He found his way into my life with a sexy smile and hint of mischief in those raven eyes.
Felt imagined sun on me until he professed a love for Miles Davis who’d given him a trumpet as a kid.
True story.
Cool, I said and meant it, but not a fan of that sad, sad music or him beating his wives between sets.
Sun dipped behind a cloud when date predictably stared back as though I’d just said I didn’t like air.
He reeled through photos on his phone. Miles at a studio recording. Miles cradling his horn. Miles with his index finger to his lips. Miles blowing in concert. Caricature Miles. Album-cover Miles. Black-and-white, color, computer-generated Miles.
Miles, Miles, Miles.
WTH?
Why was he campaigning for a dead person I’d already discarded? Wasn’t my fascination with saxophonists good enough?
Date tucked a just-bloomed daffodil into my hair, snapped a picture and inserted me front-and-center into his Miles collage.
Subtext: if you can’t worship Miles, I can’t worship you.
I just wanted to feel his sun on me again, not mess with Miles. But maybe our timing had been off. Miles and me. Maybe now I could separate the mean little man from the musical giant and experience a hint of the deep devotion from his number one fan.
Give me THE song that will turn me, I challenged because a jazz legend should have that one mind-blowing song even a non-disciple could love and maybe I just hadn’t found his yet.
Unfair, he said, poking his lip out and holding up six fingers.
I stood my ground. One. Song. If I don’t feel it, we leave Miles to you.
‘Round Midnight, he tossed back without hesitation.
Call you later with the verdict, I said wanting to hear it away from his watchful, hopeful gaze.
Googled it at home. Auto-repeated.
Nice, but not THE song that turned me, although it led me to the magical one that did. This brilliant eight-minute slow-motion rhythmical kind of prayer I can’t stop listening to. A trumpeted version of Time After Time—which, not so coincidentally, even without the lyrics I know by heart, is also kind of the way dating feels. A fluid, melodic, mysterious equation that changes with time, energy and choices.
Better For That 