a long slow thumb
“ When I was a young man I carried me pack,
I waltzed the Matilda all over….. “
And so are the words of a song I’ve long enjoyed having, in a past life…. “waltzed the Matilda all over”. Waltzing the Matilda, or in my case, backpacking the globe has shown itself to be a life long lesson . I remember first hitting the road with a pack of immense weight….it held nothing more than my idea of the absolute necessities. After a while however it became apparent that I really didn’t need to carry a shirt for every day. Later I learned that If I wore shorts six days a week there was little need to carry three pairs of long pants. And I learned I was happier carrying one pair than carrying three and so I culled my 48 lbs of necessities down to 17lbs , including of course the tooth brush that I cut half the handle from eliminating 2 oz. .
As unintelligible as this may sound…. I sometimes miss those days when I owned nothing more than those 17 lbs as they always provided me days of life long memories. Those days of culling the weight down from 48 to 17 were fun….as the choice to do so were mine. But here I am again, using those lessons all over again to cull from 48 lbs to 17 lbs . This time however, the choice is not mine…..its in the hands of two political parties. Two political parties so vehemently opposed to each other that regardless of who might prevail….I, a conservative minded American blue collar….am
Totally screwed
