Dating in highschool was a necessity, but never very interesting. Especially the movie-going dates. As tradition would have it, I usually purchased the tickets and the popcorn, and would hold her (alas…) hand rigidly on the arm rest.

One particularly odd date involved my on-again/off-again girlfriend, Kohane. She was an intoxicating (yet humble) person with whom I would have gotten along so much better had she known I was gay and didn’t really have what it took to be a boyfriend. I know this because I know that she didn’t necessarily want a boyfriend, and so my posturing put us both in an awkward position. But we trudged on, and one evening we found ourselves at the movies with her father. We had gone to see Mr. Holland’s Opus. Sounds great, right? Yeah, me too. Tony, on the other hand, has just started laughing so hard he pissed himself.

Well, there are only two things I remember from the movie. One was an especially exciting scene which, in an attempt to illustrate how times had changed, showed two punk boys walking down the street holding hands. ‘Nuff said. The second was a medium-sized quote from Mr. Holland to his wife:

“When I was a kid I used to go to the record store every day, and the guy there would tell me what to listen to. One day he hands me a John Coltrane album and tells me to go home and listen to it. So I did, and I hated it. I mean, I just hated it. And I hated it so much that I had to listen to it, every day, over and over again, until I figured out why it was that I hated it so much. And while I tried to figure out why I hated it, I finally realized that I loved it. And to this day, I love John Coltrane.”

I had not heard him before, but from that point forward I was sure to notice whenever his name was mentioned. It first appeared during my (mostly one-sided) love affair with Micah Ray. Jazz was becoming a part of his own affair with the Beats, and so I took to learning and listening about and to both. Coltrane and his high-spirited improvisations. His work with Bird. These facts I could recite upon prompting. And yet, I had never actually heard him play.

Slow dissolve into my freshman year of college, winter term, I am being wooed by a boy named Jesse. He is the first of many musicians with whom I had become involved. We spent afternoons in his loft listening to his records, burning candles, and drinking wine. He pulls out A Love Supreme and tells me to “listen hard” to what is about to happen. Cacophony! I was drunk and confused, but sat quietly and smiled.

It isn’t until 7 years later that I actually return to Coltrane. A couple days ago, a friend of my lover has come to visit. Josh lives abroad in various countries that used to belong to the Soviet Union. His life is simple and his excitement unending. He shows us pictures of his travels and tells us about his new-found love of jazz. “Jazz?” asks my boyfriend. “Why, jazz?” It relaxes me, he explains. My boyfriend decides he needs to start listening, and with that my exploration begins anew. Josh said he loves Miles Davis and Coltrane, and asks me if I have heard these albums. I put on Miles, who I have loved for years, but suddenly feel the tingling that the echo of Coltrane has always provided.

And so I begin to read about him, and decide that I will track down one of his most lauded recordings: Blue Train. As it is downloading onto my computer, I am flooded with these memories, and begin to write.