My Life As A Suburban Farmer

        I can admit that it’s silly, but I’m still proud of it. The “it” I’m referring to is my Roma tomato plant. I don’t have a garden. I’m not growing vegetables in raised beds and I don’t even have herbs growing in pots, but I have a fine Roma tomato vine that continues to spread and bear much fruit, and I’m proud of it. I come out every morning to check it and see what new excitement it has for me. Each day I count the new blooms, the little green tomato buds, the ripe tomatoes and how many are close to ripening. My early morning inventory has become one of the highlights of my day.

Anyone who has encountered me within the last several months has likely grown weary of hearing about my tomato plant or finds it comical at least. I talk about it, post on social media about it, preach about it, and as of now, write about it. There is no doubt that my faithful furry friend Levi has had his patience pushed to the limits over it. He’s a smart dog and he figured something out on his own. He sees me carefully inspecting my tomatoes every morning, when he thinks I should be throwing the ball with him, and decided to lash out in the form of agricultural terrorism to get my attention and send a message: “throws” before “grows.” 

For several weeks I noticed that whenever a tomato got ripe it would vanish from my plant. After blaming squirrels and birds for a couple of weeks, the cold hard truth hit me in the face. One morning I walked outside to find my own familiar friend had lifted up his heel against me (Psalm 41:9). My beautiful black lab was shoulder deep in my tomato plant eating the ripe ones off the vine. Et tu Levi? No doubt he was hitting me where it hurt, seeing as how I was paying too much attention to tomatoes and not enough to him.

Here is the backstory on this botanical blessing. Last year my wife and I decided to create a compost box. It consisted of a rubber maid tub with about a hundred holes drilled in it. We put some soil in it and then began tossing all of our organic waste in the box. Fast forward to this spring and one morning I noticed a little shoot of something green growing from one of those holes. Curious, I began to watch it each day as it grew bigger and bigger until one day I was able to discern its identity because of the appearance of an undeniable little yellow bloom. It was a tomato plant. Apparently we had tossed some left over Roma tomatoes into the compost box and a little seed, despite no attention from any human, and against all odds, did what God created it to do and began to grow. For a moment I thought about doing all sorts of things like watering it and adding fertilizer and pesticides, but ultimately I decided the Lord had given and if He saw fit He would take away. This little tomato plant had done just fine without my help and so I decided to stay out of the way, well, almost. I did at least turn the box where the rain water could fall on it. God planted, God watered, and God gave the increase. The next few months were filled with an almost embarrassing amount of joy as I cheered on this little plant that could, watching it grow and grow, climbing up plant stands and across a little fence. The day I saw my first tomato it was all I could do not to run around the neighborhood sharing the good news like a man who just found out he was going to be daddy. The day i picked my first ripe, red, juicy tomato I was nearly as overwhelmed as the day I had my first child. Like Jonah from the Bible, I did nothing to make it grow, or help it along, and I will likely be saddened when it is time for it to go. I know it’s silly, and there are far more important things to worry about, but today I count it as one of my blessings, or as I’ve come to think of it, as one of God’s little graces that He places in our path each day to sustain us on our journey.

I’ve always heard if you don’t use it you lose it and that would be an appropriate description of the biological propensity for farming I inherited from my ancestors. Although she mostly grows her vegetables in pots today, my momma can produce as fine of a garden as you will ever see. My Grandaddy Sam, her daddy, plowed behind a mule to grow what was needed to provide for his family, and he successfully did for decades. The only thing I can grow consistently is my midsection, but God decided to plant a little grace in my life. I can’t feed my family from it (although I did feed my wife a nice side dish of roasted balsamic vinegar tomatoes from it one night), but it has certainly fed my soul. As you go through your day today I hope you don’t forget to stop and smell the roses, or eat the tomatoes. 

Brother John Is Dead

“Jock-a-mo-fi-no ai na-ne.” The first time I heard these peculiar, yet fascinating words they were being sung by Justine Bateman and The Mystery in the 1988 motion picture “Satisfaction.” Being twelve years old my musical tastes, like my body, had yet to reach maturity. My personal musical catalog consisted of hair metal and whatever Top 40 hits were being played n 104.3 WZYP out of Huntsville, Alabama. I would eventually learn this infectious song they were singing had a mysterious title, “Iko Iko”, an odd story line, and bizarre lyrics. I didn’t know what it meant, what it was about, and who sang it, but I knew I liked it. As odd as it may sound coming from a little white boy growing up on Chicken Creek in Tennessee, this peculiar little song awakened something in my soul that would take many years to mature, manifest, and understand. I had no way of knowing it at the time but this was the first stirring of a passion that still burns within me three decades later. 

It would be many years before I would come to understand the history and significance of Iko Iko, and the meaning of those lyrics which sounded more like a chant. The origin of the song is as mysterious as the lyrics. There are as many explanations for the origin and meaning or the lyrics as there are versions of the song. And there are a lot of versions of this song. Some say the lyrics come from West Africa, or Yoruba, or Creole patois. There is little dispute that it made its way into pop culture via James “Sugar Boy” Crawford’s 1953 recording and then became a hit for the Dixie Cups in 1965. “Sugar Boy” Crawford said he heard it as part of the Mardi Gras Indiana tribes chanting and taunting one another on the streets of New Orleans. Everyone seems to have a translation of the lyrics into English, but the one that is stuck in my throat and ringing in my ears tonight is, “Jock-a-mo-fi-no ai na-ne, Brother John is dead.”

June 6, 2019 just went from being a lazy Thursday to the day Mac Rebennack, better known as Dr. John, died. Brother John is dead. The month of June hasn’t been kind to New Orleans, beginning with the passing of Leah Chase, the Queen of Creole Cuisine, and now the loss of another legend. In just five days New Orleans has lost a Queen and a Dr.

Long before I heard the name Dr. John I was captivated by the enigmatic piano playing muppet character Dr. Teeth, whom I would eventually learn was based on Mac. Looking back on my childhood it was almost like this city was luring me like a siren’s song, speaking to me in a language that a child could comprehend. Through catchy and confounding lyrics sung by pretty girls, and wild and wacky puppets on a children’s television show, New Orleans was summoning me, not to my doom, but to the joie de vivre, the joy of living. A couple of years later I would meet my eventual best friend and his family, who moved to Tennessee from just outside of New Orleans on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain. I didn’t know it at the time but the die was cast and my fate was set. Those who know me today know that although my body was born in Tennessee my soul came from New Orleans.

The first time I remember hearing Dr. John came in my early twenties, when ironically, I picked up Harry Connick Jr’s album “20” from the Wal Mart discount bin. That album has what is still my favorite version of “Do You Know What It Means To Miss New Orleans?” I knew and loved Harry Connick, Jr. but I was intrigued by this other raspy, almost growling voice that was playing off Harry’s smooth crooner sound. Reading the album liner notes I learned the duet was with Dr. John and my journey with the Night Tripper began.

The first time I saw Dr. John in concert it was free and I was on the front row. At the time we were living in Valdosta, Georgia and I found out that there was going to be a Mardi Gras celebration in Panama City Beach, Florida. As much as I wanted to be in New Orleans for Mardi Gras I had to settle for this. The silver lining, or should I say gilded lining, was that Dr. John was performing a free show. It was a very cold night and that kept the crowds at home, which meant I had no trouble making my way to the front of the stage. It wasn’t the greatest show I’ve ever been to, but it was great because I was in Florida, during Mardi Gras, with my wife, and I was getting to check an artist off my concert bucket list. Being front and center was just lagniappe. 

The second, and sadly tonight, final time I got to see Dr. John live was just one year later, but it was one to remember. It was April 2015 and my wife and I were taking our first solo vacation in a very long time. Our destination was New Orleans and Jazz Fest. A perfect week was capped off with her favorite, Lenny Kravitz, and one of my favorites, Trombone Shorty, but the thing I remember most is the stop we made on the way back to the car at the end of the festival. As we made our way from the Acura stage on the southwest side of the fairgrounds to the Gentilly stage at the northeast corner we had a moment that tonight became a treasured memory. The sun was setting, the breeze picked up and we decided to take a break to listen to Dr. John paying tribute to Louis Armstrong with the Blind Boys of Alabama. There was a moment just before the end of the show where I was enjoying the mixture of the smell of food, the music, the wind, and the sunset, that only Jazz Fest can provide, and I thought to myself, “It just doesn’t get any better than this.” It was truly the right place and the right time. By this point in my life I had learned to stop and take it all in when it is special, so I allowed this fleeting moment to become etched into my heart. If I close my eyes I can almost transport myself back to that moment. Such a night.

I would never, and I will never, get to see Dr. John in concert again. Fortunately I’ve got those two memories, and thanks to Peaches Records I’ve got a vinyl copy of his Gris Gris album, which I can play anytime I choose. There’s no need to get out the record tonight. WWOZ is doing a fine job of playing tribute to Dr. John. It’s good to know if I don’t do it, somebody else will.

Elvis Has Left The Building

“I can assure you that Elvis Presley is dead, because I touched his cold, lifeless hand.” Those were the words spoken to me during a Sunday lunch in 1998 by C.W. Bradley, longtime preacher of the Wooddale  Church of Christ in Memphis, Tennessee. Elvis’s father Vernon was a member at Wooddale and C.W. was called upon to preach the funeral of arguably the most famous man in the world. 

My teenage years had coincided with the golden era of the tabloids. During my down time between bagging groceries and stocking the milk cooler at Johnson’s Foodtown, I would peruse the headlines of the Weekly World News, and its near constant declaration that “Elvis Is Alive!” In the era before the internet, conspiracy theories like this seemed perfectly reasonable, if not likely. Four or five years later, as a naive twenty-two year old, sitting across the table from this aged preacher, only one degree removed from Elvis Presley, I couldn’t resist asking, “Is he really dead?” Brother Bradley assured me that yes, Elvis had in fact left this life.

From as early as I can remember, I have always had a fascination with Elvis. Growing up in the buckle of the Bible Belt, and the shadow of Memphis in the 1970’s, two single named celebrities, both known as “the King”, found their way into at least half of all conversations: Jesus and Elvis. For me, the sweet spot is when you get to hear Elvis sing about Jesus. Regardless of who preaches my funeral, I hope the backdrop to their eulogy will be Elvis singing “Peace In The Valley.”

Depending on who you ask, Turner Classic Movies is to be thanked or blamed for my having watched every movie Elvis ever made multiple times. Due to my love affair with New Orleans, it should be no surprise that “King Creole” is my favorite of his films. I rarely make a trip to the Crescent City without taking the time to stroll past the balcony on Royal Street, just across from the Cornstalk Hotel, where Elvis stood and sang “Crawfish” during the opening scene of what he would call his favorite film. One of the few material possessions I treasure is an original copy of the King Creole soundtrack on vinyl, which my mother bought me for my birthday.

On my 33rd birthday I spent some time pondering the humbling realization that I was now the same age as Jesus when He died. Today, while watching Elvis in “Girls, Girls, Girls”, I had a similar moment when I realized that I am one year older than Elvis lived to be. During these forty-three years I’ve noticed that everybody’s got an Elvis story. Well, I’ve got five. I’ve already told you the most interesting one, but for context, you need to know the other four too.

My ex uncle Ralph used to be a cop, and a bodybuilder, and an Elvis impersonator. Ironically Elvis spent a lot of his life as a law enforcement impersonator — he was an honorary captain with the Denver police, was deputized by the Shelby County Sheriff, got a Department of Narcotics badge from Richard Nixon, and even had a police radio and blue light on his car that he used to pull over people in Memphis. I knew my uncle Ralph was an Elvis impersonator long before he ever donned a sequined jumpsuit and long before being an Elvis impersonator was even a thing. 

Some of my earliest memories of Ralph involve him and his two brothers, Keith and Danny, lifting weights in the tiny garage of his 1,300 square foot FHA house in Vales Mill subdivision, somewhere around 1979 or 80. From my five year old perspective they looked like giants, or pro wrestlers (I was convinced Danny and Keith were actually Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant). 

When Ralph wasn’t bench pressing Volkswagens he was walking around his house singing Elvis songs. Even though I was too young to know how to write my name,  I knew Ralph sounded amazingly similar to the Elvis records he was constantly playing. The similarities were so precise that it was hard to tell the difference between Ralph’s voice filling the air and Elvis’s voice coming from the speakers. 

We spent a lot of time at Ralph and Brenda’s house — Brenda is my mamma’s sister and was married to Ralph  —  and I loved playing with my cousins Tracy and Eric. My favorite game literally involved using my uncle Ralph as my own personal jungle gym, scaling his massive frame like he was a mountain or a tree, flipping over, and doing it again as many times as he’d let me. 

Perhaps it was those pleasant memories, mixed with his singing Elvis songs, that combined in my mind to create the love for Elvis music that remains with me to this day. I was always too young to go to the clubs where he would perform as Elvis, but to this day I can’t listen to Elvis without thinking of Ralph.

I’ve known exactly one person who was legitimately named Elvis. In kindergarten I had a classmate named Elvis. At the age of five Elvis bore a striking resemblance, not to the King of Rock and Roll, but to Mike Tyson. As best I can remember he looked like a miniature version of Mike Tyson and he had the same disposition as well. 

My introduction to this Elvis came on the playground during recess at Pulaski Elementary. I was leisurely enjoying a ride on the teeter totter with my friend, and fellow T-ball teammate, Jamie Coffee. Jamie decided he was done riding the teeter totter and got off, and since a see saw is not exactly the kind of toy you can play with by yourself, I decided to get off too. I was standing beside the see saw when young Elvis decided he would jump on it like he was doing a cannonball into a swimming pool. Physics being what they are, the other end of the teeter totter launched upward like a rocket, striking my head just above my left eye. Somewhat stunned, I looked around the semi-circle of my friends as their faces contorted into a blend of shock, terror, and disgust. I put my hand to my now throbbing brow and looked down to see the blood beginning to drip from my hand and pool at my feet. I may not have hit the canvas for a ten count, but Elvis “Iron Mike” Marsh had certainly scored his first TKO.

The last two stories need to be blended since they are very similar, both in content, and in the fact that they are most certainly not true. There are two urban legends in our family, neither of which I’ve ever been able to confirm. According to my mamma, who was told by one of her cousins (or was it one of her sisters?), that according to 23 and Me or Ancestry.com or a genealogy in the back of a family Bible, we are actually kin to Elvis. Thus far the closest thing to evidence I’ve ever seen was Freshman year when my cousin Greg was convinced he was possessed by the spirit of Elvis, specifically Jailhouse Rock era Elvis, based upon his hair and clothes.

The other story is mine by marriage. Like Elvis, my wife is originally from Tupelo, Mississippi. We have visited the Elvis Presley birthplace, and the hardware store where he got his first guitar, and I’ve even eaten at King Chicken, which has nothing to do with Elvis other than the giant mural painted of the King painted on the outside of the building. Ironically, despite living in Memphis for two years, I’ve never been to Graceland. Allegedly, my wife’s grandmother once dated Elvis. Considering he was five years older than her and left Tupelo when he was thirteen, I have a feeling this story is more folk tale than fact.

Sometimes it can be difficult to separate fact from fiction. The harsh reality is that although his movies are still on television, his music is still on the radio, and he is often imitated but never duplicated, the King is dead. Long live the King.

Hazed and Confused

     My dad is no Matthew McConaughey, and yet I think of my daddy whenever I catch a few minutes of the film “Dazed and Confused.” This movie, which gave birth to the McConaughey “Alright, alright, alright” mantra, begins on the last day of school in May 1976, which was when my daddy graduated from Bodenham High School. Ironically this movie was released in September of 1993, which was when I began my senior year at Giles County High School. The movie begins with a group of seniors plotting their hazing of incoming high school freshmen boys by paddling them, which was very similar to how my high school career began, well, sort of.

In my tiny hometown of Pulaski, Tennessee, on the last day of school the rising seniors would hunt down the incoming freshmen and use electric hair clippers to shave an “F” into their hair. As the end of my eight grade year drew to a close I was terrified of this looming initiation. For years, from the window of bus #102, which I rode to my Big Mamma’s house, I had witnessed  juniors in high school hop out of cars to chase down eighth graders and pin them to the ground, knowing one day it would be my turn to run. I imagine these “rights of passage” sound outright barbaric and borderline criminal to those of my children’s generation. Maybe they were. As the eighties came to a close and the nineties were in bloom, most of those rituals gradually died out, and looking back, I’m glad they did.

As much as I feared being held down by a gang of seniors violently shaving my head, it never happened to me, which oddly enough created a different kind of fear...the fear that I wasn’t important enough to get hazed; that I didn’t even register on the social scale. I was invisible. Perhaps this is why, four years later, I responded so enthusiastically to an invitation to “rush” a fraternity. 

Early in my freshman year at the University of North Alabama, I got an invitation in my mailbox to attend a mixer at a fraternity. I had never considered pledging a fraternity, but I knew that they represented something more. They were status symbols, the in crowd, the cool kids, wealth, influence, power, all things I never felt I had in high school. Now it was being offered to me. They were reaching out to me. They wanted me. At the mixer I felt like they were pursuing me, and I learned that acceptance can be intoxicating. 

I don’t know how they knew me or anything about me (probably one of them worked in the admissions office), but they knew things like my ACT score and that I had gotten a few baseball scholarship offers in high school. The fact that they knew these things about me added to the mystique and it connected with something deep inside me. I felt wanted. The “in crowd” was opening the door and inviting me join them and I ate it up. 

The following weeks were filled with the parties and the perks of Greek life. The fraternity house was like a mansion. It was an enormous three story house with a basement that had a bar, giant screen tv, deafening sound system, along with ping pong and pool tables. The backyard was literally a regulation beach volleyball court with a Corona net. This only child of teenage parents, who grew up in places with names like Chicken Creek and Dog Branch, was accepted by the cool kids. I felt like the underdog character from the John Hughes movies I grew up watching. It was kind of the reverse of high school. In high school you got hazed by the older guys and then they let you in, but here they let you in so that you would let them haze you. You get a taste of what they can give you before you learn the price you have to pay to get it. Fortunately I got out before things got out of control, though I can’t say the same for my roommate and childhood best friend who suffered through many of the indignities of being a pledge before he too decided to call it quits.

Last night I read a story that reminded me just how lucky I was to have avoided, not just the degradation, but the violence often associated with hazing. Seven students at Louisiana State University, all members of the same fraternity, were arrested and charged with battery, false imprisonment, and criminal hazing. These seven are accused of subjecting pledges to cigarette burnings, being kicked, punched, and struck with a metal pipe. Beside the physical abuse were allegations of actions designed to degrade them. Pledges said they were used as human furniture, forced to participate in a “slap game”, doused in gasoline, immersed in ice tanks and sprayed with water, and made to lie face down on broken glass at which point others urinated on them.

Recently there has been much dialogue about “toxic masculinity.” I may not be qualified to define it intellectually, but I know it when I see it, and I’ve seen in on middle school, high school, and college campuses, and in locker rooms my entire life. Any potential “camaraderie” that this type of abasement produces is greatly overshadowed by the psychological, physical, and emotional harm that comes from it. Dishonoring someone who is weaker, more vulnerable, or socially inferior to you doesn’t make you a man, it makes you a bully at least and a criminal at worst.

Where did these rituals designed to dominate, humiliate, produce fear, instill shame and exert power, all in the name of camaraderie, community and belonging, originate? Perhaps they are vestigial rites of passage left over from our more tribal ancestors seeking to “weed out” those who wouldn’t endure the difficult conditions of battle or hold their ground when facing down a bear. You would think these rituals would have no place in a civilized society, and yet some groups still see value in them. Maybe they are still employed in certain sectors of the population to determine who will “stand with their brothers” when there are accusations of sexual abuse or other illegal or unethical activities from outsiders. Perhaps they are designed to “weed out” those who would say “This is not ok” or “I’m reporting this to the authorities.” It’s likely they remain because hose who endure this type of abuse to the end are rewarded with initiation into the group. Having endured it and come through the other side they are now in a position of power and able to exert superiority over someone else, perhaps for the first time in their lives. “You are one of us now”, which typically means you will now be required to perpetuate the cycle. The recipient becomes the administrator. These hazings rituals continue to be perpetuated generation after generation via those who know firsthand the fear and shame it caused. Dignity in the present is traded for superiority, or power, or recognition in the future.

These days I’m far removed from freshman initiations and fraternity hazings, but I can’t seem to escape the scorn of the “us” and “them” mindset and the initiations that usually come with them. We may not shave an F in someone’s hair but we attach a label to them. Democrat or Republican, pro life or pro choice, liberal or conservative, resident or illegal, black or white. Labels serve to mark the boundaries for who is with “us” and who is with “them.” Once we know where those borders are located we can erect walls between us that can only be traversed through the performance of rituals or rites of passage designed to strip up of our identity or our culture or our heritage or our independence and replace them with groupthink and conformity. This is what “we” do, this is what “we” believe, this is where “we” live, this is how “we” vote, this is how “we” speak. Sometimes I’m on the receiving end of these attitudes and requirements, sometimes I simply observe them being perpetuated on others, and sadly, sometimes I’m the one initiating them. Whichever the case, I always suffer from it. Don’t we all? 

These days I’m not afraid of being left out. I’m afraid of making someone else feel excluded, unwanted, or unworthy. In a world of wall building, inclusion can be scary, especially if you’re not used to it. You might even find that people who consider you “one of us” might start viewing you as “one of them” if you open your mind, your heart or your home to others. Maybe you will, maybe you won’t, but it’d be a lot cooler if you did.

Ain’t Dolly and Ain’t Loretta

If I’ve learned anything in my forty-three years it’s that my thought process is as random as a ricochet. I can be trucking along ninety to nothing and then my brain hits something and it sends me shooting off in a totally different direction and I never know where it will stop. It might be something I look at, something I hear, or even just a smell that triggers a memory or a thought and off I go. This morning it was music that rearranged my trajectory for the day, or at least for a moment or two. I’m supposed to be working right now. I have been for three hours and I’ve got at least five more that I need to put in today, but I’ve got an emotional itch I’ve just got to scratch for a few minutes first. 

I decided it was too quiet in this office and I needed a little background sound to keep my head humming so I clicked on my Spotify and hit play. The first thing to pop up was Dolly Parton. The song selections may be the result of an algorithm or artificial intelligence, but the emotions it stirs up are anything but artificial. I didn’t make it to the chorus of “Here You Come Again” before my mind was a million miles away. Maybe not quite a million miles, more like five hundred. I was back home and I was back in time. No particular year, just somewhere between 1975 and 1995, and no particular place, just somewhere around Big Mama’s house or Fall River Road. Maybe ricochet is too strong of a word because I don’t make these journeys in a rocket ship. I usually drift back slowly on a river of tears. Tears that spring from my head and my heart, a mixture of sadness and gratitude, regrets and joy. Truth is, those songs just turned the spigot, but the well was primed yesterday while I was preaching about Big Mama. I find myself compelled to do that more and more. I haven’t sat and talked with her in years, but she can still bring out the best in me just by talking about her. She obviously possessed a special kind of magic to be able to do that from beyond the grave. 

Regardless of the origin of this emotional odyssey, by the time Dolly got to singing about kids with June bugs on a string in “My Tennessee Mountain Home” I was practically drowning in salt water. And so here I sit, not writing a tear stained letter, but a saline soaked blog post. 

Occasionally I’ll surprise an “old timer” with my knowledge and love of old country music. They figure a man my age doesn’t go further back than Alan Jackson, or Garth and George Strait, so when I bring up Ferlin Husky and Jerry Reed, or Patsy Cline their face tends to light up. Without fail the next question is, “How did you come to like all that music from before your time.” Secretly, I’m always glad they ask. The simple fact is that a lot of that old country music and several of those artists remind me of my family.

Whenever I hear Dolly Parton I think of my aunt Brenda. They don’t necessarily look or sound alike, but they both have an infectious laugh and personality that just put you in a good mood. As far as I’m concerned Loretta Lynn is just a black headed version of my aunt (momma) Dot. Both of them are pint sized dynamite and you never know what they’re going to say. I can’t hear a George Jones song without thinking of my uncle Lloyd. They look absolutely nothing alike, but I think it’s something about the way they wore their hair back in the 70’s. I know he doesn’t qualify as “old country” but still, Zac Brown is the spitting image of my uncle Dale when he was in his thirties. Speaking of my Uncle Dale, his wife Linda and Crystal Gale could have been sisters in the early eighties. Uncle Miles doesn’t remind me of anyone in particular but he definitely looked like a rock star. 

These bizarre correlations aren’t always connected to musicians. My uncle Ricky still reminds me of Robin Williams and can make me laugh just as much. He was always “on” and when I was a kid he seemed to have an endless stream of jokes, voices and impressions. It probably had something to do with being the baby of nearly a dozen kids and having to find a way not to get lost in the crowd. My cousins Kevin and Kendal always pop in my head when I see the Dukes of Hazard because they too were brown and blonde headed brothers, and we used to watch the Duke boys together when we were at Big Mama’s house. My cousin Felecia is the real life Ella May Clampett because I never saw her without some kind of animal, and usually a “wild” one like a coon or a deer.

Not every family member reminds me of some country music singer or actor or character, and for the ones that do it’s not easy to explain why they do. It may be something different with each one, but it’s usually a blend of several things. Appearance, personality, hairstyle, voice. I imagine some of it is just associated with what music was playing in their homes when I was a kid or maybe stories that overlap with the lyrics of certain songs. I can’t explain it anymore than I can explain how a music app randomly playing songs always seems to know exactly what kind of musical mood I’m in. All I know is that my memories of my family back home are inseparably intertwined with classic country music.

This may not make any sense to any one but me and that’s ok. For whatever reason, this music makes me think of my family and more than that it makes me feel close to them when I can’t be. To quote the old country singer Bobby Bare, “I’m 500 miles away from home” and that means I don’t get to physically be with my family very often. It’s rare that I’m in town for family reunions, Christmas gatherings, and funerals, so Loretta and Dolly and Conway are the best I can do most days.

It may be silly and I may be the only one who thinks this way, but I just needed to follow this stray bullet from my mind wherever it went. Thanks for taking the journey with me. Now if you will excuse me, it’s back to the future. I’ve got work to do and I’ve got to mop up all this water.

(My Uncle Dale/Zac Brown in first picture, and my Aunt Linda, Uncle Loyd, and Aunt Dot in the background of the bottom pic).