Josh has been found

I feel really good. I hope you out there reading feel just as good as I do about this! Through all your efforts Josh's been found!

I spent two hours talking on the phone with him last night. While writing Uncle Bill's Helicopter, I had no idea that Billy Joel's song, "You're only human", had a ska beat. Josh's in bad shape, and I know the road ahead is going to be really hard for us both. I think, though, Josh has got hope, for the first time in a long while. There's a million tons on my chest but I feel really good. In fact, I feel like I've just jammed with God, and he's asked me to join the band. Jeff at Stubborn Records came through last night, and uploaded the entire contents of Josh's first cd to me. Maybe you'd like to hear a few happy ska songs Josh wrote, when he was 16. Try: This I know. He quoted the lyrics of that one to me when we talked. It would be wonderful to hear stuff this good, on the radio, anywhere, but especially in San Diego. The entire contents of The Radiation King's first album, with mp3's and pure, pefect, uncut cd .wav files is here - and there's a song of mine about the current travesty of copyright law, and one of King Django's - about Josh, in there, too. Stubborn Records still has a few hundred copies for sale, but feel free to make as many copies as you want. Josh makes happy music. It should never die. It deserves to be heard. He told me last night he never wanted to hear his stuff again, but I think he just doesn't remember it.

I've promised Josh we're going to make an album together this coming year. He says he has no guitar, but he does have a few new songs.

I discovered Murphy's Law #16 on a web page today, and I'm savoring the irony of it:

If several things taht could have gone wrong have not gone wrong, it would have been ultimately beneficial for them to have gone wrong.

I had the great honor this morning of Doc Searls naming a law after me.
Michael's Law:

If something can go right, it will go right. If you will something to go right, there's a better chance you'll find a way.

I would love it, if one day, this law was as well known, and as well understood, as Murphy's Law. I think it would do a lot of people a lot of good.

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I just got off the phone with a dear friend, Evan Hunt. All his 12 musicals have always been an inspiration to me. It's really sad that the videotapes he has of these have not been seen by more people. The Phantom of the Operation was, in part, about me. He said:

I'm concerned about you.
The collossal highs, and collossal lows of what you've been going through, remind me of what happened 9 years ago. They make me uneasy. You are normally a mellow, happy, funny guy. I know you have to build a bridge. But it needs to be strong enough for two people to stand under it.
Don't start tilting at dragons until you have spent at least a week feeling calm, and steady.

I took a lot of strength this month from the story of Don Quixote in the play Man of La Mancha. Posted on my wall, is a song called The Impossible dream.

I have long admired the books of Oliver Sacks, in particular, the story of Witty Ticcy Ray. It's too bad the text itself is not on the internet. It's the story of a musician with Tourette's Syndrome, so bedeviled by involuntary convulsions and obscene cries, that he couldn't hold down a normal job. He was a great jazz drummer. Only while playing music, could he be calm and at peace. The medication for his disease made him "normal" enough to function in our world, but it took away all his musical ability. The cure was far worse than the disease! Ultimately he and Oliver Sacks, found a solution that worked.

I know Oliver's pretty busy, but if someone out there could recomend a good psychiatrist, one that understands the pain musicians can feel, for myself, and Josh, I would appriciate it. Email me here: mike@ackley.net

It's really hard to tell, in advance, the difference between a good man and a bad one.
Two bad shrinks once helped send me on the road to hell.
I was very inspired, last night, by the story of the Archangel Michael. I would like to know what real role a guy named Michael and a kid named Joshua, have to play in this world.
I have what feels like walking pnuemonia, and I'm going to go and get checked out shortly. One of the things I learned 9 years ago was the importance of listening to your friends and family. And I'm going to do a little Christmas shopping. When I get back I'm going to start building the infrastructure for a bridge that can stand up for us both.

Thanks for listening.

Michael

  ¶ 3:25 PM