Day 158: Cashed.

Until recently, if I used the term "cashed" it meant the bowl was spent. Whatever had been loaded into the pipe, bong or one-hitter was gone, and only ash remained in its place. Alternatively, it meant I was spent, as in exhausted.

Now it means something different. To be "Cashed" means to have finally figured out that Johnny Cash is cool.

I know, what took me so long? It wasn't the Joaquin Phoenix/Reese Witherspoon movie - I haven't seen it. And it wasn't that I'd never heard of him - of course I'd heard of him. I used to be a music critic. I knew he was the Man in Black, I knew he was married to June Carter, I knew about the prison connection, and I knew basic songs like "Ring of Fire" and "Walk the Line." I certainly didn't think Johnny Cash wasn't cool - I just didn't think about him one way or the other.

Then, three weeks ago, I read a blog entry written by Molly, a friend of a friend. It was about Cash's "At Folsom Prison" recording, and it focused on a specific moment before the song "Jackson." Johnny asks June to come on stage and sing with him, and after she says she'd love to, and that she's "glad to be back in Folsom" (seemingly unaware that being back in prison isn't necessarily a good thing, the blogger comments), Johnny says, with complete and utter sincerity: "I like to watch you talk."

The blog writer goes on to say:

i like to watch you talk. is there anything more romantic than that idea? the notion of being so enamored, so enthralled by someone that the simple act of watching them talk is a source of pure joy? you can hear the happiness in johnny's voice when he says it and you can tell that he, at that moment, has nothing but june carter on his mind.

Maybe because I'm such a hopeless romantic, I was immediately smitten. I went out that very afternoon and, even though I'm poorhouse broke, bought "Folsom." (Unfortunately, Amoeba didn't have any solo copies of "Folsom" - I had no choice but to drop $28 on "Johnny Cash: The Collection," which also includes "At San Quentin" and "America." Why am I so obsessive that I couldn't order it on Amazon for $7.97 and wait a few days?)

Anyway, I began listening to "Jackson" as soon as I got in the car and then continued the lovefest once I got home. The romantic moment may have been what drew me in, but the song is what made me put iTunes on "Repeat One." Talk about ripping up the floorboards - I had no idea June Carter's voice was so incredibly ballsy. The final refrain, in which the pair explodes into a final "We got married in a fever," still sends chills rippling down my spine every time.

Since then, I've spent quite a bit of time with the rest of "Folsom," too. I love the first song, "Folsom Prison Blues" - and not just because I finally know where the line "I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die" comes from. "I Still Miss Someone" pretty much guts me, "Cocaine Blues," like "Jackson," is impossible not to sing along with, "Give My Love to Rose," sweeps me up in its longing, and I forgive "Dirty Old Egg-Sucking Dog" (and even laugh with it) because, despite its threats against a canine, Cash winningly introduces it as a love song to man's best friend.

But for me anyway, "Jackson" is still - hands down - the high point.

One of the great things about music is that there's so damn much of it. There's always something new - or something old - to blow you away. A month ago, I never would have imagined that I'd be playing a Johnny Cash record with such incessant fervor - and that's exactly what makes it so great. I should probably be embarrassed that I managed to go all these years without truly understanding Cash's importance (four years as a music critic, no less), but I'm not. I'm just grateful that I'm listening to it right now.


From the liner notes Cash wrote for the 1999 reissue.