When I started this countdown of the 678 records in my collection, I vowed I would finish before my degenerative brain disease — Lewy body dementia — killed me or rendered me too incapacitated to finish.
Well, that was six years ago. I won’t lie, it has been a bumpy road. I didn’t post for more than six months starting at the end of last Juy (2020) because hallucinations were, shall we say, keeping me occupied. (Post on how we handled my hallucinations later.)
So, I just re-started a few months ago in January as a new medication knocked back most of the hallucinating.
I have 190 to go.
Sounds like a lot, and it is. But I have already under my belt 487 mini-profiles of vinyl records I started collecting in my teens.
That’s a lot of rock and roll (and jazz and blues). It’s all available free at www.myvinylcountdown.com. Also included on the blog but not part of the countdown are more than 100 essays, poems and ranking lists, many centered on Lewy and me.
In the music reviews, the numbers in the headline where the artist is identified there should be a number representing its place in the countdown. (There’s a plus/minus error rate of three I would estimate.)
And as a side bet, I think I’ll break the lifespan averages on this disease. Depending on the source, the average lifespan after diagnosis is anywhere from four to eight years. I’ve got six. I just hope I don’t end up like the poor runner in one of the Carolinas a few years ago, he finished a grueling marathon only to be struck by lightning at the finish line.
For more information see the About Me button on the website. Also check out the Lewy Body Dementia Association site www.lbda.org