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Talking Story with Arlo |
Picture this, cats and kittens: I’m 58, a gray-bearded beatnik with a heart full of stardust and a rent bill that won’t quit. Life?
It’s been a hamster wheel of legal tender lately—waking up to the gray dawn creeping through my window blinds, chugging coffee blacker than a Kerouac poem, and schlepping off to the gig.
Punch the clock, shuffle the papers, nod at the same tired faces. Then it’s back home, where the couch sags under my bones, and the TV hums a lullaby of reruns.
Morning light streams in, and boom—do it again. Amen. Say it again. Amen.
Just like Jackson Browne crooned in The Pretender, I’m caught between the longing for love and the struggle for the green stuff, the almighty dollar that keeps the landlord from kicking me to the curb.
It’s a grind, man. A soul-sucking loop where joy’s a rumor and the freeway’s shade is my only shade. I’d pack my lunch, clock in, clock out, and dream of some greater awakening—something to bust me out of this monochrome movie.
But the days just rolled by, heavy as a junkman’s fender, and I was starting to think the veterans dreaming at the traffic light had it better than me. At least they had dreams.
Then—they showed up. The Groovatrons from Funkadelia. Oh, daddy-o, these ain’t your average visitors. These are neutrino-sized funk fairies, zipping through the universe faster than a Coltrane solo, slipping into your soul like a secret chord.
They’re from a dimension where the air’s made of glitter and the rivers flow with pure, unadulterated groove. And one day, while I’m slumped over my desk, counting paperclips and cursing the clock, I feel it—a tingle, a shimmer, a cosmic kazoo buzzing in my chest.
The Groovatrons have landed, and they’re here to flip my script.
First thing they do? They nudge me. Not a shove, not a push, but a gentle, funky nudge that says, “Arlo, my man, this ain’t the whole gig. You’re not just a cog in the machine—you’re a supernova waiting to pop!”
And suddenly, I’m seeing the world through tie-dye goggles. The office? It’s not a prison—it’s a stage. My desk? A drum kit begging for a beat. My stapler? A maraca in disguise. The Groovatrons whisper, “Dance, daddy-o, dance!” and before I know it, I’m tapping my feet under the desk, swaying like a willow in a breeze nobody else can feel.
They teach me the Funkadelian Two-Step—a move so smooth it could charm a tax collector.
It’s all hips and heart, a wiggle that says, “I’m here, I’m alive, and I ain’t afraid to shake it!” I start grooving down the hall, past the water cooler where Debbie from accounting gives me the side-eye.
But the Groovatrons nudge me again—“Engage, man, connect!”—so I flash her a grin and say, “Hey, Deb, ever try dancing to the photocopier’s beat?” She blinks, then laughs, and suddenly we’re trading steps like it’s a jazz jam at midnight.
The office starts humming, not with fluorescent despair, but with a low-down, funky vibe.
Work’s still there, sure. The rent’s still due, the freeway’s still roaring outside my window. But the Groovatrons? They’ve rewired my soul. I wake up now, and instead of groaning, I’m humming Browne’s tune with a twist:
“When the morning light comes streaming in, I’ll get up and groove it again—Amen!”
I pack my lunch with a flourish—sandwiches cut into star shapes, a thermos of tea spiked with cinnamon dreams. At the gig, I’m not just shuffling papers—I’m spinning stories, cracking jokes, turning memos into haikus.
“Paper clips gleam bright / Stapler sings a steel song / Coffee fuels the soul.”
My coworkers catch the wave, and soon we’re a crew of merry pranksters, laughing through the grind.
The Groovatrons don’t stop there. They nudge me outward—into the streets, where the sirens sing and the church bells ring.
The Groovatrons don’t stop there. They nudge me outward—into the streets, where the sirens sing and the church bells ring.
I start chatting up the junkman, who’s got a laugh like a bassline, and the kids waiting for the ice cream truck, who teach me their secret handshake. I’m dancing with strangers, twirling old ladies at the bus stop, high-fiving vets dreaming of the fight.
Life’s still a struggle for the legal tender—gotta pay the piper, right?—but it’s a dance now, not a dirge. The Groovatrons have me seeing every dollar as a ticket to the next groove, every workday as a chance to spread the funk.
Jackson Browne knew the score: we’re all pretenders, caught in the push-pull of love and loot. But with the Groovatrons riding shotgun in my soul, I’m pretending with a purpose. I rent my house in the freeway’s shade, but now it’s a palace of positivity—walls plastered with poems, floors vibrating with beats.
I’m not just surviving; I’m thriving, a beatnik supernova exploding with joy. The morning light streams in, and I don’t just get up—I leap up, ready to shimmy through the day, to turn the struggle into a strut.
So here’s the word from your ol’ pal Arlo: if life’s got you down, if the legal tender’s got you in a chokehold, listen close.
The Groovatrons are out there, neutrino-sized and funky-fresh, ready to nudge you into the light.
They’ll teach you to dance, to laugh, to turn the grind into a grand ol’ time. You’ve got to work, sure, got to make that bread—but with a little Funkadelian magic, you’ll do it with a skip and a hop, a grin and a groove.
Amen, cats. Say it again. Amen
Groove is in the Heart - Arlo
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