Seven years after he left this earth and found a better place to be, Harry Chapin entered my life. I was eight years old at the time, and my grandparents had just moved to Florida. So starting that year, every February, my family would drive down from Long Island to visit them.
My sister and I learned quickly to expect several performances of “30,000 Pounds of Bananas” by our father on each trip. “Greatest Stories Live” quickly became our favorite album.
I think of Harry as that old Danceband on the Titanic. The Titanic was a beautiful thing, a real wonder of human achievement, and the renaissance of reason that occurred in the United States in the two decades before I was born was another wonder. I like to think that as the righteous, youthful spirit of the ’60s and ’70s sank into an ocean of first conservatism and then E-trade, Harry never stopped playing his music, singing to the survivors and to the lost spirits that were born just a little bit too late. (Though, as a credit to E-trade, Ebay has allowed me to finally purchase my very own “Harry It Sucks” T-shirt, which I’ve been wanting for years!)
I make every effort to spread Harry’s name, ideals, and music to others my age. The circle of Harry’s life is still rolling-every one of you reading this is evidence of that. But always remember that the most important thing is that we keep that circle rolling along to the next generation and the next and the next….Scott
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