Werking Out*

Terry- husband, music benefactor, driver, and incurable straggler.
Dera- wife, music heiress, passenger, and (all too often) stranded.

Yesterday, Terry offered to go to the Farmer's Mkt. with our children, while I spend some always-welcomed alone time at the YMCA.  Being the one-car-family that we are, I was dropped off out front, while he unknowingly drove away with my phone and wallet.

(insert sweatbands, purple leotards, Jane Fonda, high-top Reeboks, and the Rocky theme song here for an entire hour.)

Once clean, dressed in clothing that isn't made of cotton spandex, and ready to go home and eat a bowl of mashed potatoes, I realize that I have no means of communication on me.  I'm stranded at the Y... of all places.  It's a mild nightmare. 

But how long could a person grocery shop, right?  I took the rare opportunity to go outside, enjoy the unseasonably beautiful 70º weather we were having, and listen to Terry's ipod in the meantime.

I pulled up a lounge chair alongside the closed pool.  I was alone, and I had nothing to do.  No children, no games on any iphone, no magazines, not even a writing utensil.  I was stranded on an island with only a pair of headphones.  (A huge first-world problem.)

So, I began to scroll through the names of artists on his ipod, looking for anything recognizably good.  Some, like, Kool and the Gang or somethin.

But, in the spirit of pushing myself to do something that is slightly outside of my comfort zone (like exercising), I made myself skip over New Order, Kool and the Gang, and Stereolab.

I went to work- Kraftwerk, that is.

The warmth of the sun (after a long cold spell in the south, I might add), the satisfying ache of a post-calisthenics, and the absence of small people begging for flavored milk, I fell into a trance of sorts... a meditative state that was better than anything I thought could come of my first true Krautrock experience.  I haven't listened to this band since college.  And for good reason.  There are few times in my day that I'm eager for a noisy accompaniment to the glamorous job of making up beds and scrubbing toilets.

But placed under these already wonderful conditions and forced to listen over an hour of whatever, I closed my eyes and let my mind go everywhere (other than making up beds and scrubbing toilets).  It was like I took a hit of acid.  Better than any massage, yoga class, facial, or bowl of mashed potatoes I've ever had.

The first song, Ruckzuck, was so familiar.  But truthfully I'm more aware of their (very different) later werks, like Autobahn and Radio-Activity.  It finally came to me, with a little help from Google.  It was the theme song from the old PBS show, Newton's Apple, that my parents used to watch waaaay back when cable television was reserved for fancy folk. 

(disregard the long intro)

Even more interestingly, Ruckzuck translates to "very quickly" with a slight connotation of "push-pull", or so says Wiki.  All I kept thinking as I listened was how beautifully orchestrated the ebb and flow of these 2 albums were, and how amazed I was that they could keep my interest for over an hour of uninterrupted listening.

Magically, Terry picked me up at the end of Kraftwerk 2.  If you are familiar with these albums and their lengthiness, please take a moment to add up how long I waited for him.  

But it was a nice hour and a half.

The moral of the story: pleasure comes in unusual forms, usually discovered with a little self-coercion. Also, forgo Kool and the Gang for a little Krautrock.  Also also, use the term Krautrock more than once in a paragraph and you are a bonafide pain in the asshole.

*I've already told my brother this story, only to have him say, "Wow. That's really cool.  I'm in need of getting excited over something that's not very exciting.  Kinda like this."  Yup.