Song of the Week: “And So It Goes” by Billy Joel

Fortunately for his fans, Billy Joel has popped up on television quite a few times in the past weeks. Unfortunately, these performances were in response to tragedy. Joel was throwing his weight behind charity efforts meant to restore his home region. Happily, Joel’s played some of his radio-friendly, upbeat tunes, uplifting ballads or relevant songs like the one about the sinking of Manhattan.

But this song is too sad for a benefit concert. Instead I play it hoping to aid, even superficially, in the aftermath of a tragedy occurring in my home region.

I have formed an odd connection between this song and school shootings and for a very odd reason. Not during the news coverage of Columbine itself, but during a retrospective clip segment which aired during Katie Couric’s last morning as co-host of the Today show, the opening of “And So It Goes” played in the background as Ms. Couric talked about her experience of the incident.¹

One of his later songs, "And So It Goes" certainly isn't one of Billy Joel's most popular, or his most successful or even his best. But the imagery presented in this song is amazing. It has come to lend to my personal definition of both vulnerability and resilience.

There is a moment of loss. We feel remorse and sadness. We retreat inward in response to the pain then we feel guilty about retreating. This guilt and this pain consumes us almost entirely. While we lay feeble and vulnerable behind the barricade built deep within our heart, we completely forget the cycle that we desperately hope exists. We know there will be good just as we know there will be bad (or at least we hope we can know this). But we forget the bad while we experience the good and we forget the good while we experience the bad. But then we remember. And so it goes.

Maybe we resolve to emerge from that room within our heart, to abandon that “sanctuary safe and strong.” Maybe we just don’t have any other choice. Maybe the next years of life will be the happiest imaginable. Maybe they will be the most tragic. And so it goes.

And so it goes. We will all soon, I suppose.


____________________________
¹ It turns out, I remembered this incorrectly. I was compelled to check the video, which I found online, and “And So It Goes” is actually played during the highlights of Katie Couric’s interview with John F. Kennedy Jr., immediately before her discussion of Columbine.

The Gun Control Discussion

 

I don’t have any answers for this for this. You don’t have any answers for this. My parents don’t have any answers for this. My friends don’t have any answers for this. The Bible doesn’t have any answers for this. Nietzsche doesn’t have any answers for this. My schizophrenic neighbor Steve claims to have answers for everything, but not for this. Democrats don’t have any answers for this. Neither do the Republicans. We have the answer, though. We might have the answer for this. But we, the collective, the group, the inclusive entirety of a mass of individuals striving for a common goal, might be able to solve this problem.

Because it’s a problem. It’s one hell of a problem.

***

The human brain is quite the computer. The primary similarity between our thought-organ and the hunk of machine with which you’re reading this is their communal penchant for binary. Computers only operate in a binary system. Everything on a computer – every color, every letter, every number, every keystroke, every click of the mouse – is converted into a one or a zero, an on or an off. From this initial separation, the computer can operate.

The human brain looks at the world, no matter what its eyes tell it to see, everything is aligned around the arbitrary line separating good and evil. Every idea, before it is process by the brain, gets stuck, by pure instinct alone, with a blaring label: liberal or conservative, cynical or optimistic, right or wrong, light or dark, happy or sad. Every thought is subconsciously biased. “This idea” the brain says, “comes from an Other. Be wary.” “Clearly this person is an Other,” it whispers. Disregard everything he says.” “Oh here’s someone on my side. Let’s listen in…”

Obviously this is the problem with the United States political system. The line is already drawn. I am in the right side and you are in the wrong. All bills written in blue ink I shall be support, while all those in red I shall oppose. We make ourselves comfortable because we know what to believe based solely on the color of the tie worn by the man speaking. Never again will an idea be able sneak up on us, startle us or challenge us.

“How many fingers, Winston?” We’re just as brainwashed as anyone in 1984.

***

In the past few days, I’ve heard, seen and said many dismissive things about the “other” side, the “wrong” side of the gun control debate. A lot of people are saying “you’re only saying that because…” and claiming their rival in the debate is brainwashed by lies. Because there’s no chance that they themselves are just as misinformed as they claim their opponent to be. Worse, there are attacks on “politicizing a tragedy” and using the Newtown murders to advance a particular agenda. Of course these are the conversations (if you can call these shouting matches based entirely off party propaganda conversations) that fill public discourse after the killings in the Aurora movie theater, the killings at Virginia Tech and the massacre at Columbine.

With any hotly contested, heavily political and dangerously ambiguous issue, we all start acting like Danny DeVito in Matilda. We start sentences with rolled eyes, we sneer and snort. Sometimes we chuckle softly to ourselves. We are on the right side and you are on the wrong. And we walk away proudly. We like winning and these debates are just another way to assert our dominance. We don’t realize that the person we just debated feels the same way.

Rarely do we get opportunities to see how horribly this attitude is destroying society. The United States, currently careening towards the edge of a fiscal cliff because of this hopeless braggadocio, has had quite a few recently, at least regarding the gun control discussion.

The shockingly frequent public shooting sprees do not even tell the entire story of how much of a problem gun violence is in the United States, which far and away leads its industrialized peers in gun related killings per capita. I don’t care what you think the answer is. I don’t care if you think you know. You want the complete ban the civilian use of firearms? And you think the only answer is to arm every capable American with a concealed pistol? Good luck. Both of you can enjoy your political self-righteousness while innocent people continue to die for no goddamn good reason.

It’s kindergarten all over again. Share, compromise and don’t be a selfish, narcissistic asshole. Realize that the line dividing right and wrong, good and evil exist only because we see it there, only because we want it there. Otherwise kids will keep bleeding to death in gutters, dying from a gunshot wound. Otherwise Sandy Hook will happen again. And it will happen again, not because we have guns, not because of the nation’s mental health system, not because of the politicians, not because of the Democrats and not because of the Republicans. It will happen because we failed to have a single sincere discussion about the issue.

But it’s easier to just keep shouting.

Newtown Massacre

Last week, America had another chance to indulge a real life soap opera. It was one of those rare afternoons when the most despicable of horrors make an appearance in real life, instead of being confined to the opening scene of a Law & Order episode where they belong.

26 people died on Friday in a matter of minutes.

20 elementary kids were murdered by a violent, gun-wielding lunatic. News channels got ratings Politicians got another platform. The other kind of psychos, whose lives are so void of meaning or feeling, got another jolt. These sickos, who must make up a bulk of both news-making and news-consuming populations, counted the bodies and the bullet holes with a depraved fascination. They waited for the official death count to be released while watching interviews with wailing 6 year olds, traumatized beyond reason and crying for mommy. They wondered how this particular massacre would “rank” in history, like they’re filling out their March Madness bracket.

And the rest of us could only choke back tears and cower in the corner. Another bastion of safety and innocence has been violated by a certain subset of American culture. It is a culture that combines a glorification of violence with easy access to murderous weapons with a failing system of mental health care with the deliberateness of a seasoned chemist but only the wisdom and foresight of an eight year old boy. It is a culture that seems to be growing in strength and influence.

Stop.

I can’t stop thinking about it. Sometimes I have to tell myself to stop thinking about it. It just seems so incomprehensible. The whole story does. Of course, every time something like this happens, and it happens with an alarming frequency in the United States, it seems utterly absurd, beyond imagination. What does it mean that 26 human beings, 20 of them children not only died, but died in such a brutal, unexpected way? Can the loss be expressed to an outsider in any way other than a statistic or some tear-jerking CNN obituary? I keep saying that number over and over in my head and trying to understand its emptiness.

Stop. Sometimes I have to tell myself to stop thinking about it.

Maybe things will change. Pundits are already predicting that this latest massacre of innocents at the hands of a weaponized madman will be something of a turning point in the gun control debate. Petitions are flying around Twitter like Instagrammed pictures of Crème brûlée. Senators are calling for reinstatements of a retired ban on assault weapons. Connecticut’s Joe Lieberman has called for “a national commission on mass violence” to further efforts to prevent future violent tragedies.

How many times have these things been said before? How many Op-Eds in the New York Times and the Washington Post have been written? How many documentaries have been filmed?

No matter how much blood is lost initially, even the deepest wounds are reduced to faint scars over enough time.

For enough of us, time will pave over this trauma. For us, Newtown will become another collection of tear-jerking CNN obituaries about bravery and happiness. It will be thrown onto the pile of events that triggered a nationwide gasp, just another piece of innocent naiveté chipped away from our suit of armor. These people won’t forget, but they might as well. “Newtown – 26 dead – kids involved – 2^nd on the list” will be all that is left in the brains of most Americans within a few weeks. It won’t be that way for everyone, but it will be for enough.

The fury is good, in spite of the many cries against “politicizing the tragedy.” Sex offender registries were created because a tragedy was “politicized.” Same goes for tighter airplane security. Maybe something will come of it. It worked for Australia.

My uncle tweeted this. Consider that, for as much as these events are talk about, the mass murders of Columbine, Aurora and Virginia Tech have just become words. They haven’t been worn out from use, but they’ve been separated from their meaning. Whatever you feel right now (presumably some strain of shock and horror), do not forget it. Do not let go of it. Do not forget it.

Hopefully it motivates you. Hopefully the insufferable horror you feel right now makes you want to do something. It’s that way for me. If it motivates you to campaign for stricter gun regulations, do that. If it motivates you to campaign for easier access to sufficient mental healthcare, do that. If all it does is force you to maintain a discussion about violence, guns and their place in American culture, do that. If you aren’t motivated, if your guts don’t squirm every time you think about 6 year olds crouching under desks while bullets whiz around them or about bloodstained kindergarten classrooms, well…just don’t forget. When we talk about gun control, when we talk about violence, when we talk about Newtown, we shouldn’t talk about statistics or amendments or politics or tear jerking CNN obituaries. We should talk about this feeling. Don’t forget.

Don't Forget