Sojourn to the Berkshires Day 2 -- some walks, a dinner, and a play

 OKAY! I'm in the Albany NY Airport, and I've found a perch at the terminal walkway bar table  counter, on a stool with a nice draft local hazy IPA beside my laptop. I have 3 1/2 hours before my flight to DC boards, but I did save a little $ on Bruno the Purple Charger by getting it in a bit earlier than the reservation. 

Yesterday morning I slept in until around 7, grabbed a decent and filling "free" breakfast in the motel lobby, then drove out to the theater to make sure I knew where I was going when I had a curtain time to honor. It's a good thing, because pulling out of the parking lot I went rogue on Waze directions and found a shortcut that bypassed all of the roadwork that slowed down my drive there. I made a note to go out without cell phone directions and to turn on Tacatonic Road to get there that evening. That night, after the play, I drove out at waning dusk onto the road bordered by fields of high wild grasses and lit by more fireflies than I have ever seen in one place. I almost pulled over to video, but decided to save the image in my old brain instead. 

As I have shared before, my mantra is "I am good, I am well, I am healthy I am Happy I am whole." Yesterday I changed this to "Healing Seamus Seamus Healing" and will continue utilizing that for the immediate future. He is healing and he is home from the hospital as of last night, but I figure anything I can do, you know, on the spiritual plane... The benefit of this tack, as opposed to praying, is that no deity, no higher power, needs to hear and respond. I am certain it is at least as effective. After all, if there is one God, she must be checking those mantras, right?

Okay, I'm getting all non-linear again. Jimmy and I talked about that at breakfast this morning. He cam to the hotel and we took Bruno ("because your car is cooler") up less than a mile up the road and ate outside at the Rio Cafe. Really good stuffThanks for breakfast, buddy, if you're reading this. Who is linear anyway? "Oh, there's a dandilion. Oh, that thing I did in high school." Right? But. That discussion was today, and we were talking about yesterday.

Let's pop in a picture to break things up, shall we?

After breakfast see ya later hug at the Rio Cafe

Okay then. After leaving the theater on my scouting mission, I hit downtown again, and found a place to park at an entry point to River Walk, an attraction that came up early in my searches. It was attractive enough, and everyone needs to see it, but it turned out to be only maybe a city block long. I took some video along the way, and a couple pics--note the two of a dark barn with a bright little something in its darkest region, then the close up. Class, folks, that's class. I wish I'd got a pic of the road-facing wall of the building. It's just an old barn with two big doors and nothing else, but I can imagine families starting here, on a cool fall night with the disco ball fracking the room.

I walked the little downtown, saw some cute shops, refrained from buying art at some really inspirational studios, took a pano from a corner, and noted the location of The Well, a restaurant and bar I had my sights set on for the next night's preshow dinner. 

Okay again. First little thing after my scouting and my Riverwalk aside was to head up to Housatonic Flats. I pulled into the parking lot with only one more car there. It's been quiet in GB during my stay. Jimmy says they are getting big weekend tourist hits, but luckily my stay was Wed-Fri. Here's Bruno at the trailhead. I was hoping it was a bit longer than a city block. But, it calmed me down nicely. 

Bruno the Purple Charger at the trailhead

I checked my shoelaces and hit the trail. 

Trailhead at Housatonic Flats

Flats sign with explanation. It's a buffer, ya'll.

Trailhead sign closer and clearer

First bench stop with an aside trail to the river

Two dandelions

Pano at the river, click to enlarge-o

I just liked the color here and think it might be fun to paint

And a video... Ducks, ya'll...

It was a quiet, wonderful walk. The trees are taller, older, up here, I think. And the tall wildflowers grow taller before they dry and turn to seed, as they are doing in Tennessee as I type. I just cut mine down in my little back "yard," though I really enjoyed the Queen Ann's Lace and the tall clover that I let run out its time in my "meadow," as I like to call it.

I drove back to the motel and after an hour in the pool with an intervening hot tub soak (excellent power in those jets, Fairfield Inn by Marriot). I took a nap. I got into my nap by meditating on my new mantra, "Healing Seamus Seamus healing." With the help of a phone alarm (I left my iWatch charging at home. I hope it's good for it) I got up, showered, dressed, and drove.

At the Great Barrington Community Theater, Bard College Daniels Cultural Center (say that three times really fast), I parked and moseyed inside, where my ticket was awaiting me. I jacked into the play, which I thoroughly enjoyed and believe is going places, but will not review here. No photos were allowed after I took this one 

of a couple audience members (Sandy and friend, as I found out later) awaited the dimming of the lights. Turns out it was a preview performance with opening night tonight (as I write from the airport). There were only about 20 of us in the small theater audience. That's all good. It was spectacular, and intimate, and I enjoyed emersion in the world I only peripherally experienced. Jimmy called me the day of the diagnosis. I remember it so clearly--I was helping a kindergarten teacher, Mary McCullough, set up her classroom printer and begged off that to go to a corner of her bright, welcoming, kindergarten classroom to talk and to weep a bit. I do that, and it was certainly all right to do that day. From my perspective as a retired human person, I now know that the right thing to do was to fly out there. I did not. I wish I had. Jimmy and I have talked over the years, and I didn't get far from Seamus's recovery, but neither did I really get close to it. Regrets. And healing, which this trip generated, at least a little.

"Leave your Fears Here" is  a "Rememberer" play, a Father play, and a play everyone should experience. I got to meet both Robert Egan and Michael O'Keefe, sat next to Michael for the preview performance. More on all that later. 

That's freakin' it! I'm ready to fly om the morning. I am ready to be home. I love you, Jimmy. Keep plugging into that impressive piece of writing you've created and bringing it alive. You are going to awaken a whole new audience to this kind of journey and its kaleidoscopic complexities and contradictions, and to your beautiful son, to your beautiful soul mate, and to your beautiful self. I love you.

Sojourn to the Berkshires Day 1

 Good morning from the Berkshires, Great Barrington, Massachusetts, particularly. I'm going a-walking this chill morning. I'll start a little travelogue here and update it to keep records of images I'll collect in my travels here. The entire Google album of my little sojourn will be archived here.

It's only a two day trip, as mentioned in my previous post, but one of my new goals in iPhotography is to collect images I may want to paint in the future. 

Tuesday I walked my best buddy Watson and tossed him into Casper the Friendly Kia to take him to K9 Logics, his home away from home, for fun on the farm. He initially wanted to drive.

No, Watson, you may not drive Casper the Friendly Kia

In the afternoon I met my dear bud Rocky at Tailgate Headquarters for a bite to eat and a beer, capped off with a cigar. After an early to-bed, Lee Ann and I were up by 4:30 so she could drop me off at BNA for the trip.

I made my away through the crowded airport through security and after grabbing a turkey tomato sandwich at the high tech Amazon islands (how cool to register your handprint to a credit card, get want you want, and leave without any further interaction with a cashier--bye-bye jobs) boarded a 7:07 AM American Airlines flight to Albany, NY, via Chicago, IL. The first flight was on a 737, so I crossed my fingers a lot. All good excepting the flight was around 40 minutes early arriving and we sat on the ORD tarmac for 45 of that awaiting permission to dock. I had around 30 minutes left to snag my flight to Albany. That turned out to be on a teenyplane, you know the ones with two seats on the right and one on the left and not enough headroom for 6-footers. I power-walked and they were just calling Groups 6 and 7 to board when I huffed up to the gate, which was about as distant from my landing gate as they could make it. That flight was fine, just cramped for leg room, and I made my way to the car rental tables only to find the Enterprise booth empty, with a sign on the plexi telling me to "Please proceed to the Alamo, National rental station in the parking lot." 

I did so and the nice attendant-of-many-rental-services, Sam, who gave me my options. There was a Dodge Charger, a Toyota Camry, and a Kia Forte. I asked Sam which one he would pick, just for fun. He unhesitatingly said, "I would personally take the Charger. It's sporty and a little ballsy, you know, a muscle car, and not too hard on mileage." I did. Little did I realize it would get even better. I walked the way Sam pointed and found the purple car:

Bruno the Charger

What hat a lovely drive down southeast to my motel. Here are two quick snaps I took whilst the car was resting:

Waiting for his master's voice! Nipper is patient.

One of those bridge-is-one-lane red lights

I made it to my motel around 3:00, after winding through blue highway small towns and enjoying the view at every turn. I plan to take my time up to the airport for my late afternoon flight on Friday and see what I can see in some of those towns. Though I see on the news that beaucoup holiday flights are being cancelled all over and I should give myself 3 hours at the airport. 

I got settled and drove out to explore a little and catch that late lunch I needed, landing at the picturesque and friendly Barrington Brewery and Restaurant only a couple long blocks away from the Fairfield Inn by Marriot where I am staying. I caught a beer at small but cozy bar

 

and after Jimmy called to say he was on the way I moved to a table where we could talk privately. We hadn't seen each other in 7 years--since my lovely daughter Miranda's wedding in Nashville--and I got a little weepy for a number of reasons when I got my long delinquent hug. We sat, talking for a bit. There have been some complications that I gather could have been much worse (thank you, universe, for it not being that) that have precluded Riad, Jimmy's beautiful wife, and Seamus, his son and my godson, from attending, which was the plan. I won't elaborate here, and though I am disappointed to lose those hug opportunities it is what it is, and everyone is predicted to be okay. These complications bring an oddly absurd level to the performance I will see tonight and which Jimmy will repeat for every night for the play's two week run. I am certain it will be powerful however it goes: One accomplished actor, around 2 hours, ~11,000 words, in the small Leibowitz Black Box Theater at Bard College, taking us into the present tense beginning 12 years ago in the family's hospital "home."

Jimmy had to leave to run lines with his director, Robert Egan, and to get some rest. I got a selfie, finished my delicious BBandR fish and chips, and headed back to the motel to get some rest myself. I slept pretty well. Got up this morning for the "free" breakfast, came here to blog. As you know, I'm committed to adopting that habit more consistently. Enjoy it or not, it's my "book."

Here:

Me and Jimmy, a few years later; see previous post

More later. It's 9:12 in the morning and I'm going Great Barrington exploring.

Alaska Photoarcheology

 There I am making up words again. But seriously, I had some fun over the weekend unearthing some ancient history. Back before the dawn of the computer, people used devices called "cameras" to record and share images. Sometime later, as we all know, cell phones put a camera in everyone's pocket. 

Well.

I am heading up to Massachusetts a week from tomorrow to attend opening night of my dear brother-from-another-mother's one man play, running two weeks at the Bard College Leibowitz Black Box Theatre in Great Barrington. I'll actually fly up to Albany, NY, where I'll pick up a rental car and drive down to Great Barrington, stay a night, explore what I've been told is a great (sorry) little town, see the play, take another motel sleep, then get up and drive back to Albany. I'll fly back and prepare for a sojourn with my life's love, who is coincidentally my much loved wife, to Missoula for a visit with our son, Colin and his lovely Kat (and their lovely two cats). 

Anyway, where was I. Oh. Right here.

I am SO excited to reconnect with James Morrison, known in my personal brain as Jimmy, and to see 

.

The play centers around my godson Seamus's cancer and recovery in his 10th year on the planet. It's around 11,000 words in its final state, and I am incredibly pumped to witness its delivery to the world on the 30th of June. just nine nights away. I understand that Riad and Seamus will also be there and I'm excited to see the both of them, too! I gather the playwright will be there, too, because he will be acting the role of himself, onstage. Win-win. Win.

I've been doing some reminiscing lately about our time in Alaska, and that led to some googling. I managed to move through several dead ends to the little treasure trove of the University of Alaska Archives online repository, where I discovered some things I hadn't ever seen. Here's one: 

Fantasy Factory improv group nominally entertains a group of little kids, somewhere in Anchorage, circa 1977-8

I don't see Jimmy in there, but look closely and you will see a tree that looks a lot like the 27 year old me. Let's see another:

Scene from Diamond Studs, 1978, Fairbanks, Alaska. Luan Schooler and I had the spotlight, but there are plenty more talents in the pic, including a 22ish year old James Paige Morrison (kneeling, red bandana). 

That denim vest was handmade for me by a dear friend as a parting gift upon leaving Knoxville for Anchorage in 1975. It's Don Ruddy behind the bar, and I see Susan Mendel behind the mic stand, Ernie Norris catching a bit of spotlight behind me, Warren Elkins playing bass, and I can almost recall the name of the fellow in the bottom right, but not quite. Another one?

Alaska Repertory Theater apprentices/stagehands for Four Poster, UofA Fairbanks, 1978. 

Top to bottom it's Chris Fairbanks, me, Jimmy, Susan, ?, and Luan Schooler. What the hell am I wearing on my head? Doesn't matter. I do recall that for the run of that play I ran the light board, and important and fun job. I also helped hang them, straddling 50 foot a-frame ladder to get that work done. If I were to try that today I would so end up a bag of broken bones at the ladder's foot.

I'll end this post with a pic I have in my own archives; from a visit to LA long ago, it's two young men with an abiding love for one another and everything out in front of them. So long Memory Lane, and I will see you next week, old friend, brother, hero.

Goodbye, Huey

 It's approaching seven o'clock in the morning on New York Avenue here in Nashville, Tennessee. Good morning. 

In around two hours, a tow truck will pull up to my house and a dear companion of 12 years and I will part ways. Goodbye, Huey. I hope you can bring some income to my favorite NPR radio station, 89.5 WMOT Roots Radio! You have aged well, though mechanical and cosmetic issues abound, and you have been a reliable friend. Bon Voyage.

Later:

...and a Google Photos album with pretty much every photo I have of Huey, may he RIP.

Later Later:

Watson and I took a very short walk before the truck arrived--it's right at 82 degrees and I wanted to get out there before the sun rose high enough to steam us edible in the near 100 percent humidity. Watson clearly agreed, since the duration of the walk was 12 minutes and we literally travelled one block. Back at home, I took a leap into the past.

I popped onto my laptop and visited Google Photos online, looking for pics of Huey. I found a bunch. I will now spend a bit of time curating some of these to celebrate a long relationship and its passing into memory. So.

In August 2010, we needed a new car. The old Mercury Villager van had outlived its usefulness and we could look down the road to a time when both grown kids would be out of the house. As we'd done before, we started at Carmax. I'm a fan, even if my last two cars were bought from dealerships. After assessing the condition of the Villager, they offered us $500 in trade. I thought I could do better than that selling it and began doing some research. That led me to the CARS Program, an Obama administration effort to stimulate economic growth by pulling new light car sales "...forward from a far more distant future, and thus represented an important increment to aggregate demand at just the time when such demand was sorely needed." Read more about CARS, commonly referred to as "Cash for Clunkers."

sI

I was zeroing in on a Smart Car. Why? I really don't remember, though its unique appearance and fuel economy were attractive. We drove out to Cool Springs to the Mercedes dealership and I test drove a red Smart ForTwo Passion Coupe. I LOVED it immediately. After discovering the CARS program would provide us a subsidy payment of 4500 dollars for the Villager, I signed all the dotted lines and drove away with Huey, whom, I recall, received his name on the way home. 

Why Huey? Easy. 

image from https://paramountcartoons.fandom.com/wiki/Baby_Huey 

Baby Huey

My Huey looked nothing like the 50s era cartoon giant baby duckling, but I remembered Baby Huey fondly and cheerfully, and I knew that I had chosen to name him appropriately the first time I drove him around Nashville. Seriously, people on the street would smile, often laugh, and sometimes point at us as we cruised through traffic. I thought of him as my "smile making machine." I quickly fell further in love with that aspect of my new buddy. Later on, as my son would ride with me, Colin would see pedestrians or bus stop folks and reach into the glove compartment were I stored two foam red clown noses, and ask, "Dad, should we nose 'em?" We often did. 

I never took Huey on a road trip, though he never put me in a position to use roadside service. He had no spare tire, you see; and because the tires were two unusual sizes and not readily available on the road, I never roamed past, say, Ashland City or Marrowbone Lake, or to my former job down off Nolensville Road. In the just under 12 years we were together, he and I racked up only 106,773 miles. Okay, that's still a lot of miles together. 

I used to talk to him, sometimes petting the little hump over the radio/CD player console as I did. It's okay. I talk to my dead brother and to both parents, though both of them are in the ground (on opposite sides of Thompson Lane in Woodmont Cemetery). With these last, it's a good way to work stuff out without paying a therapist. With Huey, it was just companionship, aided and abetted by a stiff dose of anthropomorphism. 

I want to thank Chet and Mike at EurWerks garage, and the lovely Melis, for being my go-to Huey maintenance team for nearly a decade. I want to thank Huey, with the hope that he will bring supporting income to WMOT either by resale or sale for parts. I want to thank you for reading this foolishness.

Now to take a ride in Casper, my 2022 Kia Soul. I think we have a long ride in front of us!

Friday ramblings

Hi. My goal is to be mostly scheduliberated. I can do this.

Let's see. Today is Friday and as of 5:36 this morning I have no appointments, just a loose commitment to Rocky for breakfast in Ashland City. There is no time set for that but it'll likely be early, in the 7 to 8 o'clock range. According to my iWatch it's only 61 degrees out there so an early walk with Watson, my "Australian Healer," is also likely. I primed a few rescued pieces of scrap lumber for painting yeseterday, and I have the image of the eerie cinder block wall mystery exterior door up on both monitors for reference, just waiting for a paintbrush to touch the wood for the first time. One "canvas", 10 1/2" by 5 1/2",  awaits on the tabletop easel I treated myself to last week. I will continue my online mandolin class with Sierra and that's at least an hour, maybe two. I doctored the hot tub chemical balances yesterday but I will check with a test strip today and do that again if needed today, though that's improbable. I may need to go get new kitchen flowers today since the yellow roses I bought and set out three days ago seem to be choking already. None of them has necked but it's in the near future according to their sad look. If the wind remains still out, I plan to finally pull out my drone and get it airborne again. Lots to do.

That's my report for the morning. I will check back here and assess my day in late afternoon. My plan is to make sure I am living healthy, practicing self care, making/creating, and doing just fine without a schedule. My goal is to be mostly scheduliberated. I can do this.

Good? Good.

LATER

Hi again. Immediately after typing the above I went down a rabbit hole at about.me, revising my info to reflect my new status as retired. Contacted Rocky and verified 9am at Cody's. Now I'm off to walk with my best canine friend.

MUCH LATER

Saturday morning. Up late, like right around 7:30, and spent some time at my desk cruising Instagram and posted a pic from the work finished to date on a new painting. I fleshed it out yesterday and added to it today, Just pencil on primed pine 2x6 lumber around 10 or 11 inches wide. Here's the pic:

I'll wash and sponge paint and who knows what all with this one. I love that the lumber piece is flawed/scraped along the top. And I will likely carry the image along the sides and bottom like I did for the goingdown Rocky's driveway painting. I think I'm on to something. At any rate, it's fun, and it's a new body of creative work for me. Ya.

I met Rocky's at Cody's right at  did not do 9. We had eggs over easy, bacon, grits, and biscuits and gravy. A heavy breakfast but it served as lunch as well. I did not do my mandolin class. Instead, I decided to change my strings on my damaged A-5 Gibson mandolin and my father-in-law's Framus classical guitar. That took, friends and neighbors, around 2 1/2 hours to do right. Then it took maybe 45 minutes to play it into keeping a tuning, as strings kept sliding and thankfully finally tightened up. I had to google how to tie classical guitar strings at the bridge. I don't think the beautiful guitar had been restrung in 3 decades or more--my father-in-law had it hanging on his wall and to my knowledge never played it. It all worked, and I then noodled on the thing, improvisationally, for another 45 minutes. Time flies when you're having fun. 

I did treat the hot tub. I did not go buy flowers, though I did toss the old ones out and get the dishwasher run and the kitchen parred up to neatness. Nor did I drone. But look at how many good things I have to choose from tomorrow, and the next day! Today, Lee Ann's home and we're planning a Saturday together. That, I love. 

So, that's a one-shot window into my retirement plan. I will not be doing this sort of blog post often. My retirement plan is: do something creative every day, spend good time walking my old pup, fish when I can, exercise and eat well, be with friends or enjoy my own company as often as I can, and spend time with my lovely love whenever I can. Music. Art. Writing. Gardening. Being. Exploring.

More later.

Scheduliberated!

 Happy birthday to me, celebrating 72 trips around Old Sol. AND happy retirement, only 2 days away as I write. I want to say a few things about retirement, or rather about the generally accepted social descriptor for it: "retired."

Thinking about actually being it, I began letting friends and colleagues know my plans a month or two ago. It took a good long while to jump through the hoops a "retiree" needs to master, but I was generally feeling pretty darned good about it all. Then I began noticing:  Nearly everyone who discusses it with me brings a number of negative connotations into our communication. 

"What are you going to do?" "Won't you be bored?" "You'll be looking for a part-time job, won't you?" "I'd be so bored." Or, from several folks' personal experience, "I got tired of sitting around at home, so I got this job/volunteered here. It keeps me busy." That's the  story I have heard from a tenured now 120 day former retiree in my school, from a clerk in a liquor store in Chattanooga, and from a dear man who brings meals to my school (soon my former school) on a weekly basis. I am certain that I'll hear it again.

Well. My dear old daddy used to tell us whiney boys, "If you're bored it's your own damned fault." Really, he did. And I took it to heart, I guess. 

1. I will not be looking for a part-time job. Or a full-time job.
2. I do not get bored. 
3. I love my home and keeping it a nice place to be (which is work, by the way). 
4. And I will be just as busy as I want to be. I'll fish, I'll write, I'll get better at my mandolin and my guitar and my  bass guitar. I'll draw and paint. I'll spend more time enjoying my life with its one true love, Lee Ann; I'll be more available to my beautiful children--Miranda and Tim and Colin and Kat; I'll explore Tennessee; I'll travel frequently/ I'll, I'll, I'll...God knows what, you can bet if it's interesting I'll be doing it.

What is a way to refer to retirement that does not drag in all the negatives? 

A search for synonyms at Thesaurus.com yields 29 synonyms for "retired." These are arranged in three tabs for one's viewing pleasure, according to that respectable resource. The next time a new aquaintance asks me the most common question any adult asks a new aquaintance, "What to you do do?," how do you think I might reply? Should I choose to respond with one of these? 

• The first tab is "adj. having withdrawn from active life." Ow. Its examples are:
• elderly
• resigned
• superannuated
• emeritus, emerita (I kind of like that one)
• in retirement
• The second is "adj. having been withdrawn, with
• detached
• removed
• secluded
• sequestered
• apart
• isolated
• retreated
• seperated
• withdrawn
• distant
• The third? "adj. done working"
• discharged
• humble
• sequestered
• withdrawn
• inactive
• retiring
• immured
• shy
• cidevant
• otiose
• cloistered
• secluded
• superannuated
• emeritus
• unfrequented

What the hell does "otiose" mean, anyway? Further investigation brings up "idle," "indolent," "listless," and "slothful" as synonyms for otiose. Dig this: its definition at Dictionary.com is 

adjective

1. being at leisure; idle; indolent.
2. ineffective or futile.
3. superfluous or useless.

So friends, I'm over it. That may be a little odd, since, really, I'm just beginning it. But here, I'm coining a word. Right here, right now. Ready?

New acquaintance: "So, what do you do?"

Me. "Oh, I'm(image from cooltext.com).

There. And, from my dear friends Matt amd Anitra, a birthday treat:

Not that I'm counting, but...

I have mostly enjoyed my late-blooming career in teaching. I certainly have enjoyed my now 5 years at McMurray Middle School here in the city of my birth, Nashville, Tennessee. I most certainly will enjoy my retirement, which creeps closer day by day. After it is a reality, not an event planned and looked forward to? Much. 

I have a beautiful wife of over 35 years, two (literally) marvelous young adult children, sufficient financial means, and a stocky 10 year old dog. I have friends, both here in around the country and globe. I have a raft of options for how to spend each day. I imagine myself awakening, arising, and choosing sometimes at the last moment--deciding in the now--very often. What are those options? In no particular order:

• Music
• I play mostly mandolin these days, and I am pursuing the Intermediate course--having finished the Basic during Covid lockdown--taught online by the amazing Sierra Hull. These lessons, completed linearly, can be 20 minutes or an hour and can be completed as frequently or infrequently as my time moves from day to day. Already I feel a much better mandolin player from her guidance and my practice and I'm looking forward to more of both.
• I also play guitar, ukulele, and a little banjo and can see myself branching back off to relearn any of those if and when I feel accomplished and adroit enough on the mandolin to make that kind of choice attractive.
• Writing
• Some may know I self-published a novel back around 2004, and I plan to set up recording gear to create an audio book of Lives. I have already spent those Covid years publishing to my blog a great deal of work, including short stories, my novella Running, and a good deal of poetry. 
• I want to revise a self-published book of poetry to make something lasting and more substantial.  
• I plan to blog regularly, having left off for a good bit due mostly to work and laziness. It's fun, challenging, and I have known it 
• Fishing
• Yes, I love being out on the water, alone or with a good friend, and working at playing the fishes' game. That's right, it's their game: We just play it. I have always been a fan of nature and the out of doors. For nearly a decade, I have fished as often as I can 20 minutes up the road from my house, at Lake Marrowbone, near Joelton. It's a 65 acre State managed fishing lake, and I catch trout, largemouth bass, bluegill, redear, and catfish. Very often I catch and release, and I sometimes bring them home, clean them, and either eat them that evening or freeze them for later smoking, grilling, or pan-frying. 
• I hope to travel Tennessee in future years, branching out to new fishing spots on short sorties into the beautiful state of my birth. This may involve renting boats and camping, or staying by myself or with a friend in cabins or motels; or, hopefully, with my lovely Lee Ann. 
• Travelling
• I'll be tripping off to places as yet unidentified. Certainly to Texas to visit my dear brother Ed, perhaps to out of state fishing holes, and with my wife to distant places we are only beginning to identify as goals. We are beginning to contemplate a trip to Greece next year. We will be spending a week in Missoula, Montana visiting Colin and Kat this summer. It's such a beautiful place I cannot imagine our week this summer will be a one-off.
• I'm flying up to Albany in June and visiting Great Barrington, Massachusetts, where my dear pal James Morrison is performing a one-man play for a two-week run at Bard College. It's a quick trip, but I am so looking forward to the geophysical co-location, not to mention the hugs. I'll also get to see my godson Seamus and his lovely mom, Riad. The play, written by Jimmy and comprised of over 11,000 words (!) centers around the family's experiences with my godson's brain tumor surgery and recuperation. I have read an early version of it and was moved to tears by its originality and masterful script then; and I plan to pack extra hankies for this trip.
• Meanwhile:

songs for myself and you--Teddy Confetti's newest EP!

The amazing Teddy has written, perfomed, recorded, engineered, and now released everything comprising this 6 piece thing of beauty, including tailoriing the one sample you may recognize. Listen and enjoy. Please click the cover pic, listen, love, and share on your platform of choice…https://bit.ly/sfyam

@WXPN

@IndieMusicNash

The Way We've Always Done It, Another Look

 Good morning,

As Fall Solstice demonstrates itself (Wednesday) and we move, here in Nashville, from a rainy and warm start to a clear and cooler end of the week, I want to note that the world around us seems to be doing a spanking good job of pretending that people are not sickening and dying every day from the ongoing pandemic. 

I have been in two public places this week, Kroger on Charlotte Avenue and Midnight Oil on 51st Avenue; and I watched the Tennessee Titans pull an awesome win out of an out-of-town game hat in Seattle yesterday (on my tv). In the first gathering place, there seemed to be some effort and concern about safety as around half the shoppers, and all the staff, continued to wear face masks. In the second, as I picked up our tasty frozen Rose wine beverages to take home and enjoy, the place was packed and I was the only human in the building wearing a face covering. I saw one or two masks in Seattle as the cameras panned the jammed stadium, but clearly everyone knows the trouble is over up there. 

Oh, wait...

Maybe someone should tell them. 

Let's look at Nashville...

Well, that's Tennessee, as reported by the New York Times, So over the previous two weeks deaths have only risen 59%. That's good, isn't it? 

Ummm, No. Three days before the national news noted that 1 in 500 Americans have died from the coronavirus, news agencies in Tennessee announced that we had achieved that outstanding statistic.

Schools are working to stay open. Students, families, and administrations, and teachers are stressed. And yet we are married more firmly than ever to what is dictated by the seven most dangerous words in the English language:

"IT'S THE WAY WE'VE ALWAY DONE IT."

Come on, y'all. We can do better. I reference an article written and published during the heat of the early battle with Covid-19. Now Covid's soldiers are wearing different uniforms, but they are still being aided and abbetted by legions of deniers and extremists, many of whom run state legislations and local governments. I (re)call your attention to January's scottmerrickdotnet blog post, THE CASE FOR REAL VIRTUAL LEARNING. 

I do not rest my case.

Stay safe and love one another. Be good and have fun.

Nashville Fireworks July 4 2017 Full Show

Thanks to Jeff Graham in Nashville for sharing this on YouTube. We were safely esconced on our sofa in our Nations home and caught a little bit of it on the way to bed, but this is the best one I've found for getting the Nashville Symphony's beautiful music with the excitement of seeing it over the mighty Cumberland River. Enjoy!

First release from "covid drafts"

Hey, y'all,

Been doing some recording and editing and I hope you enjoy this first in a series from "covid drafts" 

-- stay tooned for more!