Gone Hollywood
Supertramp
~~*~~
It's just heartbreaking
I should have known that it would let me down
It's just a mind aching
I used to dream about this town
It was a sight to see, the place to be
Where the living is easy
And the kicks can always be found
It's such a shame about it
I used to think that it would feel so good
But who's to blame about it
So many creeps in Hollywood
I'm in this dumb motel near the Taco Bell
Without a hope in hell
I can't believe that I'm still around
Ain't nothin' new
In my life today
Ain't nothin' true
It's all gone away
I've had too much cryin', seen too much grief
I'm sick of tryin' it's beyond belief
I'm tired of talking on the telephone
They're trying to tell me that they're not at home
Ain't nothin' new
In my life today
I've had enough of walkin' from place to place
I've yet to come across a friendly face
And now the words sound familiar, as you slam the door
You're not what we're looking for
Ain't nothin' new
In my life today
Ain't nothin' true
It's all gone away
If we only had time, only had time for you
If we only had time, only had time for you
If we only had time, only had time for you
It was a heartbreakin'
Now I ride in a big fine car
It was mind-achin'
Yeah, I'm the talk of the boulevard
So keep your chin up boy, forget the pain
I know you'll make it if you try again
There's no use in quitting
When the world is waiting for you
~~*~~
I started and ran a tutoring business in San Diego, California,
from 2003 until George W. Bush and Barack Obama's housing crash
destroyed it in 2010.
(Obama is responsible because he refused
to hold even a single Wall Street pig accountable,
and because instead of bailing out the American people,
which would've kept me in business,
he bailed out huge, vile corporations instead.)
I was the only member of that business,
which struggled to stay alive the entire time.
It turns out that despite having the highest per capita
concentration of Ph.D.'s in the world for large cities,
San Diego really doesn't care about education at all.
The high school I lived near, for example,
had a sixty percent drop-out rate.
>>Sixty percent.<<
I thought I could help.
How wrong I was.
In those desperate days, I'd take the buses and trolleys of the
city to various neighborhoods, loaded down with fliers
I'd spent way too much money making.
I'd walk until I had blisters on my feet,
then head on home,
then do it the next day, then the next.
Usually the sun set had set long since.
Not one person ever called me from all that work.
This song, "Gone Hollywood," would echo between my ears
day after day after bloody day as I sought out clients,
as I rested in dingy gas stations drinking the swill
that passed as coffee (I couldn't afford Starbucks),
as I sat on bus benches, watching the sharp shadows
of the city dissolve away in the ever-present urban groan
as twilight came,
as I watched the homeless stagger on down the street,
as the smell of total isolation infested my nostrils
and roiled my stomach.
You'd think I'd hate it.
I don't.
When it came out in 1978, decades earlier,
it was an immediate favorite,
one quite superior to the hits that came from that album
save one: "Take the Long Way Home,"
which, unsurprisingly, has made this playlist as well.
I always thought I could make something of that business,
despite all evidence to the contrary,
so that I could sing the last stanza
with the group
and feel just like they must have
when the album went multi-platinum.
Alas.
~~*~~
Digital Art: Downtown by yours truly
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