Hammertime?

If I had a HAMMER TIME

As I finished brushing my teeth this morning, I turned on the hot water in order to wash my hands AGAIN!!! Then I turned to open the bathroom  door and wondered when that had last been washed.  Should I  wash it ?  Can I touch this?  According to Hammer “Can’t  Touch This!”  

As strange as it sounds that might. Go down as the lyrics to the “folk song of the 80’s , and why not?  You see last night I was  thinking about  some of my favorite. “Folk” classics like  “If I had a Hammer.”  From there I was thinking “I wish it were a simpler time, like. When Ilearned that song.  Then my mind wandered back to the  day(s) when I learned that song and remembered some of the other  songs I learned right then.  Well, I learned them on a YMCA (where it’s fun to stay—according to the village People) Day Camp  Bus.  We had about  a 50 minute trip out of town to reach the camp each day and  one of the counselors  figured  it would be best if we spent our time singing.  What I didn’t realize until  much later in life was that the counselor taught us  war protest songs we were then singing at the top of our lungs as we rolled through afairlyy conservative  Midwest town.  Just a few of the songs were:

Blowin’ in the wind

Where Have All the Flowers gone

If I had a Hammer

500 Miles

And

Snoopy and the Red Baron.

We also learned. Big rock Candy  Mountain  and Turn, Turn, Turn...

Now  of course I was later to learn that most of these songs were staples of one Pete Seeger who along with Woody Guthrie and his son (Arlo)  were probably the most prolific. Folk song recorders of the 20th century.  What about. Dylan?  It’s hard for me to think anyone equals  Bobby Zimmerman and yet Pete Seeger gives him a run for the money.  Pete made it a point to record not only songs he wrote, but. He also recorded  folk music from all over the globe and most parts of the US.  He built a trememndos catalogue of recordings for “folkways” and you can look this up in the library of congress, however, I think he holds the record for recording  for the loc and the smith Smithsonian.  He crisscrossed the  country and  captured  a thousand songs on his banjo and left them for  school children and adults to learn and we are still teaching. Them and learning them today.  

Was Pete famous?  Well the government kept pretty good tabs  on him and he got. Caught up in the red scare.  His songs about greed and social injustice made him antiestablishment for sure, but he was not a communist by any means.  

He didn’t really seek fame as a popular. Artist at any point in his.career and he focused more attention on  making sure the voices of  the unsung were preserved and  represented than his own celebrity.   He made a concerted effort to invite the crowd to sing along and would often feed them  the lyrics as songs were performed.  

In short, Pete Seeger worried more about the songs being enjoyed and remembered than personal gain and glory.   WI think there. Would be much more peace and joy if we all  tried to make sure  voices were heard, ideas were shared, and engagement and enjoyment  were. A focal point of more events.  

Okay coming full circle to “you can’t touch this” it’s time for the pandemic  journal for today.  I’m wondering. How much time  I spend making sure the quieter voices get heard in a time when those voices could easily get isolated and overlooked?   Is anyone paying attention  to what “distancing” is doing to the ability to listen?  When we go back to a “post-pandemic”  world will we make the effort to have the whole  audience learn the songs and be able to sing if they so choose or will we maintain our. Toilet paper hoarding tendencies?   We  have been learning to shelter ourselves, however, will be put the same effort into sharing our spirit when we get  the daily opportunities  through social  media and when this  medical and social event runs it’s course?  My personal plan is to start looking for  the works of others to share with readers .  Will you get my. Particularly warped  perspective on them?  Sure, but I will  put the lyrics out there and you can sing along if you’d like or invent your own versions of things.  The point is—it’s time that  seeking peace and joy gets. To be a community enterprise through the sharing of  thoughts and feelings that are begging to be. Shared and, appreciated, and preserved—-Thanks Pete.