Yesterday, when I was online, I noticed that David Crosby of CSN (Crosby Stills and Nash) had passed on my birthday. And I wondered why? Why did he, or some divine force which decides such things, choose my birthday to make the grand transition? My birthday happens every year, has happened every year, and will continue to happen every year during this incarnation on earth. It's no small thing that someone who's been an influence in my life, and on the lives of so many other people for more than half a century, passes on the exact date of my birth.
I remember hearing CSN songs on mid-20th century radio, and those old songs are still memorable and meaningful to this day. So I had a look online, to see more of birthdays and dates and the life of David Crosby, and Wikipedia kindly informed me that he was born in August, the same month as my recently departed uncle, who was a jazz musician with a different Wikipedia page. Both my uncle and David Crosby were the same Leo astrological sun sign. And, like the Leo sign of the lion, David looked the part with his wild mane of Leonine "freak flag" hair, to quote some song lyrics he was associated with way, way back in the hippie era of the early 1970s.
Years later, after graduating from University, I connected with a musically like-minded group of friends who enjoyed going to concerts. I remember, for a decade or so while I was in my twenties, regularly budgeting concert money out of my meager internship salary. Shortly after an upcoming event was announced, we would pool our funds together to buy the kind of concert tickets you can only get at high prices through Southern California agencies. With those tickets, every few months, we secured seating pretty close to the front row of a lot of excellent performances that were sold out months in advance.
Meeting up at an outdoor amphitheater for a CSN concert became an annual tradition. There was absolutely nothing like being under the stars, in the cool California summer evening, wearing a light sweater atop my favorite outfit for the evening, with a group of friends absorbing the incredible energies shared through that trio of distinctly vibrant harmonies, among thousands of people in the same audience of a huge outdoor arena. The energies of perfect love vibrated through their harmonious vocals to us, as an enormous shared feeling that lasted throughout and beyond the amphitheater, and has been remembered many years.
After our friendship group eventually separated and went our separate ways, some of us getting married and cutting our hair (how could he do that after all we'd been through together?) and some of us succeeding or failing in our careers or something somewhere in-between the two extremes, after that decade of shared concert experiences under the California evening stars, Crosby Stills and Nash kept singing and playing at concerts the same as they had every year, apparently since 1969, like three immortal men. Sometimes I've thought about looking up that high-priced ticket agency, buying an over-priced concert ticket and enjoying a live CSN concert again. Someday ...
Unbelievably, to us mortals, David Crosby has passed and, sadly, Irvine Meadows Amphitheater is only a memory, having been quietly silenced and demolished a few years ago. Yet, thanks to youtube, social networking and the internet, we may hear and feel and be present in an online, electronically produced video and audio experience that stimulates the ears of people who never went to a CSN concert and simulates the memories for those of us who have. A man, who seemed almost immortal almost all of my life, has become a shared memory in the electronic and sonic realm.
So I wonder about that fateful date and I ask. Why? Why, every year from now on, will I be reminded that David Crosby passed on my birthday? What does it mean? Finally, late last night, I googled it. Google pointed me to a few pages. I clicked one that had maybe a half dozen interpretations of what it meant that someone died on my birthday. My gentle, electronic messenger kindly scrolled down and highlighted one paragraph.
And that paragraph said:
It is a common belief that those who die on your birthday are designated as your guardian angel. This is said to be the universe's way of giving you a special gift – someone who is always looking out for you and has a deep connection to you.
And, once again, I am humbled by a phenomenal musical artist who, like my uncle, was a Leo and who, like my uncle, waited to pass until his elder years in the 21st century. While I am saddened that I will never again see a live CSN concert with over-priced seats in an enormous outdoor Southern California amphitheater under the beautiful, starry summer skies, I am humbled to receive this gift and I cannot imagine having a nicer guardian angel than David Crosby.
Whatever I did to receive this gift, at such a sad moment in our musical history, I hope it was something good.
resources:
What Does It Mean When Someone Dies On Your Birthday? (6 Spiritual Meanings)
by Liquids and Solids
https://www.liquidsandsolids.com/what-does-it-mean-when-someone-dies-on-your-birthday/#:~:text=It%20is%20a%20common%20belief,a%20deep%20connection%20to%20you.
Accessed January 21, 2022
Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irvine_Meadows_Amphitheatre
Accessed January 21, 2022
David Crosby
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Crosby
Accessed January 21, 2022
Urbie Green
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urbie_Green
Accessed January 21, 2022
