Year 31: The Year of Somewhere Something.

Navel Gazing:

This has been the fifth cycle of four years since I started giving years names. High school and college made firm the pattern of lumping them into four years (maybe each year approximates a season?) but life events have, for the most part, had an odd way of conforming more or less closely with this. The first cycle was maybe the strongest exception. I started out in one city and ended in another. I started out having been home schooled for over four years and ended by going into the third school building (after elementary school and junior high) in three years. But the second cycle of years conformed neatly to high school and the third to college. The fourth cycle was marked by low-paying temp work, a lack of career focus, and the frustrating shuttling back-and-forth between Michigan and Illinois. The one steady stream throughout the whole thing was my girlfriend who, appropriately enough, I married at the end. We didn't plan our wedding with this in mind; it just fell out that way. After Belize and a trip to New York the next cycle started; early marriage. My wife and me against the world, so we divided that time between Chicago and New York, and I got my MFA and she got her own degree and now we're expecting to add another human being to our family. Again, we didn't plan the timing this way... this "major event" once every four years. But here I am and things are just heating up as another cycle of four begins. When the sixth cycle ends, my child will be four. And I wonder what I would have thought as a child, as a fourteen year old who decided to give each year a name, if I had know what those names would be and what they would portend.

Year 12 (when I was 11) was the year of Stellar Fire.
Year 13 was the year of Summereve (whch I did not know was the name for a feminine hygiene product).
Year 14 was the year of the Trampoline.
Year 15 was the year of the Mask.

Year 16 was the year of the Storyteller.
Year 17 was the year of the Broken Mirror.
Year 18 was the year of the Counterflood.
Year 19 was the year of the Agit.

Year 20 was the year of the Power Sack.
Year 21 was the year of the Hunter Divides.
Year 22 was the year of Delving.
Year 23 was the year of Conjunctisylphistry.

Year 24 was the year of the Horizon Divides.
Year 25 was the year of the Bossy Big Toe.
Year 26 was the year of the Synchopated Sailor.
Year 27 was the year of Deep Wells.

Year 28 was the year of the Shark's Lullaby.
Year 29 was the year of the Hidden Rain.
and year 30 was the year of the Magnet Castles.

The year that has just passed (mid-June 2008 until tomorrow) is officially named:

THE YEAR OF SOMEWHERE SOMETHING

1. RADIOHEAD - MY IRON LUNG
2. MOBY - EVERLOVING
3. WALL-E - DOWN TO EARTH
4. ELISABETH BLAIR - DUCK DUCK GOOSE
5. TING-TINGS - WE WALK
6. NINE INCH NAILS - THE GREAT DESTROYER
7. THE GO! TEAM - LADYFLASH
8. SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES - ENDING THEME
9. WEST SIDE STORY - SOMEWHERE
10. JOHN CAGE - 4'33"
11. THE SMASHING PUMPKINS - G.L.O.W.
12. THE WHO - WON'T GET FOOLED AGAIN
13. THE SWANS - LOVE WILL TEAR US APART
14. CANNIBAL CORPSE - I WILL KILL YOU
15. THE PRODIGY - VOODOO PEOPLE
16. PAPA WEMBA - YOLELE
17. SUFJAN STEVENS - STAR OF WONDER
18. LOUIS ARMSTRONG - WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD
19. THE BEATLES - DEAR PRUDENCE
20. PRINCE - COMPUTER BLUE
21. KATE BUSH - CLOUDBUSTING
22. SPARKS AND SPOOLS - GARDEN
23. LOU REED - WALK ON THE WILD SIDE
24. THE LEMON PIPERS - GREEN TAMBOURINE
25. PATTI SMITH - BREAK IT UP
26. THE UTAH SAINTS - SOMETHING GOOD
27. LAURIE ANDERSON - O SUPERMAN (FOR MASSENET)
28. AIR - RUN
29. BJORK - EARTH INTRUDERS
30. BJORK - DECLARE INDEPENDENCE
31. WILL SMITH - MIAMI
32. EMINEM - SAME SONG AND DANCE
33. APHEX TWIN - AGEISPOLIS
34. RICHARD WHALING - THEME FROM "PAINT SMASH"
35. LADYTRON - DEEP BLUE
36. PEARL JAM - OCEANS
37. MADONNA - SKY FITS HEAVEN