On this historic day in 1968...not very much happened. In fact, I don’t even share my birthday with anybody particularly interesting- Diane Wiest, and I’ve always kind of liked her in "Hannah And Her Sisters", although "Manhattan" is my favorite Woody Allen film. Also, Pepa from Salt ’N Pepa, and they sang "Push It" and I really like that Comcast DSL commercial where the turtle tells his wife "You push it. You push it real good". Darcey says that’s a bit of a stretch, I reply that she should read Jung.

So, you kids (get off my lawn!), what does 40 feel like? Today feels exactly like "Bookends" by Simon and Garfunkel. I just drove out to the airport in the rain and that was the perfect soundtrack. I’m melancholy and reflective (stick me on the back of your bike so drivers can see you at night), feeling all poignant, vaguely thankful... carefully hopeful? My life has really turned out quite alright. I have some great friends, a lovely family, own a house, partner in a successful business, play music for a living. All I wanted to do from the age of 6 was play music- it’s really a good thing that my parallel obsession with Evel Knieval wasn’t the path that I pursued. I guess one could blame it on the Monkees and Kiss, those were the two major bands that had the initial impact and it was mostly visual. Then, of course, came the Beatles and that just ruined me for any other kind of life. My Mom had the Hey Jude album- which isn’t even a proper Beatles album, it’s one of the U.S. only releases of singles and tracks skimmed form the British releases, but it has some of my favorite fab tracks. This was me, every day:


Can’t Buy Me Love
I Should Have Known Better
Paperback Writer
Rain
Lady Madonna
Revolution
Hey Jude
Old Brown Shoe
Don’t Let Me Down
The Ballad of John and Yoko

What more could one ask for? She also had Abbey Road, so this was high quality audio input for the wee ginger boy. Old Brown Shoe? This was a subject matter I could relate to. It was a song about a shoe that was old and brown, perfect.

I always planned to go skydiving on my 40th birthday. I’ve never gone (traumatized by a local Philadelphia weather man, Jim O’Brien, who died in a skydiving accident near when I was a boy), and I always thought it would be the perfect terrifying, life- affirming, shit-your-pants experience for a 40th birthday. Well, then we had Harrison, the son king, the super bee. I now spend all my waking moments trying to stick around for a long time so I don’t miss anything he does, so skydiving is right off the agenda.

And so, to celebrate this momentous occasion, I am going to London on Monday and my dear friend Martin and I are going to spend the day in studio 2 at Abbey Road. He has very kindly taken care of most of the details with an engineer and sympathetic musicians (including the very wonderful Ed Ball whose music I hold dear to my heart. What ? You don’t know the Times? We have to get you sorted out). I have a couple, 2, 3 songs I’d like to work on. We’ve got a lovely Studer 8 track machine reserved and I am absolutely buzzing with anticipation. Just to be in that room, it means a lot to me.

Beyond that, Harrison is looking forward to going to the zoo to see if the monkeys really do stand for honesty, and we may take the train up to Liverpool for a day. He loves trains and I love Liverpool and Darcey has never been.

Now, what have I learned by being on this planet for 40 years? Quite honestly, I ’m certain that I’m not any smarter now than I was when I was 20. In fact, I’ve forgotten a lot of stuff that was vitally important at the time. I sat on a couch next to Al Kooper last week and he played me a new version of "It Takes A lot To Laugh, It Takes a Train To Cry"- a Dylan song I’ve heard 10 million times, and I didn’t recognize it. I was saying "This is a good song, Al, this one’s a keeper" and he just let me blather on like the idiot I am. So, don’t count on me to even know the things I think I know. BUT, if you’re in traffic and you need to get in front of me to make an exit, I’ll back off and let you do it. If you need someone to learn a special song that will make your wedding more special, I’ll learn the song for you. I don’t get jealous of other peoples’ success anymore, that has to count as some sort of progress. Like, I don’t get jealous of bands that are doing well, I get jealous of Mike Viola’s chord changes or how good Kelley Stoltz’ new album sounds. I’m not saying I’m an evolved guy, I still fear sharks while on dry land, it’s just that I’ve maybe figured out a little tiny bit about how insignificant we all are so why not at least just try to be kind to the other small critters scampering around this planet? That is my message, with all my advanced wisdom. Also, wear comfortable shoes.