Love Advisory

"When you say 'I love you', you should know at least one of those people."

Oscar Brown, Jr

(Photo courtesy of Mike Tungate and Wikimedia Commons.)

WW: Flashbulbs

(Unopened box found in my mom's house. Hoarded and babied, because expensive. Now worth nothing. Sort of adds insult to injury to photograph it with a digital camera. By the way, that outfit the young lady is holding is pretty much exactly what I was shooting back then.)

Good Song: Toujours debout

Renaud was one of the heroes of my youth. Equal parts Springsteen and Dylan (to whom his voice bears an unmistakable family resemblance), his lyrics have a Villonesque flourish that only a French proletarian poet could wield. Throughout the 70s and 80s he was the public conscience of his country – often much to its dismay. Calling down national hypocrisies and – unforgivably – making merry with the French language, Renaud kept the whole nation turning on a spit.

Then he married and became a father. Some whined about the conjugal turn some of his songs took, but the halogen candour he once brought to politics he now turned on domestic life. His love songs were devastating: an adulterer begs his wife not to leave, without quite being able to articulate why not; a parent forbids the child he's just beaten to run away from home.

And then Renaud just… disappeared. Much later we'd learn that he'd poured so much alcohol on his family that his wife took the kid and left. Then he lost his recording contracts. Then his friends.

One morning eight years later he woke, showered and shaved, and called his old studio to book time.

"Not possible," he was told.

Why not?

"Renaud is dead."

Renaud assured him he was not, but with that implacability only those who know the French can fully conceive, the voice on the phone would not relent.

In the end he had to call a collaborator from his previous life, and, after a similar conversation, ask him to call the studio and book time.

The result of those sessions was 2002's Boucane d'enfer (a play on "unholy racket" and "whiff of Hell"), Renaud's all-time bestselling album.

I wish the story ended there, but sadly the intervening years have brought relapses: lost weekends, lost weeks, lost months; a second wife departed with a second child. Renaud battles addiction like a rat with a boa constrictor: he survives, but he doesn't win.

And the press haven't been kind, to say no more.

Which is why this song, appearing after yet another long silence, belted out in Renaud's trademark working-Paris growl, grown breathless and broken, hit me so hard.

Because it sounds just like him, and so different. Because his voice reminds me of my past, and also of my own serial resurrections. And because I've always loved curses spat in the face of a bully.

Here-follow the lyrics. As usual the translation is mine, and it's been the usual heartbreaking grind. How do you land the one-two punch of « Qui me dépriment, et qui m'impriment » with the English "Who depress me and print me?" (You'll see what I went with below.)

There's also profound poignance in a hooligan like Renaud suddenly opting for the inoffensive; « nom de nom », a softer form of the French "God dammit!", has a pathos that "dang it" doesn't really convey.

More globally, the song just comes off as more petulant and defensive in English. The original French is more along the lines of "nice try, dickweeds", with a warm sense of renewal and reunion.

But not to translate would leave non-francophone readers in the dark, and that's not something I'm prepared to do.

So, with apologies for the treason, the gist:

TOUJOURS DEBOUT
par Renaud

Toujours vivant, rassurez-vous Toujours la banane, toujours debout J'suis retapé, remis sur pieds Droit sur mes guibolles, ressuscité Tous ceux qui tombent autour de moi C'est l'hécatombe, c'est Guernica Tous ceux qui tombent, tombent à tour de bras Et moi je suis toujours là Toujours vivant, rassurez-vous Toujours la banane, toujours debout Il est pas né ou mal barré Le crétin qui voudra m'enterrer J'fais plus les télés, j'ai même pas internet Arrêté de parler aux radios, aux gazettes Ils m'ont cru disparu, on me croit oublié Dites à ces trous du cul, j'continue d'chanter Et puis tous ces chasseurs de primes Paparazzis en embuscade Qui me dépriment, et qui m'impriment Que des ragots, que des salades Toutes ces rumeurs sur ma santé On va pas en faire une affaire Et que celui qui n'a jamais titubé Me jette la première bière Toujours vivant, rassurez vous Toujours la banane, toujours debout Il est pas né ou mal barré L'idiot qui voudrait m'remplacer Je dois tout l'temps faire gaffe Derrière chaque buisson A tous ces photographes Qui vous prennent pour des cons Ceux là m'ont enterré Un peu prématuré Dites à ces enfoirés j'continue d'chanter Mais je n'vous ai jamais oublié Et pour ceux à qui j'ai manqué Vous les fidèles, je reviens vous dire merci Vous m'avez manqué vous aussi Trop content de vous retrouver Je veux continuer nom de nom Continuer à écrire et à chanter Chanter pour tous les sauvageons Toujours vivant, rassurez-vous Toujours la banane, toujours debout Il est pas né ou mal barré Le couillon qui voudra m'enterrer Depuis quelques années, je me suis éloigné Je vis près des lavandes sous les oliviers Ils m'ont cru disparu, on me croit oublié Ces trous du cul peuvent continuer d'baver Moi sur mon p'tit chemin j'continue d'chanter

Still alive, rest assured Still smiling, still standing I'm reconditioned, back on my feet Steady on my pins, resuscitated People falling all around This place is a slaughterhouse, it's like Guernica All these people falling, discarded en masse And me still here Still alive, rest assured Still smiling, still standing Ain't been born, or else just out of luck The jerk who's gonna bury me Don't do no more TV, don't even have Internet Don't talk to radio or newspaper types They thought I was dead, think I'm forgotten Tell those assholes I'm still singing And then all those bounty hunters Ambush paparazzi Who depress and im-press me All the scams and scandals All these rumours about my health We won't pay them any mind And let him who has never stumbled Buy the first round Still alive, rest assured Still smiling, still standing Ain't been born, or else just out of luck The jerk who's gonna displace me I gotta always look Behind every bush For those photographers Who think you're all dumbshits Those guys buried me A bit too soon Tell those jackasses I'm still singing But I never forgot you And to those who missed me You the faithful, I'm back to say thank you I missed you, too Delighted to see you're still here I want to carry on, dang it Carry on writing and singing Singing for all the untamed Still alive, rest assured Still smiling, still standing Ain't been born, or else just out of luck The wanker who's gonna bury me I've been away for a few years Living close the ground, beneath the olive trees They thought I was dead, they think I've been forgotten Let the assholes blather on Here on my little journey, I'm still singing

(1978 photo of Renaud Séchan courtesy of Paul Kiuj and Wikimedia Commons.)

WW: Steel penny

(Found this on the cellar floor beneath my grandfather's house. It's a 1943 steel penny. [Here magnetically stuck to the refrigerator.] From a time when American copper was needed for other things.

And on a tangentially related note: this is Post #500 for Rusty Ring!)

359º Kyôsaku

"A point of view is merely one degree out of the three hundred and sixty degrees of a circle; each point of view can see from that point only, and so is three hundred and fifty nine degrees blind."

Ven. Anzan Hoshin roshi

(From Before Thinking.)

(Photo courtesy of Nevit Dilmen and Wikimedia Commons.)

WW: Whale's jaw bone

(This is just one corner of it, actually. Came in on a winter storm. The fat end, beneath my foot, is about four inches thick. Very heavy; at least 30 pounds. Fortunately no-one else was on the beach to wonder what the hell I was doing, laying down on the sand to provide scale.)

The Middle Way

I recently encountered this graphic on Facebook. Sums up the situation nicely, though I might have called the right wing of Integrity "puritanism", or maybe just "being that guy". Note that the Buddha made this principle central (no pun intended) to his teaching 2500 years ago.

These days I seem to encounter the moral right more often than the moral left. (I'm not talking about the political right and left; the moral right includes organic-insisters, McDonald's-shunners, business sceptics, and Christmas re-labellers, as much as is does Red baiters, Second Amendment Witnesses, and guru-worshipers. Interestingly, sexual conduct fetishists are equally represented on both sides, though their preferred targets differ.)

It's hard for some to grasp that decency means living with complexity. The ethically lazy skirt such heavy lifting by sidling down one of two side aisles: refusing to recognise the need for regulation -- the hippy-dippy, whatever-dude leftist response -- or shooting down challengers to one's glorious Easy Answer with a silver bullet -- the dogfaced, procrustean prejudice of the right.

Both represent ego run amok. The Buddha's programme to bring it back under control boils down to "doing my best". Doing nothing is doing nothing, and therefore not doing your best. And doing just one thing over and over is not doing most of the full spectrum of things you're capable of. And therefore not doing your best.

Moral extremists tend to reproach centrists (which includes all authentic Buddhists) as shiftless and weak-willed, but in fact, that's them. They adopt one simplistic principle and refuse to do any dead reckoning thereafter. As the Buddha pointed out, they veer immediately off-course, and will never sail straight again until they abandon the delusion of self and get back to the relentless, inescapable work of triangulation.

'Cause there ain't no here nor there in the real world. You calibrate your moral sextant every minute of every day, or you run onto the rocks. (Then there's the karma you incur convincing others to follow you onto the rocks, but that's another post.)

Anyway, the person who created the graphic gets it. If you don't cleave to the channel, you founder.