/poem selection but we are doing it! I will defiantly have a finished song for you to preview by the next news letter. But I want to tell you that recording is expensive and I am NOT going to ask for blind donations - but i will ask for pre-sales. Look, I want this. i NEED THIS. I do not want tho come off as a bum. But I am offering a signed CD for $20 with free shipping. Just put your mailing address in the message space.
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So sorry the month is over half way done and I am finally getting my news letter out. Since this is the top of the year and I have been putting this out every month since the dawn of email, should I send out a shorter one? Maybe do it twice a month, with less content?
That said (or asked really, it was a serious question which i hope you will reply to.)
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I have stopped doing the poem of the week - but instead doing a a short poetry series called, “Let’s Do a Few Lines” I do them on my You Tube Channel. I am a few subscriptions away from the number necessary to monetize it. I Truly enjoy creating these things and - what the hell - I will sign off on how good they are. So If you wanna sign off on receiving my one minute poetry short here is where ya go:
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My friend and mentor Phil Rockstroh is continuing to write some of the best stuff I’ve ever read and he has started a substack page. He was the primary influence as I first began to write. I highly encourage you to check it out and subscribe.
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If you can support me or this newsletter you can do it here:
Enough! Enough of the crass commercial announcements!
Here is your:
M.U.S.E. .A.N.D. .W.H.I.R.L.E.D. .R.E.T.O.RT.
Oakland, CA
January 16
(My birthday)
Paradise... lost.
Perhaps not the way you are thinking.
~
Just before the pandemic,
as we walked through the streets of San Francisco,
Oakland, Sacramento, Berkeley...
~
Complaining then that the elastic band
on our N-95 masks fits too tight.
~
The ones that we wore for very different reasons.
And then remembering
the lives that have been more
severely impacted than our own.
~
Loss of life.
Loss of family.
Loss of home.
Loss of community.
~
Big Picture stuff.
~
But, every big picture is composed
of many smaller ones.
~
Smaller ones that depict lives impacted
in ways we don’t even think of,
can’t even think of.
Even though,
It is the smaller picture
that depicts the greater reality.
~
The littlest birds sing the prettiest songs.
~
In Paradise California,
before the fire,
like in any community,
everyday dramas were being played out on a routine Sunday morning sidewalk basis.
~
“Ya know what pisses me off - is that they do the trash pickups on Mondays - and almost every Month has a Monday holiday. Veterans day, NO TRASH PICKUP? Whats up with that?”
~
“Do you think they will ever fix those potholes?”
~
“Hey, did you see the Paradise Adventist Academy
advanced to the Northern California Semi-Finals?”
~
“Paradise Adventist? Really?
Do they even have a football team?”
~
“Volleyball.
~
Girls Volleyball.”
~
Before the fire,
these were the buzzes
of front porch
morning coffee neighborhood chit chat.
~
The stories on the local AM radio station,
the front pages of the local newspaper
“The Paradise Post”
that is now in ashes.
~
And although in ashes The Paradise Post
- through the help of her sister paper The Chico Enterprise-Record -
continues to publish as they had...
Only,
Now there is no town to deliver to,
so they deliver
to the evacuation centers.
~
For,
we all know
what happened
over a two day period.
What started as a small brush fire well west of the town
swelled into a bonfire
that turned Paradise
into Hades
in a matter of hours.
~
~
~
~
~
Potholes and Volleyball are no longer on anyone’s mind.
~
Grab your family and escape...
Escape...
Escape...
~
But not all of the pre fire drama
of Paradise’s “Refuse to Die Community”
was turned into floating ash
that settled on to your car windshield
in Berkeley.
~
There are twelve players on The Paradise Adventist Academy Girls Varsity Volley Ball Squad.
GO COUGARS!
~
They and their families all made it out alive...
Barely.
~
Eight of them
and their families
had lost their homes.
Lost everything.
~
They were all spread out
staying in shelters or with relatives
from Shasta to Stockton.
~
How could there be a Volley Ball game?
~
But, this is the semi finals.
No sport in the school’s long history
had ever made it that far.
~
Their opponent...
The Forest Lake Lady Falcons assumed
that the team would have to forfeit,
and the Falcons began
preparing for their next opponent.
~
But the Cougars refused to be defeated!
~
Yet, the Cougars had no equipment,
no uniforms,
no place to practice.
NO PLACE TO PLAY.
No Homes.
~
But these girls? Now, that is a different story.
~
I thank God they don’t see things like you and me.
~
NEVER
under-estimate the power of young women.
~
These girls took to social media and they let it be known that THEY needed the game to go on!
~
In Solidarity, the Lady Falcons agreed to host...
~
The Lady Cougars,
their lives in total chaos,
arranged for transportation
from points unknown
to Auburn, California,
home of the Forest Lake Christian School.
~
met in the high-school parking lot
for the first time since the fire.
One of them had manage to scrounge
twelve white tee shirts from a shelter.
Another had a sharpie.
Together,
they scrawled Cougars on the shirts
with numbers on the back.
Together,
they linked arms.... United.
Defiant.
~
Together,
they marched into the opposing team’s gym.
~
There, they were met with something
that few “visiting teams” receive
when they walk into an opposing teams’ home:
~
They were met
with a standing ovation.
~
They were also met with much more.
~
Within 24 hours of the devastating fire,
the Lake Park Falcons
had collected donations of $1600
~
Laid out on the visiting bench
were new knee pads,
socks,
and most impressively...
~
New uniforms.
~
Each matched with the players’
number and name on the back.
Matched perfectly
with what they would have worn
if the fire had not happened.
The Paradise Lady Cougars
went on to win that game
against the Forest Lake Falcons.
~
They won the game,
but not the match.
~
But in truth, they won much more
than any volleyball squad could,
including being the champions of my heart!
~
It would be poetic to say that the Lady Cougars went on to win the state championship,
hell, the national championship.
~
In a way they did.
~
Instead, what actually happened,
Paradise lost.
~
They had to...
~
because, my friends,
~
this is not Hollywood
~
~
THIS IS PARADISE!
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If you would like to help support Musicians in the Los Angeles area effected by the fires there you may do so here though The American Federation of Musicians #47 Los Angelas.
