My Mind Is Taking A Walk

Talking about birds. Talking about a frame of reference. A mindset. Music. Lyrics.
Searching for simplicity. That's what I am doing. That is also the name of a Gregg Allman solo album that rocks quite beautifully. You should check it out if you want to enrich your life.
If you don't want to enrich your life stay the hell away from me.
John Prine has a song called Taking A Walk. I have talked about this song before. It rips intense emotion out of my heart, my mind and my soul.
He describes situations that stress him out, then the chorus kicks in and he's taking a walk.
I'm in a different head space now and the lyrics mean so much more to me.
I have spent my life fighting against. Fighting against my job and my income and my career and my situation. Never accepting that the life I am living is my life.
It has caused me a great deal of stress.
I am developing a new outlook, a more mellow outlook and I like it. So all of a sudden  I listen to John Prine's lyrics and my heart expands to a dangerous size.
Previously, when I was stressed, I reached for The Crown. I am trying not to do that now. And when I listen to Taking A Walk I can identify with it deeply. Something sucks, go outside, absorb some sun, listen to the birds and the wind and the stream and realign yourself with your own humanity.
Whiskey is a scam. It creates artificial release; this accomplishes nothing.
Concurrent with this realization is my love affair with the birds. Over the past couple of years I have tuned my ears to the songs of the birds who begin each day beautifully at sunrise chirping their happiness un-self consciously out into the world.
I always wake up early. Because my mind is tortured, because my mattress sucks. If I awake at 4:00 a.m. the world is silent. Even the birds are still asleep.
Around 5:00 the birds begin to sing and it is magic. As I lie there knowing full well that I will not get back to sleep, I listen to the birds and I am blown away. They deliver peace directly into my soul.
Coincidentally I am listening to Leonard Cohen on my way to work and the opening lyrics to Anthem burn their way into my skull.
"The birds they sang at the break of day, start again I heard them say, don't dwell on what has passed away or what is yet to be."
I suddenly realized with explosive realization that this is what I get from the birds in my own back yard at 4:45 a.m. A joyfulness, a sense of hopefulness, an innate beauty. A new beginning every f***ing day, a forgiveness.
I listened to John Prine on the way to work that morning and Leonard Cohen on the way home. Very dangerous, but I survived it and expanded my emotional and intellectual scope.
I survived it because my head is in a very great place.
By the way, John Prine has a killer sense of humor, as most creative people do.
Last verse: "Found a card in my pocket, of my worn out overalls, from a girl in Cedar Rapids, now residing in Idaho Falls, I wish you could have been there when she opened up the door, and looked me in the face like she never did before, I felt about as welcome as a Wal-mart Superstore."
So he took a walk. By the way Prine's chorus also includes the line "I'm watching the birds."
It's all connected, baby.
So I am searching for simplicity and wiser men than me are inspiring me on how to go about it.
You have to open your mind.
You have to listen and learn and think.
Goddamn I feel good.