sometimes you gotta wait. sometimes you dont mind it.

they were coming out of a sports bar. slightly older than the type youd see exciting such a joint. turned out he had just retired and she was a year away. he was from london. she from the valley.

both had been married before. neither thought lightning would strike twice but right away you could see these two weren’t the problems in any relationship.

they laughed. made space for each other. complemented. allowed each other to finish telling tales on the long trip due to traffic on the 10

we were going from the marina to pasadena. finally i was gonna make a few bucks that night. so i didnt mind waiting as she used her cane to get in while he kept the door open as if they were on their first date.

dont let my motorhead tshirt fool you, im a sucker for romance and love asking people about their first dates, first kisses, and first time knowing whoops ive fallen into something suddenly out of control.

i was in a tom waits cover band he said from the back seat, holding his bride’s hand. i wasn’t allowed to play any instruments back in london so when i moved in with some lads in echo park i picked up the bass and they taught me the rudiments by learning tom waits songs together.

omg rain dogs is one of my all time faves, i told them.

earlier than that, he said. ’70s tom waits, when he was a beat poet, the crystal gayle years.

i didnt have the heart to tell me that was my least favorite era but any style of the gravelly voiced poet is better than most. we crept along the 10 and i turned down the radio.

her friend brought her to the party which was originally a practice in my mate’s living room but people began to appear like this one and before you know it, it was a party.

the missus chimed in by saying i didnt tell him until later that i didnt know who the hell tom waits was, which is ironic because i worked at warners when he was signed to asylum.

do you fall in love with people and their little details? is it just a libra thing? it’s good i dont have a meter like an old school cab because when she said that i wanted to give them the rest of the ride free. which is reason a million i need to figure out what im doing wrong with the lottery numbers.

i knew she didn’t know tom waits, he chuckled.

sometimes the conversations get so sweet and tender you just want to sigh, which i did right as the traffic opened up and i gunned it around the curve next to the convention center.

what was your wedding song, i asked?

we had two, she said, but don’t tell anyone because we didn’t have the rights cleared.

her husband laughed, there were 50 people there. who would care?
she cared. still does apparently.

my favorite song since being a little girl was elvis’ cant help falling in love with you, but i really enjoy bruce springsteen’s version and he put it on tape for me when we were courting

the one i choose was ‘Little Trip to Heaven,’ he said.

‘On the Wings of Your Love,’ she finished.

so i said, hey siri, play little trip to heaven on the wings of your love by tom waits.

the muted trumpet set the tone of the old school romantic tune. you could almost smell the cigarette smoke in whatever studio he recorded it in.

or was it a bar

or was it a dimly lit living room apartment in pasadena where they’d later recreate that first dance moment while the warm santa ana winds sneak in through the cracks of the old house

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