I am glad I didn't get to see Glen Campbell's last concert on his farewell tour as he settles into losing all his memories and finally, perhaps, we have heard of it, only his fingers when he holds a guitar, will retain what has been taken from the dreaded Alzheimer's disease.
It seemed like a pretty fine send off. L.A. elite, Jenny Lewis, Kris Kristofferson, Jackson Browne. Reading the L.A. pop and hiss review, I discovered that it is Glen playing the lick on"Viva Las Vegas. And that he played lead on "I Get Around", "Daydream believer" and Last Train To Clarksville" I think I kinda knew that last line.
I got to see him perform a really terrific show with two sons and a daughting backing him up. He was in great spoirits and it was the way I wanted to seehim. My brother-in-law died of cancer seven years ago and I didn't get to say goodbye and my sister said I was lucky because I got to keep the memories of the last time I saw him before he died when he was in remission. I am glad I had that, and I am glad I have this.
Really, of all the slow malingering deaths, this one sucks so bad. All you have is memories, how cruelly indifferent can nature be, to rob them from people. Terribly sad, really. Glen, like so many of us, went through the lot on his road to redemption, and Alzheimer doesn't take it for us, it takes it from him.
I think I'll remmber, more than anything, his daughters affection for her father as they shared the stage. Those of the kind of things that remain gentle on the mind, those and his fingers finding the notes he's spent a life time playing.