The times when you don't know that you don't know

  So, I was listening to Blue Oyster Cult, but I misheard it as Blue Oyster Culp. So I asked my Mom what a Blue Oyster Culp was..she had no idea of course.  When I finally realized it was 'cult,' I felt a vague sense of "duh."
   I also did not know what an Aerosmith was, and neither did my Mom.  After a while, I stopped asking, because I felt that were certain things that my most knowledgeable Mom did not know, and that was weird to me, because she knew EVERYTHING!
   When I started reading Creem, and Hit Parade, I started to learn the answers to my questions and what it is that, and who is that. I recall remembering the instruments that certain people in bands played, because I was that in to music then, or I just didn't have anything better to do. Mostly the latter, I would say.
    Any time I hear Neil Diamond, I think of long car rides to take my Daddy to a port, to board an aircraft carrier to do nine months at sea.  It was usually the song, "I Am, I Said," that we heard, or "Sweet Caroline."  Other times it was the Carpenters. So any time I hear them, my first thought is of taking Daddy to Norfolk, from Virginia Beach to board the "big boat, that has airplanes."
    "Close To You, by the Carpenters makes me think of my Brother. He had hair of gold and has eyes of blue and all the girls long to be close to him.  So do all of the boys.  He is a striking looking man, and he is also a great guy. I am more than glad to call him my brother.  My parents gave me a wonderful gift in having him.  We are alike in so many ways, and divergent in others, but music can always bring us together.
    If I really think of it deeply, as I have in these blogs, music was a huge part of our family bonding. We weren't great at expressing our feelings to each other.  But rides in the car with them, had Daddy switching the radio channels and coming to like songs.  Mother played music during the days when she cleaned house(before she started working later), and we could often hear John Denver coming out of open windows, or Bobby Goldsboro.
    Speaking of Bobby Goldsboro, the song Honey.  He sounds like a munchkin with vibrato, singing it in some areas of the song, but the message is so sad. I find that one more moving than Tony Orlando's "Tie A Yellow Around the Old Oak Tree."  I guess because Vietnam had a harsh effect on my young mind before I even realized what it REALLY WAS, and I thought the song was too upbeat. But then again, is it about him getting out of prison? War is a prison, so eh, same thing. In my world, anyway.
    Oh the songs you love when you are a teenie bopper "in love."  The song Miracles by Jefferson Starship.  There is a part in there where he's talking about he tasted a strawberry then he went down on.....so yeah, I had no idea what that meant.  My Daddy even asked me at some point. I was 10 at the time, and I had no idea at all. Some of the lyrics I had no clear idea what they were.  It was just a pretty song, with lovey dovey lyrics so it worked for me. A child thinking loving thoughts about another child, having no idea what the real world concerning love is about.
     That brings to mind another song, Thelma Houston's song, "Don't Leave Me This Way."  Who has ever left someone so young?

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