Who doesn't?

We all want to be something we imagine we might be. We try on the persona we desire and see if it fits and then play make believe as if we were five and a super hero of some sort flying through the air or defeating some extraordinary foe. When I got to Shimer College I came with a guitar and a vague political agenda. Having written lyrics for a music company for a very short time (and not having an iota of success with any of my partners) I thought of myself as...well.. sort of musical and protesty and intelligent and intellectual. After all I came from New York and had actually spent time in THE VILLAGE. I had heard Pete Seeger. I had heard Bruce Murdoch. I had heard Patrick Sky and The Simon Sisters. I had actually bought copies of Sing Out and Broadside. I even had the pleasure of dressing up in the same shirt as three other guys and making believe we were The Brothers Four or The Highwaymen or The Kingston Trio or somebody. I had even written the words and MUSIC to some songs that, honestly, were not all that good. So I showed in the The Middle of Nowhere, Illinois at what was then, arguably, the strangest college in the country. It is not that I was full of myself. But it was not as if I was empty either. I remember the first time I took the beloved Goya N-21 out of it's chocolate brown case and began to play something or other I had written. Someone, and I do not for the life of me remember who, came around to listen. I finished and said, "I wrote that. I write songs." He replied, "Who doesn't?" Boom. I recovered and the fella in the picture up there with the stinking stupid flower in his hair. (A FRIGGING FLOWER!!) is me making believe I was someone I wasn't but wanted to be for that moment when the camera shutter shuttered. I don't know where he went actually. He began to fade as time went on. Now I am not at all sure I remember him all that well. Of course I am still playing around with guitars. I still write songs but, hell, "Who doesn't?"