My Guilty Secret

MY GUILTY SECRET

I have spent a lifetime in search of redemption. Like the Flying Dutchman I search vainly in the hope that one day somebody with sufficient purity of vision will understand, and in doing so give me peace.
And my sin?
I fell asleep during Jimmy Hendrix's last concert!

Council for the Prosecution: We needn't dwell at length on this. This wretch squandered a once in a lifetime opportunity to hear the definitive Rock Blues guitarist at the zenith of his extraordinary powers. I demand the maximum term.

Council for the defence: Mi' Lud. This side would not seek to detract in anyway from the enormity of the crime. Whatever odium the rest of us might hold my client in, nobody can be as hard on him as he is on himself. But let us not damn outright. Let us weigh the evidence first.
My client attended the Isle of Wight Festival in the autumn of 1970 with the expressed intention of seeing the aforesaid Jimmy Hendrix, fact!
My client had gone three days and three nights without sleep because the music never stopped, fact!
My client had gone three days and three nights without food, fact!
My client, then an impressionable youth of a mere twenty summers, his head still turned by the summer of love...

Judge: Could the learned Council explain for the benefit of the Jury what is meant by `The Summer of Love'.

Council for the defence: er, yes M'Lud,... the `Summer of Love', as it was referred to in the popular press at the time was 1967. It had become associated with the free use of hashish, L.S.D. and promiscuous sex.

Judge: I'm obliged. Pray continue.

Council for the defence: Thank you M'Lud. His head still turned by notions of free love and 'tuning in, turning on and dropping out', fact!
With the unfortunate conjunction of exhaustion, low blood sugars, and alcohol, music played at a volume which could have in any other circumstance woken the dead could not on this occasion waken my client.
Mi'Lud all of this is offered by way of explanation rather than excuse. You may do what you like to him. Look at him, the haunted countenance, the utter dejection. Is there anything you can do to this man he has not already done to himself. I rest my case.

So there it is. Like the Ancient Mariner I detain people on their way to weddings and bore them with this tale. Someday I hope to find somebody else who's got the guts to come out and say "Hey, that happened to me! I did that too, wasn't it a bummer?" I had toyed with the idea of using my web page as a means whereby people could come out about this, and perhaps support each other. Some day I'll find somebody who'll understand, and then I'll be able to listen to Jimmy again without those dreadful feelings of guilt.
If, like me, you have suffered in this way then contact me
� A.Keith, MT Systems 1997.

MY GUILTY SECRET
I have spent a lifetime in search of redemption. Like the Flying Dutchman I search vainly in the hope that one day somebody with sufficient purity of vision will understand, and in doing so give me peace. And my sin? I fell asleep during Jimmy Hendrix's last concert!
Council for the Prosecution:	We needn't dwell at length on this. This wretch squandered a once in a lifetime opportunity to hear the definitive Rock Blues guitarist at the zenith of his extraordinary powers. I demand the maximum term.
Council for the defence:	Mi' Lud. This side would not seek to detract in anyway from the enormity of the crime. Whatever odium the rest of us might hold my client in, nobody can be as hard on him as he is on himself. But let us not damn outright. Let us weigh the evidence first. My client attended the Isle of Wight Festival in the autumn of 1970 with the expressed intention of seeing the aforesaid Jimmy Hendrix, fact! My client had gone three days and three nights without sleep because the music never stopped, fact! My client had gone three days and three nights without food, fact! My client, then an impressionable youth of a mere twenty summers, his head still turned by the summer of love...
Judge:	Could the learned Council explain for the benefit of the Jury what is meant by `The Summer of Love'.
Council for the defence:	er, yes M'Lud,... the `Summer of Love', as it was referred to in the popular press at the time was 1967. It had become associated with the free use of hashish, L.S.D. and promiscuous sex.
Judge:	I'm obliged. Pray continue.
Council for the defence:	Thank you M'Lud. His head still turned by notions of free love and 'tuning in, turning on and dropping out', fact! With the unfortunate conjunction of exhaustion, low blood sugars, and alcohol, music played at a volume which could have in any other circumstance woken the dead could not on this occasion waken my client. Mi'Lud all of this is offered by way of explanation rather than excuse. You may do what you like to him. Look at him, the haunted countenance, the utter dejection. Is there anything you can do to this man he has not already done to himself. I rest my case.
So there it is. Like the Ancient Mariner I detain people on their way to weddings and bore them with this tale. Someday I hope to find somebody else who's got the guts to come out and say "Hey, that happened to me! I did that too, wasn't it a bummer?" I had toyed with the idea of using my web page as a means whereby people could come out about this, and perhaps support each other. Some day I'll find somebody who'll understand, and then I'll be able to listen to Jimmy again without those dreadful feelings of guilt. If, like me, you have suffered in this way then contact me � A.Keith, MT Systems 1997.