It's an old slogan, I even recall a store in Minneapolis that used the name "Life Socks". The pessimistic ode reminds me of the story of 'D', a young woman I met years ago. D was probably less than 18 when she began hanging out with musicians. She was sexually active in a day when everyone was, but she never really had a relationship with one guy for the first few years of her adult life. She had a sweet disposition and got along with everyone. She didn't seem to mind being used and always acted like this was her role. Then she got into hard drugs. What was unique, was that her personality didn't change, she was still sweet, never put anyone or anything down and didn't resort to stealing to feed her habit, although she did widen her sexual network to include more users, in order to get off.

At one point, we were in different cities and exchanged letters for a while. One day she wrote me saying she had finally realized she had to clean up, she wanted to change her life, and she went to rehab. As is often the case, she met her soul mate in that program. This often is not a good thing, but they both turned their lives around to the point that they got married and had a child. They embarked on a "normal" life, jobs, raising the kid, etc. I never met D's husband or saw the child, but from what I heard, they were doing allright, until the day her husband died in a car crash. Not too long after I heard that news, another piece of news came in, D herself was also killed in an auto accident. I never heard what had happened to the child or whether he or she had even survived.

Somewhere on the planet, an orphan of these two extremely unfortunate people lives (I hope). You probably have no idea how hard it is to escape from heroin addiction, but these two people somehow managed to do it against enormous odds and they were headed for a (hopefully) full life. A life outside of what we used to call the merry-go-round, the cycle of addiction where you live to cop illegal drugs and will do absolutely anything to get them.

D made a lot of people "happy" in her short lifetime and that life, more than any other, makes me hope that somehow our essence (soul, if you will) is recycled in the cosmos somewhere.

I had a dream
In the blue of the night
I was caught in the scheme
Of the Woman in White
Long ago
The mists of the past
Blackened my soul
It all happened so fast

 Down Cadillac Valley
I copped me a dime
and did it in the alley
To save a lot of time
When I almost died
As I slid to the ground
I heard kind of cry
Like a siren sound

 Then I remembered
Moments of bliss
The scent of a smile
Or the color of her kiss
But seeds of sorrow
Lay buried deep within
And I'm never gonna go
Never going back there
Ever again (never never)

 solo

 I woke with a scream
In a stone cold sweat
That can only mean
That I'll never forget
That she got my money
Nearly took my life
And I can never stop running
 From the Woman In White

 I still remember
Moments of bliss
The scent of her smile
Or the color of a kiss
But seeds of sorrow
Lay buried deep within
And I'm never gonna go
Never gonna goin' back there

 
This song is related to T, J and the Hooker and I posted the link to listen there to listen to the song.
 

In the early days of the web, when images were only in line and there was no control of the page, I recall finding the lyrics to Woman in White on a site for nurses. They mistakenly thought the Woman in White was one of them. This Woman in White bears no resemblance to a person who would selflessly comfort a suffering human being. Animals were harmed in the writing of this song.

You can play this song, "The WOman in WHite" while you read this:

This is an anecdote about two ordinary Los Angeles couples. T and his wife were dealing H out of their Hollywood apartment. J and his wife were regular customers.

I was at T's place one evening and the J family was there. I'd met them several times before. They were nice folks. He had a goatee and was a big guy and she was blonde, pleasant-looking and only a pound or two over her ideal BMI. Neither looked in any way vulgar or trashy. It's unfortunate that I can't recall what we were talking about - people do actually converse in these situations - but I do know J wanted some H and had insufficient $ to pay for it.

Although you could literally buy a house under the HollywoodLand sign on credit, you could not get a quarter bag as easily. This is where I got a surprise on the human behavior level. I've always thought that working in a bar, especially seeing everyone there from the height of a raised stage, gave a unique psychological point of view.

Forgive the digression, but a tiny bar gig anecdote comes to mind. We were playing in a club one night and a bunch of bikers came in. About an hour later, there was the pretty much inevitable bar fight, with at least 5 major events taking place at once on the dance floor. At one point a mic stand got slammed into the bass players face and one of the two guys in front of him, who was being choked at the time, squeezed out "Sorry!" before dancing away with his partner in strangulation. Unforgettable vignette! Possibly explains my great enjoyment of Sons of Anarchy. I've already said, it's The Sopranos on motorcycles and it rings true to life.

Back to the J family. So they didn't have $25, but Mrs. J made a few phone calls and was able to set up an "appointment" at a nearby motel. I thought maybe she was a hairdresser. While I talked to J within 50 yards of the sleazy motel room door (Don't ask me what I was doing with them or what could we have been discussing at that moment) Mrs met a guy in the lot and led him upstairs. I do remember J saying we needed to stop talking for a few minutes because it would "spook the John". I swear those were his exact words. So picture me standing with J in sight of a motel room where his wife was pleasuring someone for money. J was not just calm, but totally indifferent, cheerful even, as if his wife were dropping off some laundry, which was about the amount of time that we passed together in silence. I guess there wasn't much of a line. When she joined us again, I almost expected her to be holding a receipt so strong was the "business as usual" vibe.

I've quoted the Dalai Lama in the past who said that one distinct characteristic of prostitution is the mutual lack of respect. Isaac Bashevis Singer once wrote [something like] "Who knows what goes on in another man's head?", a line, I think, from the Magician of Lublin. Indeed, who knows what J was thinking.

I hope it has occurred to anyone who considers themselves human that a person can be driven to do unimaginably difficult and sometimes horribly damaging things by necessity, whether they create it themselves by being addicted to a drug or whether they just happened to be born in a place so hopeless, they will throw their children into the sea from a boat if this can obtain a better life. You shouldn't need to walk a mile in anyone's shoes to feel these things if you have a brain and a soul. What the world needs now isn't so much "love, sweet love" but empathy and respect.

Extra points:

- Who or what is The WOman in WHite?
- Why am I numbering these things in octal?