Just Another Child Of The 70’s

Morning comes far too soon or maybe the night before ended way too late, I can’t say which is true and which is not.

I roll to the right and to the left, slowly trying to work out the kinks in my back and mystery aches in various other body parts.

Not that long ago I would spring out of bed feeling energized and refreshed–the day was mine.

That is not myth or memory, but it doesn’t happen with the frequency it once did because like so many other children of the 70s time has moved for me and the reflection in the mirror isn’t of the boy I used to be.

The guy who loved going to pizza places with sawdust on the floor and songs that people always seemed to be singing along with.

“Hey
If you happen to see
The most beautiful girl that walked out on me
Tell her I’m sorry
Tell her I need my baby
Oh, won’t you tell her that I love her”
The Most Beautiful Girl– Charlie Rich

Just Another Child Of The 70’s

Sometimes I wonder about the influence of our childhood upon us and think about how that impacts my generation, ya know the people labeled as X.

I arrived in time to be a part of the sixties, albeit very small but close enough that when adults talked about JFK, RFK and Dr. King’s assassinations it was always clear they were relatively recent.

It is not hard to remember the conversations about Watergate and whether Nixon was a crook. Not hard to remember Vietnam and conversations about the war, vets and whether we should have been there or not.

I remember WWII air raid sirens going off on the last Fridays 0f the month, the hostage crisis, Cold War and discussions about what would happen if we really went to war with the Russians.

It is all stuff I have written about a million times and I could leave this post as just me reminiscing about those things.

I could talk about how the 70s love songs I found interminably boring and awful as a kid grew to have meaning to me as a writer and in some cases related to others.

That is low hanging fruit and so very easy to hit.

Hell, far too many people want me to focus on such things. Far too many want me to write silly stories about fighting Santa Claus, cooking the Easter Bunny or the great love that got away and whether it would ever come back.

That’s cuz we’re all tired of the chaos and nonsense.

Cuz it is nice to just focus on stories about being another child of the 70s.

History Repeats

There is a part of me that is tired too of it all.

Tired of the political infighting, division and disagreements. Tired of struggling exert influence on people who don’t seem to give a damn about me or mine and that fatigue makes it easy to want to just lay down.

To want to let others handle things.

But I don’t do well with just sitting back and watching because my priorities may not be the same as others and if I don’t try to move the needle things could go astray.

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There is a movie about the increase in intolerance and antisemitism on colleges that is going to be shown this weekend.

I have been mulling over whether to go and thinking about how it might be ok to skip it because I am aware.

But a comment someone made on my Facebook account ticked me off a bit. Can’t say if they intended to be obnoxious but it is how I took it.

What did they say?

They asked if all I do is complain about Trump?

They are not the first to say something to me, others have suggested I should just suck it up and be quiet.

You don’t need a complete accounting of what has been said to me and why people think I ought to pipe down.

What you need to hear from me is that I will push back over and over again because I refuse to let this deranged, delusional and demented man convince us that chaos is acceptable.

He says things that are applauded by Nazis, white supremacists and xenophobes.

That is troubling because he does little to nothing to disavow them and history repeats itself.

So I am there to be one of the squeaky wheels to try to make sure others question him and that they don’t feel alone.

I’d rather err on the side of caution than let the silence mean acceptance to the monsters who walk among us.

Fear and Common Sense

I am not selling fear and trying to make you wonder and worry about the things that go bump in the dark.

Nah, I’m using common sense and saying my history teaches me to pay attention to people because the wolf that Little Red Riding Hood should most fear doesn’t have four legs.

I don’t walk around worried and wondering if or when I or someone I care about will be a victim but I am cognizant of the world around me.

And that is why the clarion call to wake up has to be sounded again and again.

Because we spend time trying to convince ourselves that only the mentally ill use guns to shoot people or that only evil folks do terrible things to others.

Sometimes it is true and sometimes the bigger horror is understanding that the people who do horrible things aren’t always ill.

They look normal and ordinary and in many ways they are but for reasons that seem unreasonable and illogical to others they choose to do terrible things.

Sometimes it is as simple as because they feel like they can and sometimes for others.

I am not a shrink or social worker so you won’t hear me get real deep into why they do as they do.

Nor will you hear me accept that G-d has a plan we can’t understand. Sometimes we are required to take steps on our own.

Sometimes we have to have hard conversations or at least try to.

Not everyone will listen or engage, but some will and sometimes others will come around, but only if you stick with it.

“Sometimes the silence can be like the thunder
Sometimes I feel like I’m being plowed under”
Love Sick– Bob Dylan

Choices

I am sitting in my room listening to the echoes of my father’s voice in my head.

Something about being smarter with the choice I made impacting my ability to eat dinner with the rest of the family.

It is not the first time I have been sent from the table nor will it be the last.

I tested my will against my father and mother repeatedly, took the punishment when needed and sometimes when not.

Something tells me my children might say the same, but I digress.

We all make choices and I choose to protest the monster-in-office in a variety of ways, one of which is by making my displeasure known on Facebook.

If people don’t like it they are welcome to unfriend or unfollow. No one is forcing them to read the stuff I post.

I choose words and I choose action, err on the side of caution and not chaos.