Getting old is not pretty.

And it’s pretty damn weird.

This week Nathan Hubbard disconnected from Ticketmaster. And I didn’t care.

Don’t get me wrong, Nathan’s a friend of mine. I’m concerned for his future path. But once upon a time the shenanigans, the comings and goings of the music business, were my lifeblood. But now I know CEOs come and go, and very few are remembered. It’s the way of the world.

Same deal with the records. So many of those albums I drooled over in the sixties and seventies will never be heard again. Certainly not after I die. Yes, you’ve got a better chance of lasting if you’re an artist, but that does not ensure longevity.

Kind of like this summer’s movies. I read a great article about them. How you can’t even remember this summer’s hits! It’s not a whole hell of a lot different in the music business. Top Forty songs are fodder, they go up the chart, fall off, and deleting them from your hard drive is even easier than trashing the physical product. Then again, with streaming you never have to own it, you’ve got no investment, so if you abandon a record or an act…c’est la vie!

But when you’re younger everything’s so damn important. You’re still figuring out how the world works. It’s all brand new. Then it gets old, and you die. Would it be different if we lived to 120? Would the arc change, would we still be invested in the evanescent or…

The bottom line is you age and your body just can’t do it anymore, never mind your mind. You’ve got aches and pains. And the reason the original band can’t get back together is someone is sick. It’s like we’re all Yugos, built to fall apart, in a zillion different ways. And some people can’t even afford a mechanic.

So I’m trying to figure out where I’m going. I ain’t got time to waste. And there are plenty of people doing just that. What’s important?

And I was contemplating all this when I noticed a sensitivity in my tooth.

Huh? Another one? I’m still not sure the one on the left side, fixed in Colorado, is copacetic. I’ve been chewing on the right side and then…when I brushed my teeth the cold water made me jump. When I ground my teeth…I got sensitivity. But I’m a hearty chap, I can tolerate pain. But when I was eating a salad for dinner last night and got the pain, and it returned when I went to brush my teeth, I wondered…did I need to do something about this?

I’m the king of anxiety. I’m going out of town next week. Is this just a fantasy, psychosomatic pain, that is here today and will go away?

That’s what I want to believe. I want to believe there’s never anything wrong, and if I just tough it out, I’ll prove it.

But that’s gotten me into a lot of trouble.

So I bounce between being unable to sleep, staying up until the crack of dawn when I can call the dentist, or forgetting about the whole damn thing.

The dentist… Mine is in Alaska, boating. He’s not back until September. And his old associate started up his own practice, should I call that dude?

I became completely paralyzed. But when I crunched on a piece of cauliflower at Whole Foods and got the pain I felt I needed to do something. But I couldn’t. So I called Felice.

Her issues are completely different. She can be calm, cool and collected. She said she’d go to the dentist.

So I decided to do this.

At quarter to four on a Friday afternoon.

He couldn’t see me today.

He doesn’t work on Monday.

I’m solidly booked on Tuesday.

Could I come at 8 or 8:30 tomorrow morning?

Huh?

I’m a late night person. This is like asking Tom Waits to do his act at 10 A.M…

But at least they were willing to see me.

I called Felice again.

I called back and said I’d come at 8:30.

But now they said 8 only.

Huh? What happened in three minutes on a Friday afternoon?

And I know not to push, but I asked again, and they said I could come today at 5, but I might have to wait.

SURE! I’ll wait all day! Just don’t make me get up in the morning!

And I didn’t have to wait at all.

And at first the dentist couldn’t find the pain.

But he had the wrong tooth. I had the wrong tooth. I told him it was the second from the back.

But it was in the rearmost position. And there was a crack. Deep and…

Got to give this guy credit, he gave me a whole education, and I won’t bore you, but just get to the bottom line.

I either need a crown or an implant. And the odds of a crown working are 30%.

So he shaved down the tooth so I wouldn’t grind it and sent me on my way, with an appointment in September and…I’m still in shock.

I’m always wondering. Did I play it right? Did I make the right choices, did I do enough research, would someone else say something different?

And don’t bombard me with your guy or your snap judgment. I’m invested.

But that doesn’t mean I won’t keep contemplating the situation, keep running the facts and the possible scenarios through my brain like a PGA golfer analyzing yesterday’s mistakes and trying to suss out tomorrow’s cup placements.

So what does this mean? Do I have to give up trail mix?

I did. For months.

But I decided to go back. And it was the day I went to the market and bought some that I got this pain, Sunday ten days/two weeks ago.

I mean I don’t smoke and I don’t drink and I can live in denial, but…

Did you see that guy Allen Lanier, of Blue Oyster Cult, died? He smoked himself to death.

And I’m on this health thing more than anybody I know.

But I seem to have more problems than anybody I know.

Then again, seemingly everybody I know got cancer in the last two years. Oh, that’s an overstatement, but it was prevalent, and as Led Zeppelin put it…your time is gonna come.

You’re gonna die. Sure as shit. We used to love you, but it’s all over now.

And some people are rewriting history. They coulda, if the world weren’t stacked against them. Hey, the world’s stacked against everybody. If you think the winners lucked out, you’ve never played the game.

And some delusionally still believe they’re gonna win, even though they can’t because they’re either afraid or don’t know how the game is played.

And some just invest in their kids. And I’m into that, we’re all just animals after all, isn’t that what David Byrne sang? Just as long as you don’t go on pontificating how great your progeny are, I’m cool. Tell me you’re watching TV with them, having a laugh, then I feel like I’m missing out.

And then there are some who try to deny aging. You know, they get plastic surgery and exercise ad infinitum, as if God and biology were listening.

They’re not, just in case you’re wondering.

And the one thing you don’t want to do is miss out on opportunities, you don’t want to live your whole life and end up with regrets. And the dirty little secret is it takes your whole damn life to do one tiny thing, just maybe. And too many people are trying to do everything and accomplish nothing.

But the closer you get to the destination, the less it means. Money, power, they’re worth something, but not everything.

Hell, there was a great Steve Wozniak article in “New York” magazine. Kim Kardashian called him to do a favor for Kanye. Woz was game, but he didn’t know who Kim was and had never heard any of Kanye’s music. Yup, you think you’re so damn important, with photogs bugging you at LAX, but the truth is most people don’t care. If you’re doing it to impress others, boy are you wasting your time.

So, we baby boomers want to believe we’ll be young forever.

But this is not true.

But equally weird is we’re living longer than previous generations. What do we do with the time when we don’t want to hear the music, don’t want to go to the movies and know that the younger generations, still beholden to the cardboard reality constructed by the media, have already written us off.

I’m trying to figure it out.

And you wonder why we wanted to move to California…

I used to live in New York City
Everything there was dark and dirty

It’s different today. People don’t take L.A. seriously. The whole state of California, it’s lost its position in the country’s consciousness, except for maybe Silicon Valley. But once upon a time California was the repository of our nation’s hopes and dreams, it’s where you went to let go and be your true self. And despite all the bad press, about taxes and social problems…it still is.

You drive up PCH, you stand on the beach at Malibu…and you believe you’ve been delivered, you’ve finally made it to the promised land.

Once upon a time, young girls did not want to be Mariah Carey, boys did not want to be Justin Timberlake, they congregated together and sang the songs of the Mamas & the Papas.

Huh?

You see John Phillips was an amazing songwriter. Not that Lou Adler was not an amazing producer. They’d both already paid their dues, Adler with Jan & Dean and so many other SoCal acts, and Phillips in the folk scene.

And then came “California Dreamin’.” Positively east coast introspective, it was a winter song about the free and easy life in the perpetual summertime of Southern California. This was the initial hit, the injection.

But unlike so many acts, the Mamas & the Papas were not one hit wonders.

The follow-up, “Monday, Monday,” was almost bigger. Because we were primed, we were ready. It was at this point that girls and boys formed groups to sing the songs. At school assemblies…

You only wished you had the long hair of Michelle, who was suddenly bigger than any movie star. She did more for blondes than Marilyn Monroe.

And suddenly it was okay to be fat, if you had talent. Everybody knew Michelle was eye candy, that Cass was the real talent.

And at this late date, my favorite is the third in a row, “I Saw Her Again.” A summer hit, it was cool and breezy and full of optimism and opportunity, just like June. Furthermore, it exploded out of the speakers. You have no idea how great we felt to be alive and hear this emanating from the speaker.

But at this late date, the one that I play most, that sets my mind adrift in its own private cocoon, is “Twelve Thirty (Young Girls Are Coming to the Canyon).”

I knew!

Not everybody did.

Not everybody on the east coast knew we were experiencing a revolution and we all had to get the hell out of there, that the world was blowing apart and was suddenly full of possibilities, and to experience them fully you had to be in California, where it wasn’t only about what you thought, but what you felt.

Young girls are coming to the canyon
And in the mornings I can see them walking

We didn’t even know it was called “Laurel,” we didn’t even know the topography of the L.A. Basin. We didn’t know every rock star we adored lived in this crazy quilt of streets in the hills, smoking dope and making music.

At first so strange to feel so friendly
To say good morning and really mean it
To feel these changes happening in me
But not to notice till I feel it

Eureka! On the east coast you had to be self-deprecating, artifice ruled, sincerity was for pussies. But in L.A. you could just be yourself. It was something you felt when you landed at the airport, when you drove across the border, you shed your old skin and became someone new.

It was different. This was pre-Manson, pre-AIDS. If you wanted to get around, you stuck out your thumb. If you were under thirty and had long hair, we trusted you.

And we ruled. Our parents weren’t wannabe hipsters wearing our clothing, rather they were completely clueless as to what was going on. It started with the Beatles, after the British Invasion the scene shifted to Los Angeles.

And at this point in time, you can barely go anywhere, the traffic’s just that bad. The smog is better, but it’s not good. Still, nobody’s breathing down your neck, nobody’s in your business. East coasters put it down, saying there’s no substance, and they’re right, it’s primarily about lifestyle, but people think out here, for themselves, after all we’re three hours behind New York, eight behind London, we’re not taking our cues from anybody else, we’re making it up for ourselves.

And the funny thing is if the Mamas & the Papas were on “Idol” or “X Factor” or “The Voice” today, they’d win. They were good-looking enough, charismatic enough, and not only could they sing, their material was better than anything on the hit parade. Today. Back then, giants walked the earth, they forced everybody to be better, there was no higher calling than being a musician.

And we knew it.

Rhinofy-Twelve Thirty (Young Girls Are Coming to the Canyon)

Ain’t that America. Where if I’ve got a loss, you’ve got to pay.

It’s not only this wrongful death lawsuit, it’s jobs. Nothing can happen that I lose mine. I don’t care if everybody has to overpay to ride in a horse and buggy, if I’ve got to sacrifice just the tiniest bit, it can’t happen.

So what we’ve got here is a raging drug addict looking to solve his economic problems by playing way too many gigs in London. Then again, AEG has experience with residences in Las Vegas, most famously with Celine Dion. Is it AEG’s responsibility to save MJ from himself?

That’s why we’ve got all these warnings on products. So idiots who don’t think won’t be able to sue. Or, to put it another way, the monkey bars have disappeared from playgrounds because little Johnny fell and got hurt, even though he was walking atop them hands-free, and your opportunity for good, clean fun is now gone.

Is AEG a mercenary company always eager to make more money?

OF COURSE!

Welcome to America. That’s what corporations do. But you don’t want to rein them in because you delusionally believe that one day you too will rule the corporate behemoth, raking in double digit millions, if you just will yourself, believe in yourself enough.

Reining them in. The government won’t do it.

So it’s left to individuals. Via lawsuits.

Now the tide has been turning for years, it’s harder to sue than ever before, class actions have been limited, same deal with whistleblowers, all because a couple of people made a lot of money, most specifically lawyers and that woman who had hot coffee spilled on her lap, and the people who can’t read the financial page who don’t realize this is a drop in the bucket compared to the corporation’s revenues get a hair up their tush and say it must be stopped.

Must be stopped. What exactly do you want AEG to do in the future?

That’s what lawsuits of this type are about. Less about compensating the individual than changing behavior.

So, in the future, a concert promoter should try and convince you to not do multiples, because you might get sick and tired from overwork, you might O.D.

As for that throat problem you’ve got backstage? Start surfing the Internet, the promoter is not going to hook you up with the local specialist for fear he’ll get sued down the line. Yup, when it turns out you’ve got a granuloma, you’ll say the doctor caused it or didn’t see it and you know who’ll be liable? The promoter!

And while you’re at it, bring your own food. And your own stagehands. The promoter’s hands will be tied.

Of course the Michael Jackson situation is not a perfect fit.

Then again, superstar musicians die on a regular basis. It’s a hard life.

And whose responsibility is that?

Caveat: I’ve neither gone to the trial nor researched the law here. I do not know how the evidence fits the statutes. For all I know, there’s a possibility a judgment in MJ’s favor can be rendered. As an attorney, I reserve judgment. But I will say all those people supporting Michael and ganging up on AEG…this is no more than hero worship. Your act can do no wrong. Furthermore, I don’t see these people lining up to make sure the underprivileged underclass gets its due in court. Screw them, they’re not FAMOUS!

Looking through some photographs I found inside a drawer
I was taken by a photograph of you
There were one or two I know that you would have liked a little more
But they didn’t show your spirit quite as true

“Fountain Of Sorrow”
Jackson Browne

“Late For The Sky” is my favorite album. Of all time.

Not at first. I liked this song, that I heard on the radio, but the rest didn’t penetrate, not yet. It happened a couple of years later, when I had a brand new stereo and too much time on my hands. That’s a funny thing about art, sometimes you’re not ready for it, but it’s there, waiting to be discovered when the time is right.

And it’s not like Jackson Browne has the best voice. And it’s not like the album contained a hit single. But it was mellifluous, and as you continued to listen it revealed its truth, which was all about relationships, life.

That’s the funny thing about guys. They rarely reveal their inner dialogue. They speak with their buddies about tech and cars and shy away from vulnerability, that’s what women are for. Wanna get in a guy’s pants? Don’t dress up like a Kardashian, don’t even bother to lose ten pounds, just draw him out, get him to talk, listen and he’s yours forever.

Or not. Because guys don’t know how to manage. You’re everything we want but if we’re involved with you we’re losing touch with who we once were and we keep wondering if your devotion portends a change in our lives that we will not be able to tolerate, that we’ll never be able to get back to the garden.

That’s what “The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P.” is all about.

Or not.

I can’t say I identify with the title character. A Harvard graduate with a slight belly who just sold his first novel and finds too many of the women in Brooklyn want him. Then again, they tell me women have become more aggressive in the years since I’ve gone to school. But when I was growing up not only could you still afford to live in Manhattan, your goal was to get straight out of Brooklyn. Still, there’s so much truth in “Nathaniel P.” that I just can’t stop reading it.

Oh, it’s one hot book.

But there’s also backlash. Maybe because its author, Adelle Waldman, broke through, she gained success. Writer jealousy is the worst. And if you characterize a scene, you’re inundated with the blowback of blowhards who tell you you just didn’t get it right.

But there’s something incredibly right about “Nathaniel P.,” in its descriptions of relationships.

Everyone I’ve ever known has wished me well
Anyway that’s how it seems it’s hard to tell
Maybe people only ask you how you’re doing
‘Cause that’s easier than letting on how little they could care
But when you know that you’ve got a real friend somewhere
Suddenly all the others are so much easier to bear

“The Late Show”
Jackson Browne

Nate actually had a hard time finding his niche. He straddled two worlds in high school, between sports and cool, and ended up nowhere.

In college, he fell in with the wrong crowd and it wasn’t until he was almost done that he found his friends. You know college, that’s where you make lifelong buddies, that’s where you discover who you are.

So now, he finds he can screw the beautiful, get laid regularly, but too often they can’t see the real Nate. That’s what draws him to Hannah. She’s real so he can be too. You don’t want to be a blank slate, you don’t want to be sans edges. It’s your personality we’re drawn to. Like Velcro, your sharp edges hook men, remember that women. Then again, what bothers Nate is when women get you but then start ruminating about it. Second-guessing themselves. This is when he’s turned off.

Now to see things clear it’s hard enough I know
While you’re waiting for reality to show
Without dreaming of the perfect love
And holding it so far above
That if you stumbled on to someone real you’d never know

“The Late Show”
Jackson Browne

Hannah is not as pretty as Elisa. What will Nate’s friends say?

Women… Wanna seal the deal? Make friends with your boyfriend’s friends. Don’t talk crap behind their back. Do your best. Otherwise, you might be abandoned. Worse, you run the risk of neutering your guy, sapping all the energy and personality from his bones to the point he becomes putty in your hands, but is positively dreadful in real life.

Not that breakups don’t occur.

Now the words had all been spoken
Somehow the feeling still wasn’t right
And still we continued on through the night

“Late For The Sky”
Jackson Browne

Are you gonna break up or stay together? The things we do for love. If you haven’t had that late night discussion, too often fueled by alcohol, wherein you recite hurts and flaws and question whether continuing makes sense, you’re not in a relationship, even if you think you are. Staying together is so hard. There are so many hurdles. You lose sight of what you’ve already built. Pay no attention to the people in the media, the celebrities who bed, wed and abandon. They’re emotional basket cases, they make you look positively normal. Get older and connection becomes ever more scary. But the thrill of it keeps you going.

We read fiction for truth.

And it’s there in “Nathaniel P.”

“She was someone Nate liked, someone he was always happy to see at a party. Yet he inevitably ran out of things to say to her.”

I remember meeting her for tennis, her passion. And when we went back to her apartment, with nothing left to say, I kept wondering how long do I have to sit here before I can bolt, without offending her.

You know, the people you see at parties you think would be just perfect if you were single. Then you are, and it never works. And even if you are single…you see someone across the room, you screw up your energy to make conversation…but it just can’t be done. At first you blame yourself, you try harder, then demoralized, you give up. It’s only much later that you realize it wasn’t you but them.

“He felt like reading. Or fooling around online.”

My two greatest passions! (Other than skiing.) What do you do when your girlfriend wants to talk or have sex or go out for an activity and you just want to be alone. How do you handle that? I’m not sure Nate knows either, but it comes up in this book.

“What began, after a few more minutes, to irritate him was that she didn’t even attempt to be engaging – made no effort toward wit or color in her replies. Only an attractive young woman would take for granted a stranger’s interest in the minutiae of her life.”

I’m the world’s greatest listener. And what bothers me most is after I’ve drawn you out, when you don’t ask a single question about me, happens all the time. It’s all me, me, me. It’s worn me out. I’ve about given up going to parties and events because I don’t want to be sold by everybody I run into. I have something to say, I like to talk too, if you want to be my friend, if you want something from me, listen! And then there are the people I just can’t crack. They’re looking over my shoulder for something better. The here and now is best. You can always dump me for better. When it appears!

“‘It’s actually amazingly annoying,’ Aurit continued. ‘But it’s also kind of tragic. She must alienate people all the time without having any idea why.'”

So this is what I’ve learned in psychotherapy. You’ve got a golf bag, with fourteen clubs, which one do you wanna use? Losers just go through life blindly, hitting the driver or the putter. Not only is that no way to play golf, it’s no way to live your life. If you’re not reading situations and figuring out how to interact, you’re home alone or losing more often than winning. I know you mean well, but if you want to get ahead you’ve got to work at it. You’ve got to question your personality, you’ve got to make changes. Not that you’ll never make mistakes, but the goal is to make fewer of them.

And I could go on forever.

But the point is, there’s a ton of truth in “Nathaniel P.” Which is even more surprising because it’s written from the male perspective by a woman. It’s rare one sex knows what goes on inside the mind of the other.

And I was thinking of “Fountain Of Sorrow” because I first heard it in the fall, and the leaves just changed in the book, it set my mind adrift. That’s how art works, it fires the synapses, it gets you thinking.

This is a guy’s book.

You might classify it as chick lit. You might think it’s too narrow, about the Brooklyn literary scene. But the personal is universal. And there’s a lot of personal in “Nathaniel P.” And the only thing that matters is the personal. Not the kind of car you drive or where your record is on the chart. That’s what screwed up the movies, it became about special effects and action, human truth was squeezed right out. But it’s evidenced in television. And when done right, it’s evidenced in fiction.

Read this book.

Adelle Waldman

“The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P.”

“Late For The Sky”