Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day is a whole lot better this time than it was last year. Last year my beloved Jack cat had died just two days prior. It was a harbinger of the year to come but, at the time I didn't know that. But it ruined VD just the same.

I still miss that old cat. He was the best.

2010 brings more play, less work

The title is exactly as I had intended 2010 to be. The first thing to go, less Tonic. Now, before you thousands of fans turn blue from gasping, fear not. The interviews continue - I've got three lined up over the next 10 days in fact - it's just that the show has been streamlined. That means, some things nobody was paying attention to anyway have been cut, like the Call to Artists and Remembrances. For as much as I'd like those to remain, they are time-eaters and I just don't have it to give anymore. So, until some $$$ starts flowing my way to help support the time it takes to keep them up-to-date, they've been 86'ed.

"The" book

Yes, it's come to be know simply as "The" book. People are as sick of hearing me talk about it as I am of hearing myself talk about it. But finally, things are moving.

Well, they were.

Then I got a call from a friend who asked me to send the manuscript (now a completely designed book) to the University Press of Kentucky, ironically, the only publisher I had approached previously and the only to reject me. Granted, it was the nicest let-down I'd ever gotten but it was a "no thanks" just the same.

So, just how weird is it that they want to see the book some three years later when it's ready to be self-published? I'll keep you posted on just how weird weird really is.

Hats off to The Black Rose

It's been eight months since my last post. Seems when my dog died she took some of me with her. But many, many things have changed since then - and all for the better.

One of those great things was the new friends I made through Humanity Academy. It was a week-long session filled with many ups and downs, mostly downs because we had to confront the horrible ways we treat one another, either because of race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or just because somebody doesn't look and act the way we think they ought to. Stupid shit, but it's real and it hurts. But in all that dust-up I found a few people I could connect with. One of those is my friend LaKetta Rollins. She writes The Black Rose and has encouraged me to start writing again as well.

And so....here is to all things in the past, moving on, being stronger, and finding good friends along life's path. Thanks L. Shawn Rollins for being my pal.

R.I.P. my best friend - Dog is God spelled backward

what I always saw when I walked

last night - we walked the yard a lot

She was sick of my camera in her face

new toys

I've had a recent influx of gear upgrade-ness....

One I play and get to listen to all the time (Grestch drums and a PreSonus Firewire recording set-up). The other, I get to look at. Here, you have a look, too.

happiness in the grief

April has been a hard month. Not just for me but for many others I know. But in grief comes goodness.

For instance, I have some of the best co-workers anyone could ask for. Instead of sending flowers to both funerals, they instead gave me a $100 gift certificate to a local flower shop. I knew almost immediately what I would do with it.

On Saturday I bought and planted four fruit trees; one for each grandparent, even the one still living. I could think of no more fitting a tribute to their lives and the impact they each had on me than to plant a tree in their honor.

(I have planted everything, except the mature trees, in this pic)

 

My Terry grandparents had apple trees all over their small farm and my grandmother Terry's home place, at the head of Railroad Fork, was littered with apple trees. They even had an orchard on the side of the mountain. 

My maternal grandparents (Adams) had a peach tree behind their house and it was from this tree that a green snake fell down the back of Mamaw's dress while she was wringing a Sunday Chicken's neck. Needless to say, she slung the chicken into the creek, broken neck and all, in order to free herself of the serpent. Someone downstream enjoyed our Sunday dinner, I'm sure. We had a vegetarian meal instead. But my Mamaw Adams made the best crab apple jelly on the planet from the crab apple tree beside their garden.

Fruit trees: I can't thank my co-workers enough for helping me honor my grandparents.

R-L: Hazel Prater Terry (Jonathan Apple), Hannah Hamilton Adams (Crab Apple), 

Orville "Bodine" Adams (Georgia Peach), Thornton Terry (Elberta Peach)