When I was a kid, there was quite literally no other place that I spent more time in than the Des Moines Eastside Public Library. My mom and I were there several times a week, and once I was old enough to hang out on my own, the library became a pretty good sitter for me. She could drop me off, run to K-Mart and Richman Gordmans and have enough time to hit the grocery store before I’d even made my way out of the Aliens, UFOs and Other Clandestine Mystery section. At some point, I discovered the library had back issues of comic books, mostly from Marvel, but a few DC comics, and the drive to lay down good allowance money at the grocery store for the newest Batman or Spiderman comic went out the window.

At some point, I had decided I needed to up my jokes game. The library from time to time would have a book sale of books that clearly were not getting checked out. For a mere $0.50, I took home a book called, The Nonsense Book of riddles, rhymes, tongue twisters, puzzles and jokes from American folklore. It was a few hundred pages of mostly riddles and folk poetry and some mind-bending puzzles, but there were jokes with punchlines ready to go. And since the book had been published in the early 70s and no one, it seemed, had checked it out, it was great source material for building a repertoire of mostly good-natured jokes.

But, ever the Scholastic Book Fair patron I was, my quest for good jokes and riddles didn’t stop there. I think it was within the year, I also got my hands on two of the best books ever, Shel Silverstein’s A Light in the Attic and Where the Sidewalk Ends. Neither book had clear cut jokes. But, both were full of thoughtful poetry, written with a young, curious mind in focus.

These three books became the pillars of my interest in folk stuff. And, I say “stuff” as the most general catch-all for the time. I was already consuming quite a bit of PBS and NPR, including A Prairie Home Companion. I was paying far more attention when Dad would put Crosby, Stills and Nash on the turntable and I was starting to suspect that the Jesus that we’d discuss in Sunday school was a much bigger revolutionary than the Sunday school teacher would lead on.

Then, at some point, and I don’t remember exactly when, my Dad said something that would change the course in a slight but important way for the upcoming years. “Son, did you know that Shel Silverstein wrote and performed music too?” Mind blown. The guy whose books of illustrated poetry I’d poured over also was a musician?

We found a Johnny Cash album that had “A Boy Named Sue” on it. That too blew my mind. This guy was so talented that Johnny Cash would record one of his songs? I mean, it was a jam.

Back to the library. Sure enough, we found a vinyl copy of the album, Inside Folk Songs, which included Bananas, Boa Constrictor, and Beans Taste Fine.

Boa Constrictor probably became the most played song and Dad helped me make a copy of the vinyl with my tape recorder, which was the first criminal act of media piracy I’d commit.

Shel Silverstein remains one of my favorite folk heroes. He’s at least a triple threat as an poet, illustrator and musician. His art has been deeply influential in how I think of music and literature today.