I Wonder What Took Me So Long?

Danny Allen, watercolor of Bill Whiting as a naked hippie, ca. 1972. (Newly framed.)

I wonder what took me so long to get around to properly framing Danny Allen’s watercolor of me displaying my birthday suit during my long-gone and misspent youth? Perhaps I was deferring to a shyness I once had but subsequently dismissed. More likely it was a case of having overlooked how much this drawing really meant to me–up until I gave Dan’s portfolio back to the Allen family. Like the work returned to the Allen’s this past July, this piece along with the other pieces I’ve kept, will eventually go back to Dan’s family. I remain the keeper now of only a few sentimental pieces that have tremendous meaning for me–but would be of no real interest to my own heirs.

It’s odd to think of myself now as having once been an optimistic if not totally naive hippie with long hair and youthful, unrealistic life expectations. A gray old man stares back at me in the mirror–an old man who wouldn’t be caught dead skinny dipping in broad daylight. Perhaps I should work on that….

Currently I’m working on digitizing the book to make it available to a larger audience. I’m looking into online publishing options now, and hope to have more information in the near future.