go on, take a peek

Do you remember rounds? Songs ending with rounds, singing in rounds? Like this one – “Row, row, row your boat gently down the stream. Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream.” Or here’s a more popular one, for the newer-aged among you – “God only knows where I’d be without you.”

The effect, the sort of goofy pleasure of singing in rounds, came to me yesterday. Something made me call up The Beach Boys “A Day In The Life Of A Tree.” I can’t remember what, or why. It’s a song on the second side of their ‘Surf’s Up’ Album, the album with its most iconic Don Quixote-like cover, an album a few down the road from ‘Pet Sounds’ with its “God Only Knows.”

Here’s a fun story. ‘Surf’s Up’ came out late summer ’71. It took me a long while to come upon it within my ratatouille life, and fall in love with it. By that time, early 80’s, I couldn’t find a copy anywhere. Not one. During some conversation over the phone I mentioned this to Dr. Douglas Martin, he of West Los Angeles, disability service leadership, and life in a wheelchair as a result of polio. He commiserated with me, and maybe two weeks later I received a copy of the LP in the mail in Somerville, Massachusetts from Doug. My friend Doug.

Anyway, “A Day In The Life Of A Tree” is for me a stunning piece of music, always a personal favorite. And the round as the song ends is truly something else. Take a peek, with your senses, if you feel for it.