Inspired by a dream...
Ever since I bought my first Led Zeppelin tape in 1993, I have been hooked on an enigmatic dream.
What is it about this band? Is it the folklore, their presence, their ties to dark and mysterious powers? I can't honestly say I gave any of this much thought as a preteen. I was only twelve then, living in a small town of mountainous Northern California called Novato, about a forty five minute drive north of the Golden Gate bridge.
I remember riding my bicycle to the local Warehouse Music, which has been out of business for decades, now. I grabbed a cellophane-wrapped cassette tape of Led Zeppelin II and walked it up to the counter, I was so proud to be buying my own music. I payed the $12.75 in change... and I mean, change. I had taken my entire piggy bank and the poor counter clerk had to dish out the nearly 13 bucks in pennies, nickels, dimes... with the occasional quarter or two. It took about twenty minutes, and you know what? I think I had a few bucks left over even, which I spent on a Taco Bell value meal before heading back home to blast the tape on my boom box.
I've always gotten a kick out of the many Lord of the Rings references in Zepp's music. The Battle of Evermore, Misty Mountain Hop, "...but Gollum, the evil one, crept up and slipped away with her," song lyric from Ramble On, just to name a few. I guess J.R.R. TOLKIEN had captured their imagination as well.
There were plush rolling hills and lots of thick, dense and dark backwood areas in Novato, and on weekends I would always lead excursions into these nebulous mountains with my friends and a random assortment of neighborhood kids (whoever got the ok from their mothers and could pack a sandwich). My favorite times to climb were in fall and winter, when dampened by moisture the grass was tall and green, and the woods mistier and more mysterious than ever.
In Lucas Black chapter three, there is a reference to Luke being "an odd boy" because he liked to spend so much time in the dark woods of Mordor, or Rotwood. But truth is stranger than fiction... at that point in the story, the story of Lucas Black was truly the story of his writer, Luis.
