There are two series of blogs going on here: one is about my “Bosque Treasures,” and one is content for a love letter I’m writing to my grandsons’ grandchildren. What follows is for the latter in the part entitled Me: Your 2Great Grandfather Peknik.
To My Dear Great, Great Grandchildren,
I feel that a good way for you to know me a little bit is through the Likes and Dislikes of my life. I wrote earlier (see Chapter 4) about the role of music in the trans-generational Peknik genome and the high level of importance listening to (not playing) music in my entire life, so let’s start there. Here is a list of my ten favorite pieces of music and the reasons each one is included on that list. Working backwards, here is My #10 All-time Favorite Song, Sea of Joy.
Sea of Joy was written and performed by Blind Faith -- one of the first rock "super-groups,” which was formed in the summer of 1968, the very first year of my “40 Middle Years of Joy” (see below) and almost at the exact time of my marriage to your 2G Grandmother Sabina Peknik, June 8, 1968. Click here to hear it (assuming the Internet, which we use to watch videos in my time, still exists in your time). This video was recorded in 1969 in London’s Hyde Park and shows a lot about your 2G Grandfather’s times and the way we looked when young.
This song has been one of my favorite songs for over 40 years. It reminds me the famous 18th Century British poet Samuel Coleridge's poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, in which three young men are walking together to a wedding, and one of them is detained by a “grizzled old sailor.” The young man is transfixed by the ancient mariner as he listens to his strange tale. The Mariner says that he sailed on a ship out of his native harbor and into a sunny and cheerful sea when the voyage quickly darkened, as a giant storm rose in the sea and chased the ship southward. The ship came to a frigid land “of mist and snow,” where “ice, mast-high, came floating by”; the ship was hemmed inside this maze of ice.
Children, this beautiful song parallels the events of my life. My first twenty years were spent in a harbor; the next forty were spent on the Sea of Joy; and the last twenty were spent in rough waters, often with “a giant storm rising up in the sea and chasing the ship southward.”
Now, I already told you all about my twenty “harbor” years (ages 1-20, years 1947-1967) in Chapter 2, and later in this book (in Chapter 6), I’ll relate the key points of the final twenty years (ages 61-80, years 2008-2027), so allow me to tell you about my “Middle 40 Years of Joy” (years 1968-2007) and why I find this this song so wonderful. Listen to this ancient mariner (your 2G Grandfather) tell you about his wonderful 40-year voyage on the Sea of Joy for a bit on your way to your weddings. I do hope you too have at least 40 years sailing on the Sea of Joy.
I write this at age 70. The lyrics and the mood of Sea of Joy suggest that this song is about death. When I hear and read, “I'm feeling close to when the race is run,” I can relate, and it's all because of you. I think that it refers to Heaven and our waiting in our boats to set sail to the next life: in my case, that would be a next life in which I hope to see you from the time you are babies to when you too are waiting for your boat to sail. You might see me as an owl, a tree in your front yard, or in some joyful place that you are visiting.
Once the door swings open into space,
And I'm already waiting in disguise.
Is it just a thorn between my eyes?
Waiting in our boats to set sail.
Sea of joy.
Sailing free.
Now RE my Middle 40 Years, I am happy to tell you that those years were joyful, joyful I reckon in my old age for two key reasons: 1. The places where I was; and 2. The people I was with. Those two elements play an important part as a reminisce in my old age. Let me tell you about the places first. (Later n this book, I’ll go into much more detail about each of those experiences.)
- Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico (where my wife and I spent the first night of our honeymoon in 1968)
- Arak, Iran (where we lived for the first five years of our marriage — 1969-1974 — in the Peace Corps and afterwards where your grandfather Peknik’s father Christopher spent his first two years)
- Lake Louise, Alberta, Canada (where my son — your grandfather Peknik’s father, Christopher — and I had a wonderful adventure backpacking and camping here in 1980 when he was eight)
- Paleokastritsa, Corfu Island, Greece (where we — the three of us, your 2GG Sabina, 1GG Christopher, and I — spent a wonderful vacation in 1987)
- Assisi, Italy (where my wife Sabina and I spent some quality time in 2002 and where we made a pilgrimage to the tomb of St. Francis)
Dear Great, Great Grandchildren, even though everybody is looking for happiness, few seem to find it. And no wonder--they can’t even agree about where to look for it. Some think we can find happiness by seeking pleasure; or to look out for Number One; others insist that we need to own more and more "stuff.” Amid so much confusion, two voices pierce through the clamor about the pursuit of happiness or finding "perfect joy." One is St. Francis of Assisi and one is the Greek philosopher Epicurus.
- St. Francis (my favorite saint) was a thirteenth-century Italian friar who sought for contentment as a restless youth, but for years he sought in vain. When at last he uncovered the path to joy, it lay in a direction he had never dreamed of. What did this saint discover? Please find out by searching in your time’s technology the words “St. Francis living joyfully.” St. Francis’ radiant joy was so contagious that it turned his world upside down and taught people how to sail the Sea of Joy, just as it has done for many of us in the early 21st Century.
- To find joy, the great Greek philosopher Epicurus proposed a wise path (Search for “Epicurus happiness” to learn all about it), the main principles of which are philosophical reflection (reminiscence), cultivation of friendship, and enjoying one’s loved ones.
Dear 2G grandchildren, that’s what I am trying to do here: to help you find joy in your lives, especially in your old age. It is working for me, and I hope it will work for you too.
Love (and it's all because of you),
Your Great-Great-Grandfather (Papa) Peknik.
#SeaofJoy #TopRockSongs #BestRock #BlindFaith #SteveWinwood #CreamSongs