L-48

This morning I woke up to the sound of birds chirping
At some point later today
I'll hear the kids from the school outside play
On the playground
Since 1994, I've been in the same apartment building
Living up on the third floor
If I spent my entire day never leaving the house
Those sounds would inspire me to write about my past and my future and my now
Yeah its an old elementary school
And I've been wondering what the kids from twenty to twenty-five years ago are doing now
Yeah, from my living room I can see the school on Washington
And the San Francisco bay and Russian Hill and Golden Gate Bridge
And my home is maybe only eight or nine hundred square feet
I know it may not sound like much for a retirement plan but I'd be happy to live here for the rest of my life
If I passed away to the sound of those kids playing on the playground
And this apartment's so rich with memories of friends and lovers who have come and gone
And beautiful music that's been written and recorded here
And so many Christmas's spent with my cat Pink
And with you, my dear

That would be as peaceful of a way to go as I can think of
My only hope is that I die before my girlfriend does
Because she's so much stronger than me
Her beside me while I go is how I'd like it to be

Every day of my life an adventure
I was in the studio about a month ago with a few musicians over the winter
And had to take some guitars out of some soft cases in my apartment
Put the guitars that I wanted to take to the studio inside of them
To lighten my travel
One of the guitars that I took out of the cases was a 1930s Gibson L-48
Tobacco sunburst, arched top with f holes
I bought it at a garage sale when I was in the seventh grade
For sixty dollars
I never loved the sound of it and found it to be thin
But I remember working with a great engineer over twenty years ago
His name was Mark Needham
Who did lots of records with Chris Isaak
Who also recorded my album Songs for a Blue Guitar
He told me its only the f hole style guitars that leave a lot of room for vocals
So I took his advice at the time and opted for a cheaper version of the L-48
It had a fuller sound and it was painted blue

Anyhow yesterday after a five day trip filming the tour documentary
Down the coast of California seeing the grey whales surface along highway 1 between loan park and LA
My engineer and I flew back up to San Francisco from LA
To transfer the film and audio files and label what we filmed between Chico and LA
We finished all that by 10:10 pm and I told Nathan
I want to record some guitar music for an hour before we finished that day
The closest guitar I could find was leaning behind my chair in the bedroom
It was a Gibson L-48
I have no memories of ever recording with that guitar before
But it did make the cover of "Songs for a Blue Guitar"
For the tortoise shell pick guard, completely disintegrated
I improvised to their guitar parts for an hour
And the guitar actually resonated nicely
Nathan and I agreed it had been a long day
But we would pick things up again after tomorrow after meeting for lunch at my cafe
Tomorrow is right now and as I'm finishing writing these words before Nathan shows up
I can still hear the birds and my ears are still slightly ringing from this L-48 and there couldn't be a more peaceful way to start a day of singing