. . . and then there was pickle.

The other day I was going through some of my old papers and such when I discovered a notebook of old writings and poems from high school. I was struck by how much, and little, my ideals have changed in almost twenty years. Hopefully my writing has improved.

This poem struck me as very relevant to a lot of my current questions regarding the development of a value system. I think I wrote this just about the time I realized I had one.

Life by the Lyrics


Elenor taught me
compassion for man.
The old fool on the hill
gave me patience at hand.

Comfortably Numb
taught me to set my goals as a human,
and Animals taught me
that life was confusion.

Lucy gave me dreams
when all seemed dim,
and Vera was there
to be my true friend.

The bombs did fall
as depression set in,
and the worms did crawl
as my dreams caved in.

The music told me
that life wasn't pure
and it told me that nothing
was ever too sure.

But it told me too
that if my heart was true,
anything I wanted
could be mine.

With hope, dreams, and
a life of pure goals;
no matter what happens
never sell your soul.

Because what you've seen before
will soon come again,
and that who was your enemy
will soon be your friend.

You can have everything that is,
and everything that will become
and everything, everything
under the sun.

I learned to live
and to be true to me,
because if I didn't
who would I be?

I set my goals to my conscience
not to society:
Least comes to money
chincy it may be.

Second to that
comes egotistical possessions,
and anyone reading this
could surely learn this lesson.

Then comes to others
that I do satisfy,
and now comes the toughest
that I fail, but consistently try.

Third is my country.
Second is me.
First and yet most ignored
is my sense of humanity.

It was my parents who actually
taught me right from wrong,
for you see it was them
that hummed me the song.



That, ladies and gentlemen, was crafted at the hand of Florence, AZ's 1982 first prize winner of the third grade poetry competition. It wasn't actually that poem that won me the prestigious honor, but I do think it was written about the time I was creative writing editor of my high school newspaper.

Yeah, I was that good. It's amazing I didn't end up writing for a living. Nowadays I kind of write so I can keep living.

Pickle's Papa