For today’s Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt, Linda G. Hill has asked us to “talk about an organ or base your post on the theme of them…or one.”

Okay, I’ve got to get my mind out of the gutter. I have to admit that the first thing that came to mind was sex organ. But since this a PG-rated blog, I decided to think of other types of organs, like internal organs. You know, livers, kidneys, lungs, hearts (although some might argue that the heart is a muscle and not an organ).

And then I thought about mouth organs, like harmonicas or melodicas. Or pipe organs like you might find in churches. Or calliopes (steam organs) that you might find at circuses or carnivals.

And there are electronic organs and these days even digital organs.

But to my mind, there’s nothing like the organ grinder. No, not the kind you find in a butcher shop to make to make chopped liver. The organ grinder I’m thinking about was an entertainer who played a barrel organ in the streets back in the 19th century and the early part of the 20th century. You often found them with little monkeys that were trained to dance around to the sounds coming from the organ.

And that, in a true stream of consciousness mode, led me to the old song by Donovan, “The Hurdy Gurdy Man.”