I was dreaming when I wrote this, forgive me if it goes astray

I gasped out loud, in the middle of a meeting at work when I saw the breaking news that Prince had been taken from us.   Didn’t he transcend such things?  

I ain’t got no money, but baby I’m rich in personality

I wonder if people of such immense creative talent have any idea how they touch the rest of us?   Not all have the success of Prince, but really is that what matters?  

Purple Rain possibly changed my whole life, something I had never really realized or thought about until today.  Dig if you will, the picture…  two people so different:  a black guy from Minneapolis (I had to look up how to spell that.  I know Prince’s full name, but I had to look up Minneapolis) and the whitest white girls from Boston.  Yet he spoke to me.  There were bad things happening and ways to escape them.  Believing in yourself, what you want to do… be authentic to yourself, that is what matters.  Now I know that is what other people relate to (not all others, but the ones that matter to you).   I haven’t watched it in years, but it’s queued up.  I remember that year.  How big that album was, how influential the movie….  the era of Micheal Jackson, Bruce Springsteen, Cindi Lauper and… the purple one.  

I can’t disguise the pounding of my heart… 

Wooo… did Darling Nikki blew this school girls skirt up….

If you don’t like the world you’re living in, Take a look around you,  At least you got friends

I flash back to being at my friend’s basement.  Oh, could we dance to Rasberry Beret, Little Red Corvette and the entire Purple Rain soundtrack.  We were learning our way in the world.  Learning who we were.  This was all before she married a Mormon shortly after college, move to Utah and had a bunch of kids.  Today I wonder what they would think if they could have seen her then.   I hadn’t spoken to her in years, but I found her on Facebook tonight and if something that comes out of that, well Prince will have helped me one more time. 

Listening to Purple Rain again today is like visiting an old friend.  One you haven’t seen in years, but you fall back into after years, like you’d never been apart.  

You make me so confused
The beautiful ones
You always seem to lose

We lost a beautiful one today…  and I just say thank you for the time we had and the gifts you shared.

RIP Prince Rogers Nelson (if that’s what you want…)

And if the elevator tries to bring you down, punch a higher floor…

RIP Prince Rogers Nelson (if that’s what you want…)