Category: childhood

Today’s Theme Music

I dreamed I was in 2025. I’ll tell you, I looked good for 2025.

With some friends, we were discussing something that had happened in 1985 involving them. Their news amused and astonished me while it depressed and frustrated them, as a clerical error from the beginning of their military career in 1985 had just been found in 2025 and needed to be fixed.

Meanwhile, we were getting ready to party. Guests were already arriving. I don’t recall hearing any particular music in the dream. Awakening, I remembered this old hit, from 1969, ‘In the Year 2525’. Although I remember all the words and the melody, I realized that I didn’t know who performed the song or anything else about it. For this, I trusted Wikipedia.org.

Zager and Evans are the performers. This was their only hit. Rick Evans wrote the lyrics. His words, about what’s going to happen to Humans, are fascinating to contemplate. At least they were for a thirteen-year-old reading science fiction in 1969. This was the number one song in the U.S. when Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon.

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Today’s Theme Music

I put the mental music cloud on shuffle. ‘Fortunate Son’ by CCR was one of several songs that came up.

I know it from its initial release in 1969, when I was thirteen. CCR is an awesome band that gave us a hellabunch of memorable hits like ‘Suzie Q’, ‘Heard It Through the Grape Vine,’ Who’ll Stop the Rain,’ and ‘Run Through the Jungle’. Many of later generations know this ‘Fortunate Son’ because it’s been part of so many movies and video games about war or that era in America’s history, or from one of the many other performers who have covered the song. ‘Fortunate Son’ reflected the country’s mood as the Vietnam War raged and body bags came back. It also mirrors the trend that the world’s wealthy and powerful start and sustain war, but it’s the poor, minorities and those beguiled by their desire to do their patriotic duty that end up carrying the burden.

I was one of those last, joining in 1974, serving until 1995.

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Today’s Theme Music

“I like to dream….”

Yeah, I like to dream. Sometimes I’m bothered that I experience so many nocturnal dreams, often three to five per night that I remember. But many of the dreams are positive and uplifting.

Likewise, I like to dream and write in my head, spinning stories to myself that are written too fast and fluidly to ever find its place in reality for others to enjoy. I work at writing and publishing fiction but it is work. Besides wanting stories that keep their attention, people want correct spelling, grammar and punctuation. They want consistency and explanation. Many are also interested in ‘facts’.

Facts, bah. I’m a fiction writer.

No matter, they retort.

Bah. They’re such sticklers.

This spin of thoughts spun me back into one of my favorite early albums, Steppenwolf Live’. I wore the vinyl off that mutha. I have several favorite songs from it but went with one that resonates best with me as a dream: Magic Carpet Ride.

Ride with me as the ‘wolf performs it in Santa Monica back in 1970.

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Today’s Theme Music

Today’s song is from a movie. I saw the movie back in the mid-1960s when I was a child. For some reason, it popped into my head last night and stayed awhile.

So, here it is, from the 1965 production of ‘Cinderella’, Leslie Ann Warren singing ‘In My Own Little Corner’. 

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Today’s Theme Music

I rode the surf from yesterday’s catchy and memorable song (what was it again?) to today’s.

What I remember best about this was that it was one of many forty-five RPM records my sister owned. We had the little plastic spindle adapter that allowed this to be played on the thirty-three’s spindle. Otherwise, you put on the larger forty-five plastic adapter, which reminded me of a red and gray toilet paper roll. The record’s label was orange, which I think was Decca. The song was ubiquitous, true for many Beach Boys songs at the time.

Here, from 1965, ‘California Girls’.

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Today’s Theme Music

I was sent on a secret mission this morning. I’d tell you about it but I assume that if you’re reading this, you understand what secret means. Perhaps I’ve erred.

Naturally I needed secret mission theme music. The world abounds with such music but I dropped back to an early favorite. The TV show, ‘Secret Agent Man’ with Patrick McGoohan, played in the US in the mid 1960s. Dad was back in the country for a period then, and I remember watching the show while visiting him at my grandparents’ house.

Here it is, that 1966 hit, Johnny Rivers singing ‘Secret Agent Man’.

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Today’s Theme Music

This whimsical song, ‘At the Zoo’, is from yonks ago. I don’t agree with Simon and Garfunkel’s characterizations of the animals but they’re interesting. Reading about the song on good old Wikipedia.org, I discover that the song was written for ‘The Graduate’  but was never used.

I remember being young and awash in sunshine as I walked some Laketon Road in Wilkinsburg where we lived in a duplex. Dad had given me a small transistor radio. A brown leather carrying case was provided for it. I could slip my belt through the back of the leather case and carry the radio around but have my hands frees. I was listening to this song, clapping my hands to it as it speeds up, trying to sing the lyrics.

Anyway, it’s a mellow, lighthearted song. Hope you have a mellow, lighthearted day. Me, I’m drinking coffee, listening to the music, and reading the neighborhood out my window.

It’s my own sort of zoo.

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What I’m Watching

I’m not watching much.

Twenty seventeen has not started out great. I’ve seen ads for a television game show, ‘The Wall’, and think, surely this is going to be satirical science fiction. But no; it’s real.

Yes, it’s a lean time in television land, with reruns, award shows and sports dominating. That’s true even though I stream television through Acorn, Amazon Prime, Hulu, Netflix, Sling and others. Although I’ve cut the cable, as they now like to claim with marketing zeal, television is mostly an entertainment desert.

I’ve gone through ‘Sneaky Pete.’ I’m waiting for more of ‘The Americans’, ‘Orphan Black’, ‘Stranger than Fiction’, ‘The Expanse’, ‘Dark Matters’, ‘Goliath’ and ‘Travelers’. We worked through my wife’s mild infatuation with ‘Being Human’ and ‘The Librarians’. I’ve gone through all of the ‘WestWorld’, Ballers’ and ‘Cake Wars’. Nothing new and offbeat like ‘Miranda’, Gavin and Stacey’, ‘Pram Face’, or ‘Misfits’ is out there. No new ‘Foyle’s War’ ‘Happy Valley’ or ‘The Killing’. No Frankie and Grace. No Harry Bosch or ‘Justified’.  No Wire.

We’re left, basically, with ‘This Is Us’. It’s a good show, with interesting characters, storylines, and structures, well acted and produced. My one gripe is related to its location in Pittsburgh, PA. I lived in Pittsburgh until I was fifteen and visited there often after that. Mom and my sisters still live their with their families. The people on TIU just don’t have the brashness of voice and the unusual talking style I find in Pittsburgh. Pittsburghers don’t tend to talk in soft voices, awaiting their turns. They talk fast, and start talking all at once, which causes conversations to become louder and louder, and more chaotic. They also tend to end sentences with a rise, as though they’re asking a question instead of making a statement.

Well, maybe that was just at my house, with my friends and family.

On the movie side, I’ve seen just about anything that I want to see.

What about you? Anything out there you’re watching that you recommend to others?

Meanwhile, I’ll probably don my brown shirt and take up with Mal for a few days.

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Mom’s Fault

It’s pouring rain. Soaked dark, my coat dribbled rivulets across the floor as I walked across the coffee shop.

“Did you walk?” the coffee shop owner asked. “I know you like to walk. I’ve seen you walking all over town.”

“No, I just walked a mile,” I answered. “I wanted to feel the rain and wind.”

“You like to walk, don’t you?” the owner said.

“Yes.”

Yes, I like to walk. It’s Mom’s fault. In my young life’s dawn, I’d want to go somewhere and requested Mom drive me. “You have two legs, you can walk,” she’d reply. Stories about her walking when she was a child followed. She walked to school miles in both direction, no matter what the weather was, digging trails and tunnels through the Iowa snowstorms, if necessary, fording rivers and forging trails, dodging wild animals while picking berries or nuts on the way home to use in baking, and stopping to milk the cows. If she walked in those conditions, I could walk.

I might have exaggerated about what she claimed to do.

So I walked. I walked everywhere. I didn’t have a car in high school for several years, so I walked the miles home from school after sports activities and play practices. I walked to my girlfriend’s house, miles more, and back again. Sometimes I was given rides. Sometimes, people attempted to molest me.

Once in the military, my wife and I didn’t have much income, so we walked. Over in the Philippines on duty, I didn’t have a car and had plenty of time, so I walked around the base and the town. In Germany, walking was organized into Volksmarching and celebrated with drink and food. Terrific!

By the time I began writing, walking was ingrained as part of my thinking process. I was pleased to discover that studies validated my impressions about walking. Walking ten minutes a day made most people happy besides providing exercise. Walking also enhances the creative process for most.

I was sure of that latter. Deciding I needed to put myself and my goals and dreams first, I started taking an hour out of the work day to write. Bosses, co-workers and team mates didn’t care as long as I did my share. As part of that, I observed that walking helped me shift from work Michael to writing Michael. As I walked to write, I would ask the eternal writing questions, “Where the hell am I? Where does the story go next? What do I need to write next? What did I write yesterday?” Asking these questions and thinking about it prepped me to sit down, ready to type.

Likewise, after leaving, I’d often continue working out characters, scenes and plots as I walked back to work. Then, walking to write the next day, I would recall the previous day and resume writing with little effort.

I was surprised that studies didn’t demonstrate a link to improved focused thinking, as well, and problem solving. Perhaps I’d trained myself to solve problems by walking, but I always felt leaving work for a short work, changing the scenery and releasing my brain from the work environment, was hugely instrumental in being able to see answers and develop solutions. Perhaps, though, that was still the creative brainstorming that writing seems to encourage.

My walking continued once I started working from home. I walked to take breaks and enjoy fresh air and sunshine. Then, walking to the coffee shop to write, I walked to reduce my carbon footprint and help save money and the environment.

Now, I have the Fitbit to encourage me to walk. If I haven’t walked in an hour, it buzzes me to get up and walk. So I leave the coffee shop and hustle down the steps and around the block and back. That’s enormously reduced my writer’s ass, which is when your ass goes to sleep after being almost stationary while typing or writing at a desk or table. When I’m at home, my wife and I jump up and start running around. Sometimes, we chase the cats, but they’re not into it, so we don’t do that much.

But, like many things I do and enjoy, my walking started with Mom.

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Today’s Theme Music

First, the disclaimers, the buts, ands, and the so, and the lists of ‘I know’.

I know it’s a holiday, and actually the day of one of the jewels of the holiday crown.

I know many hold this holiday sacred.

But I like this song.

And it’s been stuck in my head since I heard it on the radio yesterday.

I like this group a lot; their albums were part of my teen-age year go-to rotation. I may have posted this song before. I don’t know; I don’t track what I’ve listed.  And theme music can be repeated.

And I like the blues. So, really, I’m just spreading some joy.

So — here it is, the Allman Brothers with ‘One Way Out’.  For all we know, the man down there could be Santa Claus.

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