#1014 A-Changin’ Times

The other night I watched a performance of the new cast of the musical Hair on the David Letterman show. It brought back the nostalgia of hope. I wept. As the young actors and singers moved through the nearly 60-something audience at Letterman’s show, you could see the recently-oldsters puddling for more innocent times. Back when the times they were a-changin’.
“The times they are a-changin’.” I still can’t believe Bob Dylan used that spelling in his song.
“A-changin.’”
I admit, it sounds a lot better than the grammatically correct, “the times are changing.” And it is poetically ironic that the phrase he used to describe that change was itself a throwback to an earlier time.
Still, it spoke for a generation. That was back when the conservative folks felt protest was wrong. They didn’t organize tea parties with Fox News. There was no Fox News. People were still recovering from the red-baiting and hate-mongering of the McCarthy era.
It has always been far too easy for us to be afraid and hate.
The conservatives back then had this great bumper sticker. It said, “America, Love it or Leave it.” So I thought it was funny the other day when the Texas governor suggested secession.
I don’t always agree with my government. And I’ve protested about various things over the years. Civil rights and women’s rights. I hate racism. I would have really hated slavery.
But I’ve always considered secession as synonymous with treason. A duly elected congress and president are currently leading us. For the folks who used to say love it or leave it to now say they’re going to leave it seems a little ironic.
Speaking of which. The American Flag. I saw one on a truck the other day. Well it wasn’t actually flying in all its glory from the antenna or anything. It’s image was painted on a piece of plastic mounted to the hood. A bug shield.
In the age of Aquarius, hippies were roundly chastised for defaming the flag by wearing it as a shirt. How does rendering the flag as a bug shield fit into that respect spectrum?
The times they are a changin’...
America, ya gotta love it.