Like a common leper, I was suspended from joining my fourth grade P.E. class in the swimming pool. Forced to sit in the spectator area I vowed to express myself in remarkable ways. I began to compose a heartfelt poem that would bring people to tears with its holiday sentiment and artistic beauty. I recognized the challenge of penning the words while blocking out the voice of Andy Williams, but I was fairly confident I could pull it off. Just in case somebody might say that I hadn't actually created it, I planned put in a few of my own words once I got the basic elements on paper, but the chlorine was stifling, especially with a stuffy nose.
Failure is a part of any groundbreaking effort.
This was as true for lumberjacks as it was for me. Walt Whitman may have written Leaves of Grass and Song of Myself, but he was never creative enough to try writing the Songs of Someone Else. A couple of years after that setback, a sixth grade poetry assignment proved to be my defining moment. I was looking for subject ideas among the many boxes of books in the basement of our home the night before my work was due , when a old, worn anthology presented itself to me. I had never seen the book before and could not imagine that anything so abused in appearance could contain anything memorable.