Wear A Tall Hat...

Back to the local park with Ma this morning, for more walking round the lake. Did our five revolutions, then she went to the car.
"I'm just gonna do a fast one to music," I said, handing her my by now somewhat battered, misshapen straw summer hat and plugging in my iPod. The first few chords of Elton John's "Crocodile Rock" ramped up, and off I strode...singing.

"I remember when rock was young," I told the ducks.
"Me and Susie had so much fun," I informed a big old tree.
It was when I got to the edge of the lake and turned to wave at Ma that I saw her standing there, shaking her head, stifling a laugh. I waved,  turned a circle, and sang extra loud at the man and his dog who were coming over the hillock in my direction.
"While the other kids were rocking round the clock...we were hoppin' and boppin' to the Crocodile Rock, yeah!"

Clearly, when walking solo, I'm something of a menace to public sanity. But at least I'm walking...sort of.
The next track on my "Seriously, how freakin' old are you, 70s-boy?" compilation was a T-Rex classic...Ride A White Swan.

As it happens, there aren't any white swans on the lake. Mainly just ducks and a pair of distinctly stick-up-the-butt sergeant major Canada Geese, who give you not so much the stinkeye as you walk past as the "You're lucky I'm not still a dinosaur, that's all I can say" eye. My dynamic, finish the lap enthusiasm rather burned away. We weren't Ride A White Swan people in our house, we were Get It On, Children of the Revolution people, so I didn't actually hear the deliciously nonsensical Ride A White Swan until the late 1980s and early 90s, when a girl with whom I'd fallen hopelessly in pity at the local am dram group introduced me to the song by...well, frankly by singing it, along with a cute up and downy dance.

I thought of Emma (the girl) this morning. And as I did the last half-lap, I did the up and downy dance, with some improvised turn-aroundy bits myself, singing to the sky and the past and the present and the future, to Marc Bolan, and my dad, to Emma and to d, to the swans and the geese and the ducks and the sky, and it made me feel like everything was potential. Everything was possible. Wear a tall hat like the druids of the old days - wear a tall hat, and a tattooed gown...

That's about as meaningful as today has been, really.

I realise of course that just as I've mentioned some oddball characters within these blogs, I am actually one myself. I'm loud fat uninhibited singing guy.

But hey, wear a tall hat and none of it matters. Catch a bright star and place it on your forehead, say a few spells and baby...there you go!