I remember being in Chicago back in the day, listening to an FM rock station. After a bevy of alternative rock, the DJ suddenly put on the Waltz from Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake. At the art store where I worked, one of the young hipsters immediately yelled, "Tchaikovsky!" and began conducting with her hands. I'll never forget that moment. We had gone from, say, Throwing Muses to Tchaikovsky, and I remember thinking: How cool was that? Here was music making its own case. It didn't plead. It didn't demand. In its own way, it rocked. And then, after that glorious interlude, it was back to alternative rock. The funny thing was that the classical piece had not seemed out of place. It held its own. It brought to the table its own heft, its own weight. It wasn't preachy. It wasn't better than. It was simply another fiber in the fabric of the day. And maybe that's the way great music should be heard. Not fenced off by genre. Not placed behind glass. Not approa...
TERRA FIRMA LOVE INTERRUPTED: THE WEEKEND BEFORE THE HORROR
Dr. Mark Hodge's South Pasadena Backyard Days Before the Horror
Love was everywhere, and here it didn't need to announce itself. It was casual, at ease. It was the joy that comes from unbreakable bonds, newly sealed by hearts united with passion. What's more, this was a night to celebrate that relaxed moment—still romantic, still passionate—with friends who had become family, friends who had become extensions of themselves.
There were Gunz and Lucky, sisters from another mother, as always side by side, enjoying life, enjoying the men they loved and enjoying each other. There was Dr. Mark Hodge, Lucky's fiancé, on whose South Pasadena porch they had all gathered, playing the gracious host and sharing a laugh with his best friend, LASD Lt. Sam Wojick, Gunz's fiancé. And there was Dr. Hodge's twin, Mike Hodge, FBI, leaning over and getting to really know Claire Jacob of the French DGSE.
The cocktails were fabulous, the night a rococo dream, and the company electric.
What's not to like?
And what was playing on the box during this gentle reverie?
Hooverphonic's "2Wicky."
Trust me on this one. Its low-slung glory, riding atop the magnificent contours of Isaac Hayes's glorious rendition of Bacharach-David's "Walk On By," shouts to the stars in its own subtle way. Geike Arnaert's ice-cool voice floats over the song like the ice floating in our heroes' cocktails. It's slinky. It's sly. It envelops in subtle ways.
Before you know it, the song has struck—the same way real darkness will, before it announces itself.
Recall Rick and Ilsa's budding romance catching fire under the shadow of the coming Nazi jackboots, or El Cid and Chimene before he is called upon to fight battles against overwhelming odds. There is something about the outside pressure of approaching darkness looming over everything like a storm cloud. Its psychic weight is crushing when it finally lands, but before it does, moments like this compress everything down to the magnificence of the moment itself.
A laugh.
A cocktail.
A favorite song.
The person you love standing beside you.
Friends who have somehow become family.
A beautiful night when tomorrow seems far away.
In Terra Firma, once the darkness descends, it lands like a steel curtain.
The laughter will stop. The easy assumptions of ordinary life will disappear. Love will remain—but now it will be asked to do something considerably harder than make six people happy on a beautiful South Pasadena night.
It will have to give them something worth fighting for.
Can Gunz, Lucky, and the family they've built around them carry such a weight and still function?
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