HelloAngel
ONE love, blood, life
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By Arun V.
2005.07
This whole thing started about a year ago, on April 15, 2004. My dad just didn't wake up during a trip to Cleveland. My mom and I were at home, waiting for him to come home because he was supposed to have dinner with us that night for his birthday. My mom was the one who fielded the call. I got the bad news when I was in the shower.
Death and taxes, the two certainties in life seemed to coincide that day. Dad wasn't coming home or, maybe, he is home which doesn't make it any easier. He died in the city that coined the term "rock 'n' roll," and it was fitting because he was a rock star without a microphone--man he had a voice. My first U2 concert was a gift from my dad on my 16th birthday, something I'll never forget. I don't think he ever really understood the music but he knew my love of it. After all, this was a man who'd gotten drunk with the Beatles once in the '60s.
I remember he'd come home with singles for me, I'd trained him to look for singles I didn't have when he was out and about. He'd phone me to ask if I had them and, if I didn't, it was as good as mine. Don't get me wrong, my dad wasn't the easiest kind of man in the world to live with but he's the hardest kind to live without. He was a surgeon, and with it he had the classical occupational hazards--an ego--combined with the expectations of an MD/PhD, a man who spoke seven languages fluently, could bind his own books, explain the Federal Reserve System and teach you the physics behind a tennis serve over a cup of coffee. I didn't just have big shoes to fill, I had a long path to follow in them. He had expectations but nothing specific, I just had to be good at whatever I did.
I'll spare you the details of a Hindu funeral although I will say it's very hard on the son who performs a lot of the rites. I didn't know what to do, I'd never had to live life without my dad before and it wasn't until he was gone that I realized how much he had done for me, how much of me came from him. Sons follow their fathers, sometimes by choice, sometimes through rebellion. I was the latter, I never wanted to be him because I never thought I could. He was the closest thing to myself on this planet and as little as I realized that before, I realize it now. I miss him and, as Bono says about the late, great Bob Hewson, "I wish I knew him better."
Sometimes you can't make it best you can do is to fake it
"Head of Household," it's not a title I wear very well, it's unnatural. What do you do when you have to make sure your mom in being given the support she needs and that bills are getting paid and books are being balanced? You fake it. And that's what I did, made it seem like it was the easiest thing in the world. It was a hard year, my birthday, my parents' wedding anniversary, etc. But no matter how bad it gets, it passes, not easily, but it does. I always tried to remember that even though some of my friends' lives seem very easy--affluent intact parents who cater to their every need, it's climbers not sprinters who win the Tour de France. Random analogy? Yes but not without merit. A 2,000 mile race, perhaps the most grueling sporting event ever, is almost never won by a sprinter, you need a climber, someone who can cycle uphill. Your ability to go uphill not only determines your worth as a touring cyclist, it also determines your worth in a difficult spot.
I read a lot, read my dad's old notes, his papers, asked people about him, what he was like when he was my age. Turns out we were more alike than time would let us understand and it's unfortunate.
U2's latest record, "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb," was really the catalyst for me in dealing with a lot of things. Bono's description of himself being the atomic bomb dismantled by the loss of his father was something I'd felt but had never been able to articulate. For months I'd felt like someone had reached in and taken out the part of me that ticked, the part of me that wanted to change the world, the part of me that wanted to be the best, the part of me that couldn't settle for just a nice place and a pension. I'd been dismantled in the worst way, through an act of God.
Everything on this album resonated with what I felt for my dad, from the confusion in "Vertigo" to the hope of "Miracle Drug," the naked aching of "Sometimes You Can't Make it On Your Own," or even to the desire to be made whole again in "Yahweh." "City of Blinding Lights" was written about the Elevation concert on 10/27/01 in Madison Square Garden, a show I was at, a birthday gift from my dad. But for me it was "Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own" that made this CD more than a CD, it made it a direct line into the very core of what makes the human heart so strong and so fragile at the same time.
When I met Bono outside the HP Pavilion in San Jose, California, in April, he signed my copy of "Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own" and I thanked him because this album had really helped me deal with losing my dad. He told me it was a "stinker" but that "we get through it." It was a strange moment, the world's biggest rock star taking a second out of his day to identify with me, something I do with him through his art all the time but never expected to have happen in reverse. In my head there were all sorts of things I wanted to ask him, about my Elevation Tour experience playing guitar on stage, about his thoughts for this tour, but my heart only wanted the CD signed. I got that and Bono's tacit agreement that Dr. V. is on the list of people he sings that song to, that it's not just about Bob Hewson anymore, it's about all of us who've been in that place and need a voice to sort it out. So thank you U2 and thank you Bono for giving that to us.
Hey Dad, this time I have a single for you. Wish you were here to receive it.
By Arun V.
2005.07
This whole thing started about a year ago, on April 15, 2004. My dad just didn't wake up during a trip to Cleveland. My mom and I were at home, waiting for him to come home because he was supposed to have dinner with us that night for his birthday. My mom was the one who fielded the call. I got the bad news when I was in the shower.
Death and taxes, the two certainties in life seemed to coincide that day. Dad wasn't coming home or, maybe, he is home which doesn't make it any easier. He died in the city that coined the term "rock 'n' roll," and it was fitting because he was a rock star without a microphone--man he had a voice. My first U2 concert was a gift from my dad on my 16th birthday, something I'll never forget. I don't think he ever really understood the music but he knew my love of it. After all, this was a man who'd gotten drunk with the Beatles once in the '60s.
I remember he'd come home with singles for me, I'd trained him to look for singles I didn't have when he was out and about. He'd phone me to ask if I had them and, if I didn't, it was as good as mine. Don't get me wrong, my dad wasn't the easiest kind of man in the world to live with but he's the hardest kind to live without. He was a surgeon, and with it he had the classical occupational hazards--an ego--combined with the expectations of an MD/PhD, a man who spoke seven languages fluently, could bind his own books, explain the Federal Reserve System and teach you the physics behind a tennis serve over a cup of coffee. I didn't just have big shoes to fill, I had a long path to follow in them. He had expectations but nothing specific, I just had to be good at whatever I did.
I'll spare you the details of a Hindu funeral although I will say it's very hard on the son who performs a lot of the rites. I didn't know what to do, I'd never had to live life without my dad before and it wasn't until he was gone that I realized how much he had done for me, how much of me came from him. Sons follow their fathers, sometimes by choice, sometimes through rebellion. I was the latter, I never wanted to be him because I never thought I could. He was the closest thing to myself on this planet and as little as I realized that before, I realize it now. I miss him and, as Bono says about the late, great Bob Hewson, "I wish I knew him better."
Sometimes you can't make it best you can do is to fake it
"Head of Household," it's not a title I wear very well, it's unnatural. What do you do when you have to make sure your mom in being given the support she needs and that bills are getting paid and books are being balanced? You fake it. And that's what I did, made it seem like it was the easiest thing in the world. It was a hard year, my birthday, my parents' wedding anniversary, etc. But no matter how bad it gets, it passes, not easily, but it does. I always tried to remember that even though some of my friends' lives seem very easy--affluent intact parents who cater to their every need, it's climbers not sprinters who win the Tour de France. Random analogy? Yes but not without merit. A 2,000 mile race, perhaps the most grueling sporting event ever, is almost never won by a sprinter, you need a climber, someone who can cycle uphill. Your ability to go uphill not only determines your worth as a touring cyclist, it also determines your worth in a difficult spot.
I read a lot, read my dad's old notes, his papers, asked people about him, what he was like when he was my age. Turns out we were more alike than time would let us understand and it's unfortunate.
U2's latest record, "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb," was really the catalyst for me in dealing with a lot of things. Bono's description of himself being the atomic bomb dismantled by the loss of his father was something I'd felt but had never been able to articulate. For months I'd felt like someone had reached in and taken out the part of me that ticked, the part of me that wanted to change the world, the part of me that wanted to be the best, the part of me that couldn't settle for just a nice place and a pension. I'd been dismantled in the worst way, through an act of God.
Everything on this album resonated with what I felt for my dad, from the confusion in "Vertigo" to the hope of "Miracle Drug," the naked aching of "Sometimes You Can't Make it On Your Own," or even to the desire to be made whole again in "Yahweh." "City of Blinding Lights" was written about the Elevation concert on 10/27/01 in Madison Square Garden, a show I was at, a birthday gift from my dad. But for me it was "Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own" that made this CD more than a CD, it made it a direct line into the very core of what makes the human heart so strong and so fragile at the same time.
When I met Bono outside the HP Pavilion in San Jose, California, in April, he signed my copy of "Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own" and I thanked him because this album had really helped me deal with losing my dad. He told me it was a "stinker" but that "we get through it." It was a strange moment, the world's biggest rock star taking a second out of his day to identify with me, something I do with him through his art all the time but never expected to have happen in reverse. In my head there were all sorts of things I wanted to ask him, about my Elevation Tour experience playing guitar on stage, about his thoughts for this tour, but my heart only wanted the CD signed. I got that and Bono's tacit agreement that Dr. V. is on the list of people he sings that song to, that it's not just about Bob Hewson anymore, it's about all of us who've been in that place and need a voice to sort it out. So thank you U2 and thank you Bono for giving that to us.
Hey Dad, this time I have a single for you. Wish you were here to receive it.
