Well, no, not really. But then again, maybe, yes.

Last week much was made of the 50th anniversary of the birth of Joni Mitchell’s epic album, “Blue”. When it came out, I was a young snot, a Bronx primitive, and I didn’t “get” it. I made fun of her octave jumps and her phrasing fetishes, and her chord voicings that I thought were artificially intricate.

I was given the eight ayem slot on my college radio station, only because no one else wanted to get up to the booth that early in the morning. “Just play records.” That is what the station manager told me on my first day, by way of direction.

So I did. Stones. Jimi. ‘Retha. Lots of Stax/Volt and Atlantic Records R&B. Lots of Motown. Sometimes people would come up to the booth and suggest songs.

One time, a woman begged me to play Laura Nyro, a Bronx heroine. Another time, a woman came up, eyes red with tears, with that blue-tinged LP. “Please! Play this,” she said.

My heart sank, as Sam and Dave sang “Hold on…I’m comin.'”

“Which one?” I answered, unable to conceal my disdain.

“River.” So, yeah, fine; I played it. Whatever.

The phone started ringing, and didn’t stop. Play more from “Blue”, the suddenly attentive early ayem students said to the boy-man that was me. Hmmmm. What am I missing here?

The decades passed; life — that predicament that precedes death (Henry James’ line, not mine) — happened.

I just completed a year studying “Music and the Brain” — a class taught by Dr. Concetta Tomaino, the research partner of the late, great, Oliver Saks. I read Dan Levitin’s work, and Robert Jourdain’s, and much more. I learned that there are specific parts of the brain that latch onto puzzling concepts in order to solve them. With a certain fury, we are hard-wired to create order from chaos.

I also learned from Dr. Tomaino about the magic of the music, and of how music has more power to heal physical and psychological wounds than any other art form. The phenomenon may be rooted in science, but the outcomes can only be appreciated in terms of mysticism.

Fifty years after the release of Joni Mitchell’s “Blue” album, I marvel at the bounty of that young songwriter’s facility with language and sonics. I understand and appreciate that complex electro-chemical processes fuel my mind’s analysis of her songs.

But life experience has taught me that it’s far more important to savor her sensibilities than to deconstruct her diminished chords. I’ve learned to be “frightened by the devil, and drawn to those ones that ain’t afraid.”

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So, thanks to the girl with the red-rimmed eyes, wherever you are in life. Like a bottle of Bordeaux, I was awfully green at first; it took time for me to open up and appreciate Mitchell’s majesty, her supple and disturbing art.