| If you don't know Paul Simon's Surprise, listen to Outrageous before proceeding. You have to read this blog as it was posted, earliest first. Start with "Cracked 2 More" (lower right) and then work your way up the list. The fully cracked explanations are in the comments, not in the blogs (for those who want to do their own cracking). |
On the net the lurkers (those who read but don't post) vastly outnumber the posters. I really, truly want to broaden the conversation; incorporate some more points of view; have some sober person tell me I'm nuts; have some impressionable person say, 'Wow. That makes sense.' All of which is to say I'd really appreciate some comments from you all.
I've got my teeth deep into "Northeast" and "I Don't Believe." Both obviously about religion, and neither taking an obvious position. Separating Simon's views from Simon's character's views is difficult, at best. In the last analysis, it may not even be important. Simon's brilliance as an artist does not confer on him any authority as a theologian.
So here I'll duck the really hard stuff, and look at the really easy one. The song is Beautiful, in so many ways.
2 comments:
Beautiful is beautiful. It's about family love and the wonderful parts of winter and summer. It's the counterbalance to all those emotions that are outrageous and don't feel like love.
From our northeastern winters there is hardly anything more jolly than the snowman. By itself, the snowman's the perfect symbol of winter fun. There's usually a family involved in making that snowman. Mom, Dad and the kids all playing together. Bet there was a snowball fight, too! Do you see the snow angel?
The adoptions are precursors of love and joy. (Obviously, for this family they work. You wouldn't do something three times if it didn't prove to your liking.)
And summertime, summertime! Go kart: you "don't need a ticket to ride" it. (Sounds like our man Simon is alluding to another group's work, no?) Water slides, candy stands and those children in the pool. Is there any sound more joyous than a bunch of kids in a pool?
Stuck by itself, "Beautiful" would be corny, sappy, Pollyanna-ish. But in a group with other musings on the mind, it's necessary to round the picture. Love and happiness do exist in the human mind. Perhaps not as often as we'd like, but you couldn't have things that "don't feel like love" if you didn't also have love.
While this song is definitely a portrait of a loving family, I wonder if maybe it's not as happy as it sounds. The line "keep an eye on them children" is repeated four times. That repetition has always made me wonder if perhaps Simon was suggesting that one of the children drowned. Maybe not, because most of the water references are happy (or, at least, don't portray water as deadly). But because this is the first time anything in the song is anything other than joyous, and because the chords shift to a more contemplative, minor sound, it makes me wonder if there is some implied danger. Maybe this is where the parents realize that raising a child can be frightening--that it isn't all candy stands and snowmen.
The other thing that makes me think the song is not as happy as it appears at first is the baby from Kosovo crying all night. Many internationally adopted children, most infamously Eastern European and Russian children, grew up in traumatic neglect and have great difficulty adjusting to family life. Perhaps the baby from Kosovo represents internationally adopted children that have reactive-attachment disorder? But because the song ends with a repition of the word 'beautiful,' I feel like everything worked out for the family in the end.
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