I am both a child of the 70s and a big, big sap, so it stands to reason I would like folk music. There, I said it, in one of my first posts for an urban hipster parenting blog – way to blow your credentials, Ame.
Ahem.
With both those items in my DNA, I loved Babble’s Five Minute Time Out with Peter Yarrow, of Peter, Paul and Mary fame, and most importantly, the guy who wrote “Puff the Magic Dragon.”
Yarrow talked about rumors of drug references that have dogged the beloved children’s song for years, as well as the recent children’s book with new illustrations by Eric Puybaret.
The song made me horrendously sad as a kid – the idea of the lonely Puff missing his friend who came no more just killed me. It’s got a more hopeful, less sad ending now. My favorite part of the interview was this quote from Yarrow:
“It was an important gesture to have the ending include Jackie Paper's daughter, because I'm giving my world over to my daughter, I'm saying "It's yours now, sweetheart, carry it on." That's what I'm doing with the record and the book.”
Awww. I love hippies. It’s easy to look cynically askance at their shining-eyed desire for a better world, easy to scoff at their consistent optimism that maybe the next march or boycott will really make a difference.
But we are consistently being lured away from the Big Issues like health care and the war with celebrity worship and trivia. It’s inspiring to hear a voice from the past remind us that hope and love are important, and a better world is within our grasp.
