Life For What It's Worth

 

Listening to James Taylor

for several hours today. I like

to mix my music genres often.

Generally, I play classical stuff

which soothes an invigorates me.

But Beethoven, Bach and Mozart

are generations older than I, and

rarely bring back the times with

which I have a personal association.

With James Taylor and more con-

temporarys, I can trip back to the

1970s and remember when. My

life was pretty bland and

uneventful then, you know—

house and home in the suburbs,

family, eight-to-five job, grocery

stores, malls, cutting the grass

and cook-outs on Saturday.

Due to that and my service in the Army,

an early marriage and child in the 60s,

I missed out on those rebellious Vietnam

protests and flower-child, liberating

Hippy Days.

Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Pete Seeger,

Donovan, Taylor and others gave

me my wanna be background music.

Hell, back then, I didn’t know what

I didn’t know. And I suppose listening

to Taylor and the likes put me in the

mood for those changing times.

As it eventually turned out in the 80’s

I got my chance to grow a beard, get

divorced, let my hair hang down and

go hairy-assed ape shit wild.

I learned all about the booze, the

drugs, the moving about from

place-to-place, job-to-job and

woman-to-woman. I painted and

wrote poetry, and learned a lot more

that I ever wanted to know.

And of course, having survived all that,

I grew arthritically disabled and old.

In my seventies now, I am pretty much

home bound and do all my travel by

mind nowadays.

I have seen and heard plenty enough

from the world at large in my day. And

as for tomorrow, I feel some Beethoven

coming on.

                -30-

Chris Hanch 6-2-2021