MAY 23, 2017 // MARYLAND KIDS

BIG BEAR, CALIFORNIA

I was living in Big Bear in my friend’s cabin. I have no recollection of making this song up or recording it. Those were strange and lonely times. I would work on music or archiving projects most of the day, do a bit of physical exercise, eat dinner, tidy up the cabin, then drink beer on the front porch in the night time and listen to baseball games. I would go for days and days at a time without ever talking to another person. There were pine trees, mountains, and bikers. There was one of those cabin looking bars with a dead deer head that someone accused me of liking Hillary Clinton in. There was an old graveyard that people put colorful pinwheels by the stones sometimes, those 1950s looking trailer parkers, and people who kept big barking dogs chained under the trees in their yard. It didn’t feel close to Los Angeles at all. I got some work done. I’m grateful for my time in that place. The song, presumably is about how you can’t fret about adults going off their rockers. My best friend and I, they told us we were heading for ditches and jails a lot when we were kids. I can hear a voice now saying “no they didn’t” in a dismissive tone. Yes, they definitely did. The first time I remember I was in fourth grade and the principle had us in his office for stomping on ketchup packets in the cafeteria and he told us we were going to wind up in jail. It’s probably true for lots of kids that adults tell them this. It’s a weird thing to tell a kid. I mean, it might be true, but it’s like saying the sky is blue and taking credit for the prediction. I don’t like fortune tellers. Never have.