TheSkyand theGround

PHILIP Glass and Candy invited us to join them on their trip to Nova Scotia for the month of August in 1987. My girlfriend Mary Ellen and I had been there before, but I wasn’t keen to return. A huge spread of wild and windy land sprinkled with unused cabins for visiting artists, is not my kind of creative environment, I prefer the fervour of Manhattan.

So we sublet our apartment to pay the bills, and I stayed on the fourth floor of Philip’s House over on Third Street, while they left for Canada.

It was an odd situation, I was only 10 blocks from my own place, but it completely wrecked my sense of belonging and I felt like some kind of refugee.

I ate out in cheap diners all the time, breakfasting every morning in a Polish diner. There was a family of junkies that ate there every day around the same time. I found myself observing them and presuming their story. The parents seemed like they were 50-something, while the son and his girlfriend seemed in their 20s. They were extremely humble, and apologised profusely if they had to ask the waitress for something, wearing her name out in every sentence.

‘Oh Amy, you don’t have to get it right away Amy, whenever you get a chance, no hurry here Amy.’

They talked with a stoned drawl, and had skin sores and broken limbs in casts, but weren’t homeless. They often discussed their bills and could be seen going through the telephone bill to check the price of each call. They were benign drug addicts that wished everyone well, and were in awe of those who carried the torch of ordinary existence.

They weren’t able to give up being high on heroin, but they didn’t want to lose everything, so they tried to juggle the highs and the lows, the sky and the ground. I always had my notebook with me, and one morning this scene inspired a set of lyrics with that title. Because I was unsettled myself, I saw them through the eyes of my own displacement. I rushed back to Philip’s house and wrote the song that inspired the name of a popular Wexford pub.

Candy’s parrot, Jack, stayed behind too. He was an unpleasant character who only cared for Candy, and was inclined to bite anyone or anything that interfered with their relationship, even biting the telephone for its intrusion. He had another weapon too, a squawk that was on a par with the decibel level of a subway train.

When the cantankerous Jack was taken to a parrot psychologist, he was diagnosed with having a severe personality disorder. Candy was advised to keep his cage covered when he was bold.

After about three weeks of feeling cut off, I desperately needed to have a chat with my girlfriend, but how? I could go to a phone booth and bring a thousand coins. Or! I could risk using Philip’s house phone. Not something I was comfortable with, but honestly didn’t think he would mind. Anyway, the chances of him answering the Nova Scotia phone were slim, he would be off in a distant cabin, writing.

Jack was quietly covered in his huge cage next to the phone. I dialed the number, it rang and rang, finally someone picked it up, it was Philip!! I panicked, and lied, without reason.

‘Oh hi Phil, I am just over in my friend Bob’s house (not) and thought I’d call for a chat with Mary Ellen.’ Panic turned to mortification when my lie was outed by Jack’s piercing ‘SQUAWK!!!!!!!’

It was an odd situation, I was only 10 blocks from my own place, but it completely wrecked my sense of belonging and I felt like some kind of refugee