Ramblings

It's amazing how a person's mind works. When I first decided to start this blog, I had all sorts of ideas and inspiration churning in my head, and almost knew exactly what I wanted to say to the world. Now that I have the blog set up and a grand opportunity to express the inner workings of my garrulous mind, the inevitable thing happens. It decides not to cooperate and freezes up, giving me a blank slate to stare at and insipid thoughts rambling around aimlessly.
I could start out with a "Where I Come From" introduction, but I'm afraid that my story isn't much different than thousands of other people around the world. Single parent, poor, blah blah blah. It's a story that's been told over and over again, and sadly we've all become inure to the sadness of it because a big share of us have lived it.
Instead of focusing on the bad parts of my childhood, I'd rather talk about the interesting things. Even though we didn't have much, we still had a lot. My Mom had plenty when it came to friends, and to say the least, some of them were very interesting. The majority of people that I grew up around were hippies or bikers. In the 70's, the Flower Power movement was very much alive, and we children (my sister, brother, and I) were often entertained sitting by the fireside by many guitar toting free spirits. My favorite was a man we called Brother Lynn (lots of "Brothers" and "Sisters" back then). One of my favorite memories of him are his rendition of The Motorcycle Song by Arlo Guthrie. He knew that we enjoyed it, and played it with such elan that we always begged for an encore. Of course this was back before Nintendo and Playstation, so for us it was definately primo entertainment.
Then along came Steven Speilberg with the blockbuster movie Jaws in 1975, and a whole new era of entertainment began. It's the first movie that I remember watching that wasn't a Disney production. With it, Speilberg cast a spell on the public and opened the door to a whole new genre. All of a sudden people paid to have the crap scared out of them, and unknowingly started numbing themselves to the horrors of the world. Where once a public outcry would have reverberated across the planet when a murder occurred, we have now become so inure to the injustice of it that we actually consider it entertainment on a daily basis now. The popularity of three CSI shows and several copycat series pretty much proves that.
Of course, I don't know what any of that has to do with my childhood, except that back then I was smart enough to have explained it all to you from twenty different angles until you understood it.