{"id":1566,"date":"2009-11-07T11:35:00","date_gmt":"2009-11-07T19:35:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/?p=1566"},"modified":"2009-11-07T11:35:00","modified_gmt":"2009-11-07T19:35:00","slug":"letting-my-freak-flag-fly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.leftyparent.com\/blog\/2009\/11\/07\/letting-my-freak-flag-fly\/","title":{"rendered":"Letting My Freak Flag Fly"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"CoopThose words crossed my mind this morning and I struggled for a moment to dig into my mind to remember where they were from. I did find it, though the blessed Internet (my \u201cMind 2.0\u201d) would have found it for me if I had typed those words into a browser. It came to me. That Crosby, Stills and Nash song called… now what was it… ah yes… \u201cAlmost Cut My Hair\u201d<\/a>. Hmmm… I actually did cut my hair, what\u2019s that all about?
\n
\nBut my wonderful \u201cMind 2.0\u201d got me the lyrics and took me to Wembley, England in 1974 to see the band perform it and told me again the story of David Crosby\u2019s song, included on the Crosby, Stills and Nash album \u201cD\u00e9j\u00e0 vu\u201d, released in March of 1970, probably written in 1969 when I was 14 years old.<\/p>\n

Almost cut my hair
\nIt happened just the other day
\nIt’s gettin kinda long
\nI coulda said it was in my way
\nBut I didn’t and I wonder why
\nI feel like letting my freak flag fly
\nCause I feel like I owe it to someone<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

David\u2019s hair (thinning even then I recall) was his metaphorical \u201cfreak flag\u201d, his flying colors, of his generational statement and challenge to the conventions of the previous generation.
\n
\nAs I said I was 14 at the time and appreciated the sentiment when I first heard the song, but was not quite ready to raise my own banner. But it was just around then when I saw the musical \u201cHair\u201d in Toronto (naked actors and all) and I was soon lured on stage by the \u201croar of the greasepaint\u201d to at least experiment with flying my \u201cfreak flag\u201d playing a character on stage.
\n
\nForty years later I\u2019ve found a life partner, we have two grown kids and a big mortgage, and I\u2019m still, as Jackson Browne said, \u201cSlaving for the legal tender\u201d (which then reminds me of Joe Walsh\u2019s lyric, \u201cI can\u2019t complain but sometimes I still do\u201d.) Even though life happens, and my head is shorn by a number four razor-cut from Supercuts, I still do my best, in my mostly quiet way, to let that \u201cfreak flag fly\u201d. <\/p>\n

Must be because I had the flu for Christmas
\nAnd I’m not feeling up to par
\nIt increases my paranoia
\nLike looking at my mirror and seeing a lit up police car
\nBut I’m not giving in an inch to fear
\nCause I missed myself this year
\nI feel like I owe it to someone<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But it is certainly a challenge, turning 50 four years ago, \u201cover the hill\u201d as it were, wrestling with health and financial issues, losing and finding jobs, continuing to pay that mortgage, to keep that freak flag out there somewhere.<\/p>\n

\nWhen I finally get myself together
\nI’m going to get down in that sunny southern weather
\nAnd I find a place inside to laugh
\nSeparate the wheat from the chaff
\nI feel like I owe it to someone<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Well at least I\u2019m living in Los Angeles and I think I continue to find that place inside to laugh and enjoy the adventure of it all, even the adventure of cutting my hair. (It feels so good to feel the wind on my scalp on a hot LA day!) I would not take any of it back or have anything turn out differently… well pretty much at least.
\n
\nAnd ever working those metaphors, I have reframed \u201cover the hill\u201d as now finally not working against gravity, leveraging it to spend more time as it were, separating the \u201cwheat from the chaff\u201d and taking stock of an incarnation so far on this planet we call Earth in what we designate as the 21st Century of the \u201ccommon era\u201d.
\n
\nIn fact, cutting my hair was a challenge to fly my freak flag in perhaps a less obvious but much more profound way in how I live my life among the palms as \u201cthe sun comes up on Santa Monica Boulevard.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Those words crossed my mind this morning and I struggled for a moment to dig into my mind to remember where they were from. I did find it, though the blessed Internet (my \u201cMind 2.0\u201d) would have found it for me if I had typed those words into a browser. It came to me. That […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[648,459,649],"class_list":["post-1566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventure","tag-freak-flag-fly","tag-over-the-hill","tag-turning-fifty"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t