Mr. Carr was a student at Columbia University in New York in 1944 when he introduced Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and William Burroughs, who formed the literary nucleus of the countercultural "beatnik" movement of the 1950s. By some accounts, including his own, Mr. Carr played a role in Mr. Kerouac's legendary speedwriting of the breakthrough novel "On the Road," by supplying a Teletype roll for the manuscript. Mr. Carr was portrayed as Kenneth Wood in Kerouac's novel "The Town and the City."
Mr. Carr served two years on a manslaughter conviction for stabbing dead an older man, David Kammerer, who had a romantic crush on Carr, and throwing his body into the Hudson River in 1944. The conviction cast a pall over the emerging beats who were striving for authenticity in the gritty urban streets of America, and probably kept Carr from playing a more public role for the rest of his life.
LONDON (Reuters) - Traffic drummer Jim Capaldi died on Friday after a brief fight with stomach cancer. The 60-year-old Mr. Capaldi, born in England of Italian immigrant parents, died in his sleep at the London Clinic in the early hours with his wife and family at his bedside.
Along with Steve Winwood and Dave Mason, among others, Mr. Capaldi's driving rhythms and songwriting ability helped make the groundbreaking band Traffic a household name in the 1960s and 70s. Traffic finally broke up in 1974 after releasing 11 albums, including the iconic songs 40,000 Headmen, Dear Mr Fantasy and Paper Sun. Traffic reformed in 1993 followed by a major five-month tour of the United States in 1994, including appearing at Woodstock and playing alongside The Grateful Dead.
Mr. Capaldi was five times winner of BMI or ASCAP awards for the most played songs in America and cooperated closely with Eric Clapton, George Harrison, Bob Marley, Carlos Santana and the Eagles, among others.
In 1975 he married Brazilian-born Aninha and spent much time with her helping the street children of her native country.
"Death is neither depressing nor exciting; it is simply a fact of life." - Sogyal Rinpoche
"You see, we are all dying. It's only a matter of time. Some of us just die sooner than others." - Dudjom Rinpoche
As I recall, I have something like 8,523 days left in my life. This thought is neither depressing nor morbid - it's just a recognition of what is.
This past week of my life (don't want to call it "my short life," because after all, what is longer than your life? You will never experience anything longer than your life - your life is the longest thing you will ever know) has been pleasant enough, and very little of that pleasure has been chronicled here in this blog. Sunday, after the morning Zen service, L. called me while I was picking up a salad at Eatzi's and asked if I could also pick one up to bring over to her. I did, and we wound up spending a whole blissful day together. We saw each other again briefly at the Monday evening service.
Tuesday, we hit something of a bump in the road, but as I blogged that day, we had a long, soulful talk that evening and possibly identified a path for a more sustainable way of being together. On Wednesday, I attended a meeting of the Buckhead Community Planning Unit to discuss solid waste issues (boring!), and Thursday, I stopped by L.'s after karate for an impromptu and affectionate visit.
Tonight, we had dinner at Bone's, a great Atlanta steak house.
As predicted, the weather's turned cold once again and the furnace has been running continuously. They say that at midnight, the freezing rain and sleet will hit and possibly coat my steep driveway with a sheet of ice, trapping my car where it's parked and, ergo, effectively trapping me in my house. "The car has become the carapace, the protective and aggressive shell, of urban and suburban man" (Marshall McLuhan).
Bring it on, I say. I'm ready . . .
1 comment:
And Spencer Dryden, too.
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