See me, feel me, touch me, heal me...
Penelope has been earworming me with cuts from The Who's "rock opera" Tommy over the last few days.
I've enjoyed The Who's music generally (and Tommy in particular) since I was a teenager. SlipKid is something of a theme song for me (as you may have guessed from blogging "handle" ;-))...No easy way to be free...
Anyways, with 20/20 adult hindsight and (I flatter myself to think) greater spiritual perspective, I see a lot more in Tommy at pushing 60 than I did at pushing 21.
I don't know how much of this was in Pete Townshend's mind when he wrote the lyrics. And of course there are some variations if you take the film into account vs. the original album.
This is a bit of stream of consciousness analysis of the work...
Initial shock and disappointment finding out parental figures are human, even evil, then told that his personal experience is irrelevant.
You didn't hear it
You didn't see it
You won't say nothing to no one
ever in your life
You never heard it
Oh how absurd it
All seems without any proof
You didn't hear it
You didn't see it
You never heard it not a word of it
You won't say nothing to no one
Never tell a soul
What you know is the Truth
So he turns inward...
Deaf Dumb and blind boy
He's in a quiet vibration land
Strange as it seems his musical dreams
Ain't quite so bad
Relieved of the demands of material perception. Pure being.
Then as this "tabula rasa", he is confronted with all the vicissitudes of human existence:
They believe in dreams and all they mean
Including heaven's generosity [emphasis mine]
...
How can he be saved?
From the eternal grave
Through all this he has been able to see his own reflection in the mirror; and finds his own way to encounter the world through Pinball.
For Tommy I see Pinball as metaphor for holding things in balance, not judging, leaving things indeterminate; "surfing" the wave of probability as I've described it elsewhere in the blog.
I don't think modern quantum physics notions were au courant in the general consciousness in the late 60s when Townshend wrote Tommy, but according to WikiPedia, he wanted to incorporate ideas from the teachings of Meher Baba into the work. So there was clearly a reality as illusion, opening of Self to God Consciousness impulse behind the lyrics.
Ulitmately, Tommy's Mom, in frustration, smashes his mirror, re-awakening his perceptions back into the material world.
His unique story and experience make him a "new messiah", which people are always looking for: someone to tell them what to do (or do it for them).
The thing about "messiahs" though is that we see them as somehow different from us. We worship them and place them on pedestal; and are ultimately disappointed when they turn out to be human, or not have the answers we think we want.
If I told you what it takes
to reach the highest high
You'd laugh and say 'nothing's that simple'
But you've been told many times before
Messiahs pointed to the door
And no one had the guts to leave the temple
One song in particular, Sally Simpson, always made little sense to me when I was younger. It was really my least favorite on the album for a long time, it felt like a throw-away, like it didn't make sense in terms of the rest of the meaning of the album.
Now I see it as pivotal.
She knew from the start
Deep down in her heart
That she and Tommy were worlds apart
Sally Simpson wants to supplicate herself to Tommy (with groupie-type implications) seeing him as something different, special, and beyond her. A guru/messiah, something she isn't, something she can't be.
Her father, who's seen it all, sees the same old-same old story, predicting grief to come.
Her mother, with the wisdom of women in relation to the world tells her:
...never mind
Your part is to be what you'll be
So she goes to the Gospel show, tries to express herself to Tommy who can't distinguish her from the rest of the crowd and she gets injured for her trouble.
Little Sally was lost for the price of a touch
And a gash across her face! Oh!
Sixteen stitches put her right and her Dad said
Don't say I didn't warn yer
Sally got married to a rock musician
She met in California
Tommy always talks about the day
The disciples all went wild!
Sally still carries a scar on her cheek
To remind her of his smile
Her father says "I told you so", Sally goes on to predictable rebellious conformity, treasuring her memory of Tommy and her scar as a reminder that she's not like him, fulfilling her mother's prediction.
If you believe messiahs and gurus are different from you then you're stuck. You can't leave yourself out of the equation. If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him.
I've enjoyed The Who's music generally (and Tommy in particular) since I was a teenager. SlipKid is something of a theme song for me (as you may have guessed from blogging "handle" ;-))...No easy way to be free...
Anyways, with 20/20 adult hindsight and (I flatter myself to think) greater spiritual perspective, I see a lot more in Tommy at pushing 60 than I did at pushing 21.
I don't know how much of this was in Pete Townshend's mind when he wrote the lyrics. And of course there are some variations if you take the film into account vs. the original album.
This is a bit of stream of consciousness analysis of the work...
Initial shock and disappointment finding out parental figures are human, even evil, then told that his personal experience is irrelevant.
You didn't hear it
You didn't see it
You won't say nothing to no one
ever in your life
You never heard it
Oh how absurd it
All seems without any proof
You didn't hear it
You didn't see it
You never heard it not a word of it
You won't say nothing to no one
Never tell a soul
What you know is the Truth
So he turns inward...
Deaf Dumb and blind boy
He's in a quiet vibration land
Strange as it seems his musical dreams
Ain't quite so bad
Relieved of the demands of material perception. Pure being.
Sickness will surely take the mind
Where minds can't usually go
Come on the amazing journey
And learn all you should know
...
Nothing to say and nothing to hear
And nothing to see
Each sensation makes a note in my symphony
...
Nothing to say and nothing to hear
And nothing to see
Each sensation makes a note in my symphony
Then as this "tabula rasa", he is confronted with all the vicissitudes of human existence:
- Conventional Religion (Christmas Morning)
They believe in dreams and all they mean
Including heaven's generosity [emphasis mine]
...
How can he be saved?
From the eternal grave
- Hucksters/Cults (Eyesight to the Blind)
- Drugs/Sex/Money (Gypsy/Acid Queen)
- Human Depravity/Cruelty (Cousin Kevin)
- Human Creepiness/Kinkiness (Uncle Ernie/Fiddle About)
- Conventional Medical Science (Go to the Mirror Boy)
There is no chance, no untried operation
All hope lies with him and none with me
Imagine though the shock from isolation
When he suddenly can hear and speak and see
...
His eyes can see, his ears can hear, his lips speak
All the time the needles flick and rock
No machine can give the kind of stimulation
Needed to remove his inner block
Through all this he has been able to see his own reflection in the mirror; and finds his own way to encounter the world through Pinball.
For Tommy I see Pinball as metaphor for holding things in balance, not judging, leaving things indeterminate; "surfing" the wave of probability as I've described it elsewhere in the blog.
I don't think modern quantum physics notions were au courant in the general consciousness in the late 60s when Townshend wrote Tommy, but according to WikiPedia, he wanted to incorporate ideas from the teachings of Meher Baba into the work. So there was clearly a reality as illusion, opening of Self to God Consciousness impulse behind the lyrics.
Ulitmately, Tommy's Mom, in frustration, smashes his mirror, re-awakening his perceptions back into the material world.
His unique story and experience make him a "new messiah", which people are always looking for: someone to tell them what to do (or do it for them).
The thing about "messiahs" though is that we see them as somehow different from us. We worship them and place them on pedestal; and are ultimately disappointed when they turn out to be human, or not have the answers we think we want.
We end up filling a role of ordinary follower to somebody we see as special; but then as followers don't want to put out the effort to do what's needed; or we find out we have to change what we've been doing that doesn't work.
to reach the highest high
You'd laugh and say 'nothing's that simple'
But you've been told many times before
Messiahs pointed to the door
And no one had the guts to leave the temple
Now I see it as pivotal.
She knew from the start
Deep down in her heart
That she and Tommy were worlds apart
Sally Simpson wants to supplicate herself to Tommy (with groupie-type implications) seeing him as something different, special, and beyond her. A guru/messiah, something she isn't, something she can't be.
Her father, who's seen it all, sees the same old-same old story, predicting grief to come.
Her mother, with the wisdom of women in relation to the world tells her:
...never mind
Your part is to be what you'll be
So she goes to the Gospel show, tries to express herself to Tommy who can't distinguish her from the rest of the crowd and she gets injured for her trouble.
Little Sally was lost for the price of a touch
And a gash across her face! Oh!
Sixteen stitches put her right and her Dad said
Don't say I didn't warn yer
Sally got married to a rock musician
She met in California
Tommy always talks about the day
The disciples all went wild!
Sally still carries a scar on her cheek
To remind her of his smile
Her father says "I told you so", Sally goes on to predictable rebellious conformity, treasuring her memory of Tommy and her scar as a reminder that she's not like him, fulfilling her mother's prediction.
If you believe messiahs and gurus are different from you then you're stuck. You can't leave yourself out of the equation. If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him.
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