Speak It Into Existence

I was sitting here at my keyboard thinking... this is my 500th post. What should I say? And, it immediately came to me. It's amazing how I can do this and I never really thought that I could or would keep this blog going this long. I thought that by now, I would have gotten bored or burned out or both. But, it hasn't happened. Just about everyday, I find something new to write about and something new about myself to reveal.

I remember the walks I used to take around West Philadelphia with my grandfather and how almost everywhere we went, he knew somebody and somebody knew him. They called him "Slim" and every few blocks... "What'cha know, good Slim?"... "How you doin', Slim?"... "Slim, what's goin' on?" I was fascinated by how many people he appeared to know. I couldn't have been more than about 7 or 8 years old when I said to him... "One day, Pop-Pop, I'm going to be well known just like you." He laughed and said, "Anybody can be known... just make sure you're known for something good." That was just loose talk and I had no idea that one day I might even surpass my grandfather.

If I was ever on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List, I would have to leave Philadelphia. There is simply very few places in this city that I am not known by somebody... Black, White, Asian,
Hispanic, or what have you. That's not a shallow boast... I had the disease of "wanderlust" as a young boy and I was never satisfied with the surroundings of my own neighborhood. I had to always venture off into another neighborhood, another place. The grass was always greener somewhere else.

Most mothers love their sons and mine loved me. But, I'm certain that if she could've, my mother would have tried to hold me in the womb a little longer if that meant that I would've been safe. "Safe" to my mother meant in the house where she could see me but, that was never me. I had to venture out. I would often offer to take out the trash and vanish for a couple of hours. I loved to explore.

I lived a few blocks from the elevated train and by the time I was 12 years old, I could recite every station from one end of the line to the other backwards in my head and I still can. I rode the trains, I wandered around, and I met people. I was always a friendly child. But, that was a different time. People are so crazy now that a child could have all kinds of bad things happen to him or her in this big, scary city. The city wasn't scary to me then... it was my playground.

Between my wandering and going to different schools and such, I collected an enormus amount of associates. Some, I still know today... some of whom show up in my fiction and short stories on my blog, "Escapades" but, that's another blog post for another day.

I've heard in church that the tongue has the power of life and death and that we can speak things into existence. I've said things and had no idea they were going to happen and been astounded when I realized that they would happen. I told my mother that, before I die, I was going to see the world. There was a great big beautiful world out there and my name was all over it.
Again, just loose talk. I used to say stuff like this all the time and never give it a second thought.

Well, after college (as you all know), I joined the U.S. Air Force. During those years I traveled throughout most of the United States and across two oceans. I've been in the U.K., Amsterdam,
France, Germany, Italy, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan amongst other places. I've made friends there with both Americans (usually other servicemen and civilians alike).

Then there is Blogger and Facebook. I couldn't have conceived the modern world of the internet just ten years ago. In the short time that I have been blogging, I have made friends with a close knit group of fellow bloggers from Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, California, New York, Washington D.C., Arkansas, Colorado, and even London, U.K. Most of these are people I have never met in person but, people who visit my blogs daily and whose blogs I visit. They also talk to me on Facebook.

My Facebook family has included relatives, friends from the Air Force, college, high school, the streets, and the blogging world. So, when I told my grandfather that one day I was going to be well known like him, I suppose I did speak that into existence. It wasn't easy. I had to write 500 of these posts and about 300 or so posts on my other blog to get to this point. I guess that
included a lot of riding and flying too.

It's been a pleasure and tonight, here's a toast to all of you who have been with me along the way... too numerous to name... but, more special to me than you could ever know. A drink and a two-step to 500 more posts.