Floridays looking for better days.

Yep a post about Jimmy.

My take as a Artist, writer and eternal summer chaser.

I was turned on to Jimmy when I started dating, (I was using alcohol and coke, so pre recovery days), a Guy who was 18 years older then me. He had a Doctorate Degree in Art (I know crazy right?) from Otis Parsons Institute of Art. In Cali. He knew Jimmy. They had hung out together in Laguna Beach where this guy I was dating lived. We started listening to his early work together. This was the mid 1980's. He told me stories of Jimmy. Alot.

I think Floridays had just come out. 

1986 era. 

So I listened to it. I heard his Mark Twain Story Telling. His love of Florida, the beach lifestyle. Peppered with sadness. 

Floridays By Jimmy Buffet

 

I come from where the rivers meet the sea

That's part of why I'm so wild and fancy free

I was early into crazy ways

My folks said, "It's just a phase"

They were hoping for better days

Now in my line of work I seem to see a lot more than most

Write 'em down, pas 'em around

It's the gospel from the coast

Reflections, not just replays

Takin' time to escape the maze

Lookin' for better days

I spent a year of my life one night

On the beaches in old Beirut

Seems that all they're aimin' for there

Is to hang around and shoot

Each others' lives away

Bloody winds on a distant bay

They're lookin' for better days

Looking to the left, looking to the right

Looking to the stars to shed some light

Hoping for a breath, hoping for break

Hopin' for the give without the take

The dreamers line the state road

Just to watch the runway show

Slouched behind their steering wheels

They just watch the big jets go

Streakin' through the morning haze

Focal point of a distant gaze

Lookin' for better days

Pale invaders and tanned crusaders

Are worshipping the sun

On the corner of "walk" and "don't walk"

Somewhere on US 1

I'm back to livin' Floridays

Blue skies and ultra-violet rays

Lookin' for better days

I'm back to livin' Floridays

Blue skies and ultra-violet rays

Lookin' for better days, lookin' for better days

Lookin' for Floridays

Better days, better days

Everybody's lookin' for better days

Somewhere beneath the shining star

Better days, mon't you take me to better days

Better days, I sure could use a few better days

Floridays

I think this sums up Old Florida. Looking for better days. Sunshine and Tan crusaders. The Sun is so incredibly bright and Intense along the Florida Coast. 

Frank Zappa had a kewl quote about moving to Florida as a kid I always remember. 

Frank remembers 

All of a sudden I'm in a state that was entirely in Technicolor. All my life I’d been seeing things in black and white while living in Maryland. And here I was down there and it was flowers, trees, it was great. It seemed like suddenly, BOOM!, here’s Technicolor.

I think that's What Jimmy saw. Technicolor. Being near or on the water seemed to be Jimmy's birthright. All that Color!!!!! It's what brought me here to my adopted home back in 1992.

Jimmy did a lot of good for making this world a fun place to live among it's depressing random heartaches and sorrows. Like the party has to keep going on, the sand and the sun will be there tomorrow. 

In his Forty's Jimmy knew he needed to sober up, and he did therapy to deal with it. He didn't like playing hungover at his concerts, and didn't like cheating his fans. He credits living to his 70's with that decision. 

He knew the party needed to go on, but not to the point of no return. 

He spread a lot of happiness. He made more money then any other Musician. On his business sense, not his records. 

Buffett's first big hit, “Come Monday,” originated from his own need to escape depressing times. “I was deathly depressed and living in Howard Johnson's in Marin County,” he confessed to David Letterman in 1983, “and this song kept me from killing myself.

Ok that doesn't sound so carefree. But I've shared before that my best Art and writings come from my Major drug resistant Depression that puts me at the brink of suicide ideation, which I inherited. 

Maybe that's what I heard in his songs, in his voice. A sadness behind wanting to make others happy, others smile. The tears of a clown when no one's around.

 

I remind myself of this line from his song Changes in Attitudes Changes in Latitudes:

If we couldn’t laugh we would all go insane.

He always seemed like a guy who loved his fans. He loved playing music. He loved the water, the sun, the sand. 

He grew up in a very Catholic home. Catholic Schools, etc. He was supposed to be a Jesuit Priest or a Naval Academy Grad. That's the polar opposite of what he became. But I think his Catholic upbringing was evident in his caring for others, his fans and his generosity. 

I was told a story the other day about a guy who was one of the 12 people he kept for his yearly tours and gigs. Jimmy knew he was going to pass and he made sure that for the next two years the crew would be paid as if Jimmy was still touring. That's the kind of guy he was. Caring til the end. 

And I'm sure all the other stories we don't know of his giving and caring nature. 

None of us get out of this world alive, but we can leave it a little brighter and happier then when we showed up. 

I've had a hard time writing this blog post. I had to stop and start. Put it away for a bit. He's been on my mind. 

I started praying for his soul to be raised to heaven if in Purgatory. Yes, I'm Catholic and this is what we do when someone passes. I even kept getting the word God in this article when I was writing it, the word randomly came up in sentences, when I was typing this Blogpost. 😧🤯

So yah I pray Jimmy is in Heaven singing, strumming and smiling at Adonai. 

RIP Jimmy

And gracias. .

Oxoxox 

Shanti