alexpgp | Am I Jackie Paper?

The storage capacity of my Sansa e260 is small enough to where I can't carry around all of my tunes (my experience with my iPod has taught me that there's no overarching reason to carry around 80GB of tunes, etc.) yet large enough to where the occasional not-as-listened-to song can find its way onto the unit without making me wonder what's eating up the device's memory.

So there I was, yesterday, driving up through the middle of New Mexico, through the Jicarilla Apache tribal lands, when a song came on that I hadn't heard in years - Puff, the Magic Dragon - by the inimitable Peter, Paul, and Mary.

I mused about how easy life is when everything is possble and you know you cannot fail.

Noble kings and princes would bow whene’er they came
Pirate ships would lower their flags when Puff roared out his name!

Now, I must've listened to this song about a million times (only Big Blue Frog has received more play from me), but it never hit me, until yesterday, just how sad a song this is, really.

Dragons live forever, but not so little boys.
Painted wings and giant rings make way for other toys.

Before I realized what hit me, I was crying.

One grey night it happened, Jackie Paper came no more
And Puff that mighty dragon, he ceased his fearless roar.

Indeed, the song continues, "Without his lifelong friend, Puff could not be brave," and I realized that, deep down, it wasn't Puff who had lost his fearlessness and could not be brave, it was poor Jackie - which is to say, me - and that's why I was crying.

I need to focus on life's possibilities more.

Cheers...