If you wanna be free, be free.
This was a post I wrote about three weeks ago but neglected to post. I’m sure you’ve been wondering…where IS that one post about that one stuff and oh I hope she talks about that Cat Stevens guy? Well. Do I have a treat for you…
Remember Cat Stevens? Or as he’s less commonly known, perhaps, Yusuf Islam?
Man, I loved him.
I was a child of the 70’s, and his music and voice and lyrics rocked my little kid world.
(Ok…so I have to interject here that I’m sitting in the Will Rogers Airport in OKC, OK, and this dude has fallen asleep in the bar and is snoring so freaking loud that I can hear him three tables over, even though the Dallas football game is on and all of the seasoned airport drinkers are living it up around the TV screens. Holy Moly that is cracking me up…)
And also, I loved Gordon Lightfoot, but please don’t hold that against me. I only got my sisters’ hand-me-down records (NO WE DID NOT CALL THEM VINYL BACK THEN) and it didn’t leave me much selection beyond The Kingston Trio, old Elvis Presley (before Fat Elvis and/or Elvis the Pelvis; yes, I’m referring to the good-Christian-boy-Elvis), Jim Neighbors, and Eddie Rabbit.
We’ll just leave it at that.
(Good grief, I’m old.)
(But they’re older. Ha.)
Anyway, he had a song, If You Want To Sing Out, and boy did I ever. We lived on a Hopi Indian reservation in New Mexico at the time, and I rode the snot out of my yellow banana bike with a cassette tape player bouncing around in the front plastic white basket. He helped me through that awkward school year and summer and a couple of more after.
I will forever love him, even though he’s forever banned from re-entering the United States. Here’s to you, Yusuf.
(I’m totally plugged into iTunes right now, listening to Peace Train and raising a pint of Blue Moon to memories. Sure wish I had some hippie beads and a hula hoop on me…)
So, I think of this because I’m just fresh from a trip to Oklahoma, where I saw my oldest boy. Sheesh. Not a boy. I have a man-son. Man. MAN.
(Good grief, I’m old.)
He’s quirky and funny and goofy and I just like him a whole lot. And he is free.
He has chickens.
And he coon hunts.
That sounds ridiculously funny, doesn’t it? It’s ok. It does to me, too.
He’s the quintessential Okie boy. I’m even pretty sure he noodles. Please don’t even ask what that is. (Oh wait, there’s probably a Discovery show about it. You should Google it…worth it. Swear.)
When Hank and I lived in Oklahoma City, there was a place that I went to feel the freedom of that song. It was once of those spots that was great in an awesome way: beautiful, serene, and not really commercially developed yet.
It was the only place I felt the need to say goodbye to when we moved to Colorado. The lighthouse has been taken down and replaced with restaurants, but the wind surfers still come and ride land, water, and air.
It was the only place that I welcomed the wind. It just felt right here; the sounds of the water lapping, the smell of heat and wet grass and dirt…it was my oasis.
It’s still a favorite haunt for me.
Forgot about the red clay, though.
I don’t know that I’ll ever get it all the way off.
‘S ok. It’s just another little way to never forget where my first home was.
My home now is calling its sweet song, a new verse in how to be free. Gotta jet.
