My Friend Tom

      Yesterday, when I was in my mid twenties or so, I drifted into Guitar Town. After a few days I ran out of money and got a job slinging beers in a bar. Most places have a thing called "open mic", but in Nashville it's called "writer's nite" because you are expected to play original material. Well, I had written a couple dozen songs by then and so I joined in the fun like everybody else. Among the folks who were playing their songs around town was a fellow by the name of Tom. He was, and still is, a terrific songwriter and I was proud to meet him and even prouder to actually get to know him. I thought I was a pretty good writer at the time, but after meeting Tom and hearing his songs I knew I had a long ways to go. Tom was kind...but honest. "Duffy", he said, "it's not your guitar that's out of tune." 

      Well, one night I was off duty and on the wrong side of the bar and me and Tom were having one...or two...and solving the world's problems, as we often did. Another fellow walked into the bar and took a stool next to me. I was now positioned on the stool between Tom and a guy by the name of Harlen Howard, who happened to be one of the most, if not THE most, prolific songwriters to ever hit that town. From the nineteen fifties thru the 90's there was almost always a Harlen Howard tune on the charts. Look him up if you don't believe me.

      Okay, it hurts, but I might as well get to point. Here I was sitting right between what I considered, and still do, to be the two best songwriters I had ever met. I thought I'd be cool and asked Harlen, "Mr. Howard, how in the blue blazes do you write so many hits!?" Well, he took a sip of his drink, tipped his head to one side, grinned, and said, "well, sir, I don't write hits! I just write a song and throw it in a box and when they want a hit they just reach in the box and pull one out!" We all laughed at that and ordered up another round. I let the laughter settle down, then bowed my head just slightly, closed my eyes and said, not too loudly, "Lord, I sure wish I could write a hit before the world blows up....ya know...?" Harlen looked at me and said, "son, I just don't know what to tell you." Then he looked at  Tom and sort of shrugged his shoulders and said, "boys I guess I'd better be gettin' on home. I'll see you later." Me and Tom both shook hands with him and he walked out of the bar and we ordered one more before the walk back to our appartment on Sixteenth Avenue. We talked some more about Harlen Howard and some of the other great writers we had met and heard. I was rather enamoured of some of those successful folks, but Tom was not. He respected Harlen and the others we'd talked about, but he never put them any higher up there than anybody else. To Tom they were just people, but I couldn't help it, they were heroes to me and it took me quite a few years to realize that heroes are people first. 

      Anyway, Tom and I left the bar (it was closing time) and headed up the street to home. On the way, after too much silence between us, Tom cleared his throat and said, "uh...Duffy...in case you didn't know it....uh...your job as a writer is not to write a hit. Your job as a writer....is to write. And just one more thing. I don't think you want to write a hit before THE world blows up. I think you want to write a hit before YOUR world blows up!" 

      Told ya he was honest.                                                       

oh, these kids today....what do we do with 'em?

     The other day someone at the bar said, "facebook is the devil! Just wait and see! I'm tellin' ya, facebook and that whole internet thing are the devil!" "Well, maybe," I said, "but, just to play the devil's advocate, I don't think the fact that those young folks over there in the middle-east and Africa, overthrowing a bunch of  old farts and trying to get a better life, has anything to do with the devil. They're not the first generation to revolt, they're just the first generation to have the world at their fingertips and they are using it to change their world. And ours. The kids in Cairo are on the kids in Jordan's side. They all want the same thing. Freedom. They may not know what's next or who will run things down the road, but they do know that they sure as hell don't want the bastards that are running things now. I say God bless them and best of luck to them. It ain't gonna stop there. It will move to Korea, I bet, and even South America. This is a generational thing being driven by the energy and the passion of youth and they are using the tools at hand, just like every generation that came before. Only, this time, the tools are the internet and that evil thing, facebook. Wow, if only the hippies and that damn "love" generation had had such a thing!"

Lynwood

 Some things are easy to do. Some things are difficult.Occasionally, it is both at the same time. This time is one of those times. Up and down, happy and sad.

      It is easy to talk about Lynwood because he was a good friend. I was just one of his many friends and we will all miss him, so it is hard, also. He was only fifty-two, younger than me, so I am reminded again not to take this living thing for granted. I don't believe Lynwood took anything for granted except, perhaps, that the pan of biscuits in the oven was going to taste great and that the day was too perfect to not go fishing and surely catch a stringer full. He loved his family and he didn't hide that fact.

     He and his brother were good buddies and they were proud of each other. There was a lot of laughter there. I know this because he told me so.

     The women in his life are all strong and beautiful. His mother, smiling and dynamic, amazed him in many ways. I know this because he told me so. His sister, solid like a rock and tender like a flower, will never find it hard to recall many good stories and memories of him.

     His wife, the love and light of his life, made him grin and blush a little whenever he spoke of her.

     I was priviliged to get to sing at their wedding and I won't ever forget it. She laughed and he cried and we all had a great party.

     Today his family and his many, many friends gathered at the chapel and then in the cemetary to say good-bye to him. Then we all met at Captain Sam's Landing to laugh and cry and remember, and to drink a hearty toast...to Lynwood. Here's to Lynwood!!!

Going to Memphis

Sometimes, often when we are young, we decide to do somthing and just do it. That is what I did when I made up my mind to go to Memphis and pay my respects to the king, Elvis Presley.

      I had been hitch-hiking around the country for a few years. I'd thumbed my way to Texas and California and Colorado. I'd slept in churches and roadside parks from Virginia to Mississippi to Illinois. I'd sung "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" in nursing homes in Ohio and biker bars in Georgia. Sometimes it was only because of that beat up old guitar I was carrying that I got a ride at all. Also, I'm sure my rendition of the Jimmie Rodgers' song, "In the Jailhouse Now", actually got me out of jail a little sooner than I expected. Perhaps the cops were moved by my poignant performance or, maybe, they could stand my off-key shenanighans no longer! In any case, I was free. Young, a little wild, and free.

      One time down in Texas, in July, I headed out for Austin. Willie Nelson was having a big picnic and I determined to go out there and meet this saint of country music. Just outside of Houstin, after walking all the way across that monstrosity, a nice grey car pulled over and  I got in and what a ride it was! Just imagine being a twenty somthing year old, somewhat lost and a little scared, excited and searching for who knows what (the meaning of life?) just out there being lazy and being free and catching a ride all the way to Willie's picnic, breaking out my guitar and singing "Mr. Tamborine Man" and fourteen other Bob Dylan songs and thinking, "oh my God, I am rolling across Texas in a Rolls Royce!"

      That little whim, the picnic, turned out to be a fine idea. The great Merle Haggard was there and I got to meet him and Willie both. When it was over and I walked back out to the highway, I didn't get a ride in a Rolls, but I was happy. Happy, inspired, and free.

      I made my back across Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and on down to Ft. Lauderdale, in the Sunshine State. I worked odd jobs. I goofed off at the beach, partying and playing, and waiting for spring break. Well, spring break came and one night, around a campfire on the beach,after not making too big a fool of myself by singing one of my own songs, I met a pretty girl. Her name was Pansy and she was only a few inches taller than me and we fell in love pretty quick. We sang and danced and had the kind of time that only the young can have, really. But then, rather sudden, the air got cool, downright chilly, when she discovered that I was really just a sort of a hobo, hanging out, broke, and living in a pup tent in a vacant lot just down the road.My young heart was broken for a few days, but then I was saved by another wild idea...I realized the only thing to do was to make my way to Memphis. I must go to Graceland!

      Well, this time I decided to go in style. I called my older brother, collect of course, and begged him to wire me enough money for a train ticket. He was in the Air Force in Alaska and had a steady income. Besides, what are big brothers for? He agreed and in a few days I was showing off in the club car on the Amtrak bound for Elvis Presley Boulivard.

      Guess what? We had a three hour layover in Nashville and I thought I'd take a little walk up Westend Avenue. Three hours later I made another fanciful decision. I saw a help wanted sign hanging on the door of a place called Tortilla Flat. I took the sign off the door, walked into that dive, and said, "I'd like to work here". The old man, Wild Bill was his name, put me to work. I swept the floor, made greasy tacos, poured cheap beer into mason jars, and sang Hank Williams, Dylan, and, by now, quite a few of my own songs.

      I had never lived anywhere, in my whole young life, more than a year or two, but I stayed there, in Guitar Town, almost ten years. I never made it to Graceland, but I still have full intentions of going there.....someday.

Twenty One and Eighty Two

     I went to live with Grandma and Grandpa in late spring. She was eighty-three and he was eighty-two. Grandpa was still more active than most folks his age. He worked almost everyday, or at least when he wanted to, on his tree farm. He could still shoe a horse and drive his jeep, but he was not as well, physically, as he'd once been. He had fallen off a horse the year before and now had to use a cane. Grandpa was not one who cussed often, but he cussed that damn cane. His mind was sharper than ever. He had a keen wit and his eyes looked at you knowingly and with clear direction.

     Grandma, on the other hand, was kind of the other way around. She could carry a bucket of coal from the coalhouse out back the fireplace in the livingroom. She could go for a walk down the road or through the woods on the pathway Grandpa had made for her. At the same time, her mind was slipping somewhat. She might, for a moment, think it is 1948 in the autumn when it is actually springtime in the 1970's! Grandpa just kissed her sweetly and went on reading or doing whatever he was doing at the time.

     Well, growing up, us brothers and cousins... the grandkids, had a sort of theory concerning Grandma and Grandpa. We all agreed that if Grandpa went first, which probably wouldn't happen, poor Grandma wouldn't last another week. She would just not be able to stand life without Grandpa.However, if Grandma died first, which probably would be the case, Grandpa would grieve and be sad for awhile, but then he would be okay and just keep going on. It's not that he wouldn't miss Grandma terribly, but he was just stronger and more able to cope with such a loss.....well, we were wrong.

     It is a hot day in July now and I am twenty-one. I'm driving Grandpa, in the Willy's Jeep, over to Aunt Olga's house, five miles away. We're going over to fertilize some baby Hemlock trees. Now I am walking along a few feet behind him. He's carrying a bucket and spreading the fertilizer by hand. When the bucket gets low I pour it half full from a fifty pound bag. We are nearing the end of the last row and his bucket is almost empty and there's not much left in the bag either. I say to him, "is it going to work out alright, Grandpa?" He turns and says to me, almost laughing, "my boy, everything will work out just fine." My cousin, Paul, is talking to a friend, a boy we called Moose, in the field just a few feet away. The old man walks over to the boy and thanks him for helping out earlier in the summer. Moose had helped Grandpa build a splitrail fence. Grandpa reaches in his back pocket and pulls out his wallet saying, "I wouldn't want leave here owing anybody any money." He takes out a five dollar bill and, as he is handing it to the boy, Grandpa sways a little to the side and begins to fall backwards. I try to catch him, and almost do, but I go down with him and his head is now on my lap. He takes a deep breath in and then out and Paul and I are looking at each other. One of us, I don't remember which, says, "Grandpa's gone", and so he is.

     Grandma is shattered when told the awful news and we all worry about her, but the days turn into weeks and months and years. Nine more years as a matter of fact. And although Grandma could no longer live by herself, she was "at home" at Uncle Fred and Aunt Marge's. She may not know what she'd had for breakfast an hour ago, but she'd talk about a Saturday morning in 1904, when she was a girl, like it was yesterday. And, sometimes, I was my father when he was a little boy. And, often, Grandpa had just gone down to Griffie Morton's store to get some milk and butter and he would be back in a few minutes.

Bob Dawson

Bob Dawson                                             

                      
I must tell you about a fellow by the name of Bob Dawson. I was just a boy when he was already an old man, but he was real funny and there were a lot of stories about Bob and I remember him well. Bob and my grandfather had been friends since childhood. When they were young men they pooled their money and started a small nursery. They grew seedling Hemlocks and sold them wholesale. At some point, not too far into this venture, Bob sold his share of the nursery to Grandpa but continued to work for Grandpa for many more years. They worked together and hunted and fished and were good friends.
  The nursery grew (pardon the pun) and my Grandfather started buying tax delinquent property and building houses and he hired many men through the years, but none was ever a better friend than Bob Dawson. Bob and John (that was my Grandfathers' name) were alike in many ways. They both loved to coonhunt and fish and they both loved to work, though Bob didn't like to work quite as much as John did. Neither do I, for that matter. However, in some ways they were very different. Grandpa was conservative, politically and economically. Bob was not. Grandpa never touched a drop, bit Bob liked a nip of whiskey now and then, from what I understand. Grandpa didn't care one way or the other about music and couldn't play an instrument of any kind if his life depended on it. When he occasionally tried to sing, such as in church, he sounded, bless his heart, like a bullfrog.
Bob played the fiddle and the harmonica and the French harp and he sang quite well, though some of his songs were not meant for young ears or the faint of heart. Grandpa never gambled and only reluctantly played rummy with Grandmother sometimes. Bob played poker and not just for fun, if you know what I mean.
  One day Bob was down at Griffie Mortons' store and he and Griffie were standing out front, talking and spitting tobacco juice. Oh yes, Bob chewed Red Man Tobacco all his life. 
Well, Griffie asked Bob how he was doing and Bob said, "fine, jiust fine." Then Griffie asked Bob how John was doing and Bob said, "he's fine, too."  Then Bob said, "ya know, Griffie, me and John started off even...... now John is way ahead ... and I'm still even!"
  I will tell you more about Bob Dawson later on, but for now suffice it to say he was irreverant, maybe, but he was funny and one of a kind and Grandpa liked him and that's good enough for me.