Better Get Hit In Your Soul

Every day at 3 pm he gets into his car, a 2006 Toyota Corolla 4 door sedan in  a sunfaded navy, plugs in his gps, turns the radio on to Jazz FM and buckles himself in. Even though Curtis is the only person who ever drives his car, he checks then rechecks and adjusts his mirrors, just in case they've shifted over the course of the 8 hours the Corolla's been parked in an underground secured employee only parking lot. Monday through Friday, Curtis drives the 38 kilometre return trip from his 1970's- era one bedroom walk up apartment on a quiet one way dead end street in the city's east end all the way across town to the hip new enclave of design warehouses where he works as a program developer in the land of web design. A drone tethered to his computer in a medium sized start up company where he manages to disappear into the fabric of his surroundings. Milquetoast amongst a sea of brightly coloured walls, hyper lit screens, geometric patterned floors and dynamic, gregarious computer nerds who thrive on inter office politicking. This is Curtis's worst nightmare. Buzz buzz buzz. All he wants to do is program and design. He's not a gamer. He doesn't go for the after work socials. He's not good with people. When he finally found his niche in web based deign, a world where he could ostensibly never have to relate to another human being face to face ever again, Curtis's ulcers started to heal. His psoriasis cleared up and his acid reflux settled right down of it's own volition. His doctor advised him to find a soothing, calming hobby or practice, like mediatation. Curtis discovered jazz. John Coltrane and Charlie Mingus, to be exact. Something about those two players that speak to Curtis in a way that no medication or cognitive therapy or primal screaming or hand built pottery classes ever did. Better Get Hit in Your Soul broke Curtis wide open. Then A Love Supreme. Wow. Charlie Parker, Thelonius Monk, Miles Davis. These men become Curtis's people. That music, that jazz frees up his brain in ways nothing else ever has, not electric shock, nothing. He puts his headphones on, dials up his songs of the day and digs in, ideas exploding in 5/4 and 6/8 time signatures. His heart rate settles. The dull roar in the background filters out. His head fills with the horns and bass and percussion. He starts to see images manifest before him, pulling ideas out of thin air. Without music, Curtis would simply cease to exist.