A line in the song Aqualung, by group Jethro Tull I heard this morning, “Do you still remember”, and the answer is YES, I remember. The days when you had to go to the box office to get tickets to concerts. Sleeping out overnight at the Capital Center or Merriweather Post Pavilion for concerts like Led Zeppelin or The Eagles or The Who. Or one of our favorites also Jethro Tull.

We didn’t pay any convivence fee, or delivery fee or parking fee. But we did get some damn good seats at some concerts. They did set limits on how many you could buy but I think it was something like 10 per person because I can recall 2 of us bought close to 20 for one concert for all our friends.

Ah, what great experiences, both the purchasing process and concerts. Sleeping out overnight on concrete or in a car.

The days when both your hands were in the air because you were clapping or playing an instrument or both while singing along. No phones recording the whole concert. Your mind recorded it. I think that is why the hair on my neck stands up for some songs still decades later.

Music has and always will be an important element in my life. The enjoyment and inspiration it brings have been immense. The emotions and feelings some songs hold, and grip me like a hug.

Concerts were and still are this great shared experience with others who hold those lyrics, notes, beats, and choruses in reverence. It’s one of the great unifiers in our universe. The SONG. They cross any land or ethnic barriers.

Random Thoughts of the Morning

• I guess it’s time to think about taking the decorations down. I like the thinking about it part more than the doing it. I’ve thought about it and I’m not starting today.
• That cold wind this morning is going to test my patience today.
• Some places have a 2-drink minimum. I have a 2-mile minimum on the treadmill per day. I exceeded that 2-drink minimum many times as a youth. No need to re-live that element of my hard charging days.
• It’s not that I don’t care or feel about the nasty events that happened on New Years Day. I just have to compartmentalize life because that crap goes on every day around the world, sometimes in larger numbers or many smaller ones but it’s there in our faces every day. I have to live and stay positive and work to change it for my children and grandchildren.