2006

Happy New Year everybody!

As we look back on an eventful year, we take heed to the lessons that we have learned and take time to appreciate the kindness and luck we were able to accommodate. We have had several weeks to do that, tomorrow we get to go back to the grind.

As my patron pagan namesake, the rolling of the rock is part of the price we pay for living life with our passions. Do we remember what they are? Do we recall all the goals that we had set for ourselves back in the day? I’m sure some have come and some have gone, but do we still remember what we were all about? I don’t mean success or anything like that, but the idealism that seemed lost on that generation that discovered the Rubik’s cube and video? The song goes to say, Video Killed the Radio Star…. Who were we before all that? I look back twenty years and at times shudder to think….

This next year we need to keep in mind a song by one of the inventors of rock and roll, a song by my good friend Chuck Berry.

My Ding A Ling

When I was a little bitty boy
my grandmother bought me a cute little toy
Silver bells hangin' on a string
she told me it was my ding a ling

My ding a ling, my ding a ling
I want to play with my ding a ling
My ding a ling, my ding a ling
I want to play with my ding a ling

And then mother took me to Grammar School
But I stopped all in the vestibule
Every time that bell would ring
catched me playin' with my ding a ling

Once I was climbing the garden wall
I slipped and had a terrible fall
I fell so hard I heard bells ring
but held on to my ding a ling

Once I was swimming cross Turtle creek
many snappers all around my feet
Shure was hard swimming cross that thing
with both hands holdin' my ding a ling

This here song it ain't so sad
the cutest little song you ever had
those of you who will not sing
You must be playin' with your own ding a ling
My ding a ling Your ding a ling, your ding a ling
We saw you playin' with your ding a ling
My ding a ling everybody sing
I want to play with my ding a ling

Ladies and Gentlemen, friends of the judge and the jury… this is your reference point. This is not what we want to do this year; this is what we did last year. We saw you playin’ with your ding a ling, America. You should be ashamed.

I’ve been listening to what those folks have been saying lately about Iraq, domestic spying and of the end of days. Not much of it seems to be true. But the most disdainful prospect is that there is no concerted message from the opposition. The four horsemen are up there and everyone is getting their mark, we must pay close attention to the facts.

This is a year of change, perhaps some of the most dramatic changes we have encountered in a generation. Are you ready to rumble? Are you ready to put down your ding a lings?

Good Morning America!!!! The coffee is on….