I am enjoying something that one must live long enough to experience and thanks to the COMPUTER I am able to explore this 'dream' in ways that years ago would have been impossible.
A week ago, I decided to search out places where I performed with the USO during the late 60's and into the 70's. This adventure has stirred up old memories of people, weather conditions, smells and emotions that I was feeling as a man in his early 20's! The anxieties, doubts, hopes, fears, insecurities and loneliness of travel...
I loved the tours I made into the Pacific Islands. The Marshall Islands have changed since I was there. I spent Thanksgiving at Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall's around 1972. The Islands were full of radiation due to the atomic bomb testing in the 40's. (god, possibly I picked up some radiation during that time??????) I did a google search and everything MARSHALL ISLANDS popped up. It has been wonderful to see the culture, people and 2009 lifestyle of these Islanders!
I found Johnston Island. This Island had meaning to me because of it's name. Also, I visited Midway, Rota and parts of the Samoan Islands which I thought were heavenly as well as the people were heavenly.
Viet Nam, Guam, Thailand, the Philippines are nothing like when I performed on their turf except the climate, and the people look the same and I am sure that health and lifestyle has improved.
I used a Wurlitzer Electronic Piano! Today, Yamaha has a keyboard that SOUNDS LIKE AND HAS THE KEYBOARD OF A GRAND PIANO! Not in the late 60's! The piano I was hauling around had to be set for 240 voltage, not 110! I wore jump-suit tuxedos with glitter on them! We used sound systems that we thought were state of the art, but by today's standards they were dinosaurs! I remember being in the Mekong Delta and asked where my dressing room was? They handed me a large nail.
I made three trips to South East Asia. Korea and Viet Nam being the main centers. I have old photos of shows I backed in Okinawa Japan and interesting enough, I read where Okinawa is one of the healthiest places on earth to live! Dha?
Iceland was one of my favorite places. I get the Icelandic News every day via my e mail. Even Iceland has changed so much from when I was there! Alaska was simply ice and snow when I played there, so even though I loved the "NORTHERN EXPOSURE" series on television a few years ago, I never saw Alaska in the summer months.
Some places have not changed one being Morocco. Turkey was 'magical' to me when I was 22 going on 23. I remember my 23rd Birthday in Ankora. Very big drunken event! I did love Greece. I know, I know, some people hate that hot white sunshine and the food, but I thought the energy was indescribable when I was very young and swimming naked, in the sea at sunset was a religious moment to my way of thinking. The Greeks know how to make love...
I have returned to Europe a few times, but the Mediterranean I have not visited since my first USO tour in 1969. When I was in Madrid it was going through a complete 'make-over', one only has to go on line to see that city NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Memories are wonderful and time frames are precious, but the future is forever OUT THERE! I keep reaching out for more. I do not mind change. The only change I mind, some days is the change within and outside my body!
One day I'll write a book! (now that is really talking in the FUTURE!)
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