In a pocket-neighborhood sandwiched between the rolling hills of a 100 acre cemetery and a can manufacturing factory stood the rows upon rows of little brick houses joined at the hip, providing shelter for a multitude of lower, middle-class and mostly blue-collar families, straddling the border of the 'big' city to the west. It was here that our protagonist lived the initial twenty-two years of his life learning about the world, in general, and learning about music. It's only now, after the passing of an additional thirty-eight, and additional learning about the world, in general, and about music, that he speaks through the music, as if it were second nature or even purely instinctual, about events, observations, people, places, emotions, wants, needs, pleasures and pains that have transpired throughout the entire period. Only now, the process of codifying, recording or documenting, if you will, the vignettes of music and lyrics, has somehow become more difficult whether due to a dearth of uncommitted hours or simply an impediment brought about by advancing years or even waning talent. It's not that a desire does not lie beneath the surface of a, what some may label, mundane existence, because surely he does not view his presence on this orb mundane by any means. It seems that the entire process is interrupted, more often than not, by other things and that although the intent is to return to that divine pass-time to complete individual, pre-meditated works, the reality is that only on rare occasions is completion now actually accomplished. He does, however, spontaneously create constantly and prolifically, telling tales of bold, juvenile adventures, characters of shady as well as honorable reputations, encounters with wonders of nature, lessons culled from a multitude of days now spent an memories which elicit a gamut of emotions both mature and not.
Way It Is
©2016 Raymond M. Jozwiak
