Dodging Bullets and Keeping Promises

It was not as if there were any other way. If there had been another way, that would have most assuredly been the preferred way, but in this case - there was but one way to make this right.

The journey on foot, from Howard, KS to Wichita, KS is (according to Google) only about 73 miles and that didn't seem like an unreasonable adventure on this particular day. Everybody knows that the pioneers used to knock out those short distances with alarming frequency, and clearly it didn't kill them.
There was no shortage of generous offers from friends willing to donate the better part of their work days to drive all the way there and all the way back. But, an incredible strong will and tenacity combined with a whole pant-load of false pride made any such requests quickly out of the question.

At noon on a Wednesday in June, in full sun with unbearable humidity and a 50 pound backpack on her back, she dispensed hugs and kisses and hoped that she had been appropriately grateful for the kindness she'd been shown - she took off. She thanked herself for her smart and sensible shoes within the first 5 miles.

Two hours of straight roads offering no shade and few vehicles passing by made the travel less than delicious, but at least it wasn't one of the big main roads populated with 18-wheelers nearly blowing her off the road with their speed and weight. She walked faster than usual (which was really pretty fast to begin with) and she never held out her thumb to ask for a ride. It could be illegal and the last thing she needed was some of that special Time Out activity in a police station.

So, she moved fast and looked straight ahead, continually attempting to beat her last best time for how long it took her to walk a mile. She was getting faster in spite of the elements.

Clearly, she needed a walk. She needed to sweat and think. And a couple times she needed to barf on the side of the road. She had also made a promise that she had no intentions of not honoring. Her life-long personal history of being on the receiving end of broken promises had turned this into a mission from God (whom she wasn't even all that sure she was still buying into at the time.)

Three hours into the walk, a really nice, newer model and great big ol' SUV went by, slowed down, pulled a U-turn and came up slowly beside her. She was no idiot and had heard more than a zillion stories of bad things that can happen to girl hitch-hikers, and she was not that kind of girl. She wasn't hitch-hiking: She was just walking. She picked up her pace and didn't look over.

They rolled down the window and a very nice woman in the back seat said, "Hey! Are you going this way?" She stopped then just to laugh out loud and make eye contact with this voice. She kind-of thought it was obvious that she was going "This way" as she had been power-walking exactly in the direction of "This way" as fast as her incredibly powerful gams would let her. Within about a minute she had buckled into the backseat of a sweetly air-conditioned car with 4 really nice people in it.

There were three sisters and one husband. They were on their way to one of their other sister's homes to meet some more sisters. They had a huge family apparently. They offered her water and a towel to wipe some of the glow off her face. They made small talk and treated her exceptionally well for about an hour. Then it was time for them to take their turn where she needed to keep going straight.

She walked for another couple hours, made some great progress, kept improving her time and was probably losing about 2 pounds every half hour. It was a win-win as far as she could tell. She'd been wanting to lose about 20 pounds since winter AND she was getting closer to her destination. There was never one iota of doubt that she would not be able to do what she'd promised she'd do and she'd be on time. She may have been a little OCD about not only doing what she said she'd do, but also doing it on time.

She had no idea how long she walked for this next stretch, but it felt longer than the last one. It could have just been the heat or the weight of her bag, but the day was growing long and she had started contemplating just laying down on the side of the road so maybe somebody would call an ambulance and she could make the rest of her journey flat on her back in an air-conditioned and fast moving vehicle. She thought that if she got lucky, she may have even gotten a handsome and compassionate EMT who would be nice to her.

Right at about the time she hit the most risky part of her trip (4 lane highways with 65mph speed limits) a one-ton Dodge Dooley with gigantic Harley Davidson bumper stickers on the back windows went by, slowed down, turned around and came up slowly beside her. She thought about taking off in a sprint, but her knees were not being cooperative.

Again, the window rolls down and a voice (could have been a man or a woman) said, "HEY! Are you going this way?" Again, with the "This way" thing. She started to laugh a little too maniacally while she thought, "Seriously? You are SERIOUSLY going to ask me if I am going This Way?!?!" How much more clear could it be, really? Was it rocket science to figure out that a really sunburned girl, all by herself, on what was now a big highway nearing the largest town in Kansas, walking as fast as her legs would carry her was, indeed, going "THIS way?"

She looked over at the driver and had a huge wave of understanding androgyny sweep over her. She really could not have told you, at gun-point, whether this was a man or a woman. In this case, there was just as great a chance that this person was a serial killer as not. But, she had started to doubt her abilities and wasn't absolutely certain she could make it on time, so she said, "Sure. Yea. I AM going this way."

The driver motioned for her to jump in and as she approached the truck, she realized that it was literally (and I'm serious here, NO hyperbole) all the way full of shit from the passenger side window to the elbows of the driver. Jumping around on top of this vast collection were three really wound-up Chihuahuas. As she reached for the door, the driver started screaming, "Don't LET THE DOGS OUT! Goddddamit, they'll be dead in a heartbeat on this highway!!!!"

It was too late to decline the kind offer and just too much to even consider how this was going to work out for all the mammals involved. The driver herded the dogs onto her lap and said, "Just jump in! Don't let any of that shit fall out! I'm going to need all of it!" And, in spite of the odds of it happening, she managed to get into the cab of the truck and park on top of about 13 inches of crap. None of the extra special "shit" fell out of the truck in the process. The dogs calmed down and the truck took off at a crawl.

"Yea, I know it's slow, but I think I've got a blown head gasket. This bitch won't go more than 35mph."

Awesomeness. Just freaking great awesomeness.

The driver turned to her, held out her hand and said, "Well, howdy! It's good to meet you! My name is Rebeccah and I'm not gay." It seemed that the only appropriate response was to take and shake that hand and say, "Howdy. My name is Meadow Lynne and I'm not gay either."

The next 20 minutes were spent in Rebeccah explaining that she was now going to take her new rider to a town called Buffalo, somewhere in BFE Kansas. She said that she needed help, Meadow looked strong as an ox and she paid $8 an hour and would provide a single-wide mobile home to live in. It didn't have any indoor plumbing or electricity, but if we Googled it she was sure that could be turned around within a month or two.

The traveling Gods were smiling on her pretty quick here and as the driver went to take a turn (which would have actually made the journey a little quicker and shorter) Meadow said, "Oh yea... OMG! I just remembered! I need to get out NOW! I have this other place I have to be to before the other place and it's not in this direction!"

The driver complied and Meadow jumped out faster than any human has ever jumped out of an almost stopped truck. She was warmly thankful for the ride and went as quick as she could in a direction that she knew this truck couldn't go. Logistical decisions had been made and this was a highway. There would be no turning around for the truck with it's non-gay driver.

It wasn't more than two hours later when she had reached her destination and got to move on to a more conventional mode of travel that didn't involve most of what this one day did.

In the end, she got to where she had to be, got there on time and did what she promised to do. And, when all was said and done, she'd figured out enough to change the course of her story. Then she set about to live happily ever after.

copyright 2010 moemasters

Memorial Day

To say that she was unamused would be a grievous understatement. It was freaking freezing and she'd read all the magazines. Jane had checked in and met all of her obligations.
This current stop along the way, in another hospital and another ICU waiting room, was just not a part of how she thought it would have all played out. They were on Day 5 of the waiting game. They had been eating crap-food for close to 2 months, hadn't slept well for even longer, and it was a physical impossibility to get comfortable.
She was joined in her vigil by the woman who either was, or was not, her father's wife. And, with all due respect: She was bat-shit crazy. Always had been. She was absolutely kind, big-hearted and pixie-ish, too - but, you didn't want to piss her off. She could hop up on your chest while you were asleep, brandishing a machete and speaking in tongues.

Redheads, whatchoo gonna do?

Crazy woman and Jane's father fell in love in high school, went their separate ways for 30 years and then got together to reconsider it. They got together about every 3 years, as near as anyone could tell. They got divorced a couple times, had fantabulous and elaborate re-marriages, traveled the world and engaged in a brand of hillbilly warfare only known to the True Hillbilly. They fought and loved with extreme prejudice.
She was also a nun. Or not. The lack of verifiable information in this story (in this entire family, for that matter) is much greater than the wealth of it.
Jane and The Nun had a long rich history full of things that are best told in person, so you don't miss the inflection - it's critical to the telling of these stories. Suffice to say, nobody was incarcerated for very long and nobody died.
The 36 hours that preceded this one were some of the longest ever in the history of time. Her father had coded so many times that it was no longer possible to keep count. He'd been in the throes of severe dementia for 4 days and had caught infections from the incision that appeared to run from his heel to his shoulder. He hadn't remembered her name for about a month and he called her My Little Buddy.

HIS little buddy was technically her younger brother who was mostly unavoidably detained for most of this fun. And, regardless of how many times she heard herself say that it was no big deal that he couldn't remember her name (in spite of the fact that she seemed to be the only one constantly available to run damage control) it mattered.

All of this silliness just percolated and grew as she sat in that freezing waiting room for way too many days. She began crocheting hats for the oncology floor - because she had gotten to know the nurses there. The longer she went without food and without sleep, the more knots she tied - the more impervious she became.
She stopped counting things like stitches and hours and code blues. She paid no mind to calendars and clocks.
The Nun, who either was or wasn't her step-mother, kept telling stories. The endless (and, seriously - this from a girl who can marathon-talk like none other) prattling on and on about anything and everything was roughly 10 cc's away a from homicide or a suicide or some other ...cide.

Jane looked at the beautiful, completely white haired and radiant (crazy) woman and imagined wrapping her hands around her throat. It was really a pretty skinny little throat. She'd seen people do it on TV and had read about it. She started to wonder if she had what it takes to do that.
She sat and stared without listening to a word for just barely long enough to recollect. She set down her yarn, stood up and stretched. She was holding her arms open in a big old to-the-stars stretch when the door right in front of her busted open with a sobbing couple.

They had clearly been at The Lake. It was Memorial Day weekend and it was not difficult to spot the campers and lake-dwellers in the Midwest. They had on tank-tops and flip flops and shorts or swimsuits. They had obviously been crying for a long time. Their faces were all puffed up and they had that look of absolute desperation. You wouldn't know that look unless you've spent some time in an ICU (or Pediatric) waiting room.
Their hair was a mess.
Since they were standing right there, just like that, at that very moment in time- they sort-of fell into Jane's arms. The hug that resulted was strong enough to move mountains and launch tsunamis. There wasn't enough time to savor much of that moment, however, because the door swung open and another couple pushed through in the same shape.

Then there was a grandmother and her daughter towing some shorties who had fallen asleep on the drive in. Then somebody clearly left the gates open because the waiting room filled to beyond capacity within half an hour.

In the waiting room, people typically tend to at least try and keep their shit together. This room was no exception. Everyone settled into a bizarre cacophony of suppressed sobs and labored breaths.

Turns out that almost everyone in the room didn't know if their child was alive or dead. They all had a teen-aged child who had left on a church mission trip in one of those 14-passenger vans. Something had gone horribly, horribly wrong and there was a wreck with a semi on I-70.
Seriously, when you've actually raised a child to teen-aged-ness - you start to stop worrying so much. This kind of blow is crippling on so many levels.

It was freezing freaking cold in that waiting room and it didn't take long for the adrenaline and endorphins to wear off. The lack of food and the spent emotions could be heard in the chattering teeth and hiccups.
Jane forgot about The Nun for months.

Privacy in the Wild West: Personal Branding

Almost every day lately, there is a new and alarming post, from a trusted source, illustrating how much of our privacy we have lost. That's just nutty - to have lost it, we would have had to have it first.

You can't lose what you never had.
Nothing on here is private. This is the Internet, Cowboy! This is more of a Wild West than the actual Wild West was a Wild West - we're smarter now and we brought bigger guns and craftier ninjas.
Understanding and respecting that is the first step to making sure you have a good Personal Brand. yea. That's some craziness, huh? We have to mind our Personal Brands, for real?
Yep. It's time to move on past the whole lack of privacy wah-party and graduate to what we can do to make it better. Given the easy availability of personal information on the Internet we now live in a world where anybody (friends, mates, family, employers, government agencies...) with good digits can and probably will Google you to see what you've been up to.
If you allow yourself the occasional drunk-booking (facebooking after cocktails) and wake up with a Sharpee mustache on your face, you'll get over it.
But, if a quick snapshot of your activities online yield habitual patterns of nastiness, unpleasantly regrettable photographs and other unsightly and not delicious things, you probably need to re-think your strategy.
Since you know it's not private and there's a really good chance people are learning all about you without even getting to know you in person - tend to that.
Make sure you like the photographs of you that have your name on them. Clean up any copy that you may have written and tune it till it's tight and follows all the rules of convention. A good online Personal Brand is as valuable as a good handshake and a sincere smile in person. Be happy and positive.
You are brave and funny and smart and strong, all you have to do is make sure that much is apparent.

copyright 2010 moemasters

You Make Me Wanna Be a Better Writer

We have evolved into humans who need connection.
In a perfect world, everybody would have a biological family who has known them from birth, and then ascending layers of chosen extended family. Every single one of these people represents some level of accountability in ourselves, in who we are.
As we grow up and the populations of both camps decline (both through attrition and death) we lose a little bit of ourselves with each departure. We then recover and go on to love another day. It's like we never learn.
In just watching people and reluctantly playing among them over the last decade, I've built a pretty tight theory on how being connected to people helps make us better people.
We have to be connected.
It's just the way we've evolved, we can't help it.
It's one of the most over-used movie lines ever, but when Jack Nicholson said "You make me want to be a better man" he was pretty much speaking a Universal Truth. Anybody and everybody we love should make us want to be a better person. That's the way love works. It's cool that way.
Maybe that's how you know it's love.
It won't always bowl you all the way over, but you'll know it when you feel it. It's a many-faceted and seriously unreasonable thing that will leave you feeling a little bigger, braver...taller and stronger. Less alone - proportionate to the people on your island.
Conversely, it's absence leaves holes of varying size.
Yea, sorry the whole conversely part sucks out loud.
I swear!
I stand by this theory.
I can see it like it's a cartoon!
All of these unspoken expectations, pokes, phone calls, pieces of mail ... All of this keeps us tethered and woven into some identifiable piece of fabric. These are constant reminders that we are alive and there is somebody else out there who gets us and knows us and loves us anyways.
If you love somebody, let them know. (sometimes you will also have to let them go, but we'll save that for later) Shower the people you love with love. See your people in person and hug them, even if it proves to be an arduous journey to do so. There is no time like the present, people have a way of leaving unexpectedly.
And, as always: Call your mother.
If you don't have a mother, call your aunt.

copyright 2010 momomasters

Scrambling Grog

I've been in that cave for soooo long.
I must yawn and stretch and put on some kind of killer Free Trade coffee.
Something Groggy. Wow.
Everything's turned green. Somebody needs to mow this lawn. Did you bring in the paper?
Oh yea. I date myself with that question. That's telling.
I don't feel that old.
My hips?
Oh yea, they are probably twice that old. But, as for the whole unit? Not that old. Really. I can still scramble up the banks and go 40 limbs up in a heartbeat. I climb trees, I hitch-hike and I fall for anybody who can write a decent love letter.
It's like I never learned anything AND I get to be this much older. How cool is that?
I'm just stretching here.
Do you want to go for a walk?
I'll tell you a story.
mmmkay?

Winter: Blogishness/PIONEERS

I have missed you so much.
It's cold.
We've had Pea-Soup Fog for 8 days.
Every day.
When we look out front it looks just like the the most final and ever-so-tragic times of the Titanic.
Gray. Cold. Chunky filthy dirty ice.
Horizons full of water .... indeterminate depth....
There is the constant feint whine of coal trains pushing their freight through.
It's cold. I can see my breath.
It sucks.
I've served up every bit of meat and cheese that I've got.
We're almost out of toilet paper.
We haven't had paper towels or dark chocolate for 4 days.
I'm not sure that we can go on...
I wonder if this is how the Pioneers felt.
This place is filthy. I'm not about to mop.


Send reinforcements.
Gasping..... Forrrr.....
ssssss.....some..... ssss ....
sunsssshine...

I Just Wanna Thank You. Thank You.

I know you've got a lot going on, but I just had to drop in and say thanks. So much about you has made me unbelievably happy lately.
It's fall too and that helps with the General Cheer Factor. But, seriously - you are amazing and awesome. You make me smile from a thousand miles away. I remember you.
Thanks for thinking of me - ever. That shit goes a long ways towards keeping me balanced and happy. Thanks for sending me random, unsolicited compliments.
For. REAL.
That probably weighs as much as a back tickle on the Emotional Bliss Scale. Every compliment you squeeze my way undoes about 10 unpleasant strangers on the phone.
Thanks for holding me (and you) to standards that extend past mouth-breathing and knuckle-dragging. I expect a lot out of me and you. Thanks for helping keep my disappointment at bay. You do great work.
Thanks for the hugs. These hugs mean business. Life is so freaking short. Find me ANY one single person who couldn't use more hugs. These hugs are making my time here a lot more real and meaningful. You so rock.
Thanks for jacking with me and testing the true limits of my gullibility. I can completely lose track of the time-space continuum when I'm in a project - I will believe most anything. I'm glad you know that and can mess with me relentlessly. You wouldn't really be able to jack with me if you didn't care, right?
Thanks for not telling me things that would be destructive to the delicate Ph balance known as my Sense of Self. You'll never know how cool it is that you don't agree with me when I tell you I'm having a horrible awful bad hair day. Please never agree. Apparently I may never outgrow this flaw in my fabric. I appreciate your devotion to my flawed cause. copyright2009

I Am Your Grandmother

When I was little, my grandmother (Momo. They were ALL Momos) was a highly revered, sometimes feared and always respected woman of a strong presence.
I am now a grandmother and I don't feel like what I thought my Momo felt like. She was so old, even then. My Momo scared me and loved well beyond reason. When she wasn't looking she taught me all about Love Letters.
She was, like, Jackie Kennedy's mom old.
She was old. For.real.
And, then there was my mom. She lived through the depression. She grew up in the Strawberry Hill section of Kansas City. She was the daughter of an insurance salesman and a full-time, old-school saint of a mother. More Lace-Curtain Irish than not.
They were Uber-Catholics. Momo played piano by ear and Papa Leo sang with his brothers in a barbershop quartet. They lived a version of reality that I don't think you could imagine. There were late nights full of 3 part harmony and slamming doors. Screaming sisters and not enough milk.
My mom and all her sisters had their hair permed by hooking up jumper cables to the chandeliers in the dining room. When somebody got physically broke or tore up, they sent one of the girls across the alley to get the doctor.
This Irish-Catholic Matriarchy is not what I would have ordered off the menu, but - it's what I've got and I'm all about my Momo now.
My Momo probably saved my teeny weeny life a time or two, but everyone who could validate this has already moved along. I can't go anywhere and research this, but I've been told. She was my Momo.
Now I am a Grandma. A Momo. I don't look like a Momo.
Wow. I so really did not think I'd live this long. There's this deal about being a musician. When you're playing live, you don't ever want to follow somebody who is way way better than you.
The deal about being a Momo is that ....
...well. Damn.
The bar is set so high.
The Momos before me have set precedent.
I'm pretty sure I can.
I'll Google it.

NO sale. No Sale.

One time a long time ago, I was with Bryanmasters (that's just what we always called him) and we went into Zelmans (I think it is, there on Douglas by what used to be Panama Reds.)
It was before a job at Reds and we were just killing time. We were both talking about how we'd never actually seen anyone shop at that store and admiring the attention to detail that had been paid to the front windows. In 1956. Picked over and thinned out by people we'd never seen buying things we couldn't imagine anybody actually using.
Mrs. Zelman walked up as we were admiring and we asked if we could go in. She looked at us like we had parrots on our heads and said, "Y'nevah buy anything," as she was reaching for her key and unlocking the front door.
Mrs. Zelman is as much a Wichita institution as Century II (or she used to be, I haven't been there much in 10 years or so.) The story I've been told is that she and Mr. Zelman were captives in one of the Nazi camps and she always carried a bar of that soap. She never drove and always took the bus and walked EVERY where.
For real.
She had to be 83 the night she shadowed us in her store.
She followed us for a good 15 minutes muttering, "Y'nevah gonna buy anything..." Then we'd move on to another item and she'd kinda bark "NO SALE! no sale."
She was relentless. She said "NO sale" like, 36 times in a handful of minutes. This happened for the duration of our visit.
We didn't buy anything simply because we just couldn't justify buying anything (probably.) And we probably had a house full of kids and no money.
Well, that AND she kept saying "NO SALE." I still feel kinda bad about not stimulating her economy.
So, if you're in Wichita and anywhere near downtown AND by some miracle of feistiness Mrs. Zelman is still alive and torturing shoppers - you must go in and buy something.
Then scoot down to the Donut Whole and have a maple-bacon donut or two.
Both of these things will make me feel better.
Go me.

Bluegrass Calendar: Monarchs

Up here in the NE corner of the state, it's full-on autumn.
It's gotten down in to the 40s on some nights. And, it's still (really) just the first of September. Down south (Winfield way) it's about time to start seeing the first of the Monarchs that come through as the Fall harbingers.
Blankets. Big orange moons. North breezes.
That smell (what is that smell? I've always imagined it's a special Kansas thing that is the combination of clovers and smooshed grains and soybeans and ripe humans wearing patchoulil and just a hint of skunk. Mmmm skunk.)
One of my first mass-monacrhings came on an adventure down to the Bluegrass Festival, it was probably early September (and yea, probably half a million years ago). I had my first VW bus (the '71 tan and white one with big letters all over it). John Byers (To this day the best and only VW mechanic any human should ever pick for their team) and about 8 other friends in three other VWs were in one caravan headed south for Winfield.
Somebody's car messed up. I can't remember the details which tells me it was probably mine. We all pulled over and a few hundred yards down on a dirt road lined with over-ripe something (it had started to go brown) we stopped and all got out and mingled.
These occasions of cars breaking down when you're in caravan are seen more as social bonding opportunities more than traveling frustrations. We were deciding what to do next, and probably knee-deep in a Safety Meeting when about 38 bazillion Monarchs descended upon us.
I used to have a picture of John Byers, just about two feet away from me, with butterflies on the rims of his glasses and his baseball cap and shoulders.
The world behind him was mostly orange.
You could hear all their bazillions of wings flapping and making a sound that was like a weak, but very healthy, teeny weeny generator...
For real.
I swear this happened.
It's always made me think that this particular time of year means that soon I'll smell camp-fires. I'll sleep where I fall and wake to strangers bringing me coffee and aspirin.
Don't know that I'll be there in person for this year's fiesta, but I know that the Monarchs up here are just starting to come through and it smells fantastic.

The Bluegrass Festival Calendar

Every single full moon lately has hopped off the horizon with that neon-orange glow that I have come to expect during harvest. The monarchs are packing their bags and every single shorty I know has a backpack full of cool way wicked awesome new # 2 pencils and Elmer's glue.
The sweet corn has come and gone and the avocados are no longer that good for the eating. The days have gotten shorter. The mornings have the first blush of a nip. For real. Step outside about 5am sometime this week.
I love it when there's a season just right around the corner.
I get this nutty fine clean energy. Almost autumn and you should know where your socks are. I love it when it's time to build fires. I love not being able to sleep because they said we were "gonna get a foot of snow."
Seriously.
Way more cool than I can do justice to.
It's almost autumn here. Almost Bluegrass. My personal calendar has been set to "Bluegrass" for just about 30 years.
Just for the record: I suck as guitarists go, and I'm A-OK with that, I will readily admit it and I'm sorry. I am, however, probably the most underpaid Cheerleader ever (IN THE HISTORY OF TIME!) (That gross exaggeration tossed in for my kids: To keep it fresh.) I know a million songs and I can fake my way through about another million (IF I haven't indulged in fruity girl drinks prior to playing).
That alone does not a good guitar player make.
All things being equal and that being said yada yada yada. Who'd a thunk it? It's the coolest place I've ever been in my life and it's, like, a half hour outta Ta-town. yea.
Not Germany or France or Ireland or Scotland. Nope Kansas.
It's an amazing thing to see and experience...
Ooohhh, the things you will see...
The people telling stories to friends they haven't seen in ages. The fire pits dug half way down to China. Food. Oh.my.god. The food seriously defies description.
First off: There is Everything (I shit you not. I have seen bear, whole pigs, goat, gohpers, snake, fish of every make and model, vegan feasts, psychotropic appetizers. You name it - it's there.)
Second: There is way way more than every one in camp could eat in one night.
Third: Never forget the Karma thang - do unto others, blah blah blah...wash your own eating utensils...
I know you know what I mean. Bring presents. Represent.
I've got some serious freakin callouses on my left fingers, and my timing only sucks half as much as it used to. And, I do know the entire John Prine library...
I'm jus'sayin.
I feel it coming, I smell fires built of pecan and walnut. And eggs.mmmmm....eggs.....
Aaaahhhh.....
Too many stories, and you kids need to get to bed before your father gets home. Run along now. I'll tell you more tomorrow...

Belonging

I have fully developed my most recent theory,
Theory Number 1503:
Belonging and Why People Are Happier When They're Hanging With Their Posse (or their country or state or band or class or family.)
I've found myself being all proud and patriotic today, since it's Independence day and whatnot. I'm glad to be an American. I believe in the possibilities that come with living here. In other countries I was called "That American Girl" or "America" and I completely dug it. I was part of something much bigger than just me.
Safety in numbers.
And, yea, I know - I smack talked our elected leaders for the better part of 10 years, but I'm over it. I'm being the Change.
Dial that down a notch, and all over America (as some point in the last few years) people who hadn't quite remembered my name would call me "Kansas." I'm fine with that. Kansas is big and generally nice and chill. Sadly, also a little judged by the whole uptight, haaaaard right conservative way it shows up on the radar. I'm okay with that only because I know that is no real indication of my team.
(Kansas being that team - in case I lost you.)
Look even closer and I'm a musician, an artist and a writer. Oh yea. This could be one of my most favorite places to belong, seriously. This is one huge and constantly growing group of good, alive, diverse, stimulating, over-caffeinated and outside the box people.
In spite of having probably taken them for granted for a bit now, I really need my love bunch. I am related by blood to some of them, and by honor and love to others, but without them I lose my definition. My edges get all blurry and I don't make much eye contact or offer quality hugs. Without this part of who I am, I cease to be who it is that I am.
At the Solstice Party in Kansas City a couple weeks ago I hung with a bunch of people I had never met. Even though I wasn't a due-paying member of their posse, I caught the vibe and had a blast. I belonged there just long enough to remember what it was that I needed.
Then I realized that I've got it.
It's a good day to be me.

Stella Yellin Non-Get-Alongs

For about as long as I can remember I have attended the Walnut Valley Bluegrass Festival in Winfield, Kansas for most of the months of September.

It's been years now since I attended but I still have a completely romanticized warm and fuzzy feeling about it.
One of my very first years there I came upon a camp of musicians who were in the newspaper industry and from Joplin, Missouri. Among them was a man named Jim Moss.
While most of that festival in particular remains something of a blur, I have been having really vivid memories of the time he shared with me and the key to the John Prine universe that he unlocked.
He taught me a huge chunk of the songs that I'm still playing today. I can play those songs (and have) with almost anyone, almost anywhere - and I find people to sing along and play amazing leads and share stories, food and drink till well past sunrise.
I don't know where Jim Moss is anymore (although I suspect he's still somewhere near Joplin) and I doubt I'll ever be able to thank him for the gift he gave me ~ But, almost every day I play something that he either taught me or showed me that I could learn and, for that, I'm grateful.
If you are one of the thousands that saves up your precious vacation time for those moments in the Pecan Grove, just yell "Stellllllllllla" for me sometime around 4am and then start singing "That's The Way That The World Goes Round."
I think you've only got about 100 more days to build a plan that involves that request.

Life in The Slow Lane

The town I'm calling home now smells of sweet honeysuckle from one end to the other. I see more tractors and pick-ups every day then I ever see cars. There is absolutely NO ethnic diversity and I think it's reasonable to assume that everyone I meet is related to someone else I've already met.
I have yet to see a kid wearing a helmet or protective gear on their bicycles as they ride down the middle of the "busy" street (busy in this case being defined by the fact that there are TWO whole stop signs.)
I haven't seen this many men sporting mullets since sometime around 1982. On any given night I can walk around and smell fried chicken, roasting brats and the occasional whiff of sulfur from some precipitous bottle rocket fights.
The sum total of today's 18 hours passed like minutes. We talked about sustainable hardwoods and opportunity costs. We shared stories and took hours to eat half a sandwich.
I thought about all the Twitters I'm keeping, the blogs that are maybe days overdue and the social networks that either do or don't need to be tended to. I weeded the flower beds and played catch with the Lab. I wrote. I researched. I organized and alphabetized. I made and broke deadlines.
I good vibed my grown children and their partners and babies and dogs. I offered up little prayers even though I'm no longer a disciple of organized religion.
I talked endless smack to and about my computer.
Today was one of the sweetest slices of magic I've known in a very long time. I laughed and I cried and I laughed till I cried. I'm in love with this life. In spite of knowing that all things will change and there will be some wicked bad days, I'm finally free enough to bliss out completely and love the moments that come and go so freely. And, in so doing, I'm glad you're here because this moment rocks.

Breaking The Rules

I've always been a big fan of breaking the rules.
At some point I chose to say, "Drain the break fluid and drive 100!" instead of "Have fun storming the castle," or "Be careful and call me if you're going to be late."
I've participated in illegal activities since I was able to walk (it was all in the training...years and years of practice).
Today I remembered that my grandfather taught me how to make "Jailhouse Gin" (he spent most of his life, and therefore certainly most of MY life incarcerated in a federal penitentiary) when I was way too young to even know what gin was. That was the same weekend that he taught me how to play poker and run a line across the Missouri river to catch fish so I wouldn't starve to death.
Y'know, priorities were just different back then. We didn't EVER wear helmets or elbow pads when we rode our bikes. My parents smoked Kent cigarettes like fiends in the car while we rode on the back dash all the way up to Topeka every other weekend. They never rolled down the windows.
Ever. NOT once.
My mom told me that the Flint Hills were all just a huge cemetery for giants, buried long before we were born, and that's why the grass was so green and the hills so attractive.
Blood and scabs and ropes and splinters were just a small fraction of the stuff that went into building our character. Almost nobody got busted for anything - from child abuse to tax evasion and felonious contraband.
We all had an errant uncle living with us. Good Catholics went to confession on Saturdays, received communion on Sundays and nobody was gay.
All the phones were rotary dials, the internet was far from even being a twinkle in somebody's eyes and we could go to the drive-in on Saturdays if mom never had to say the words, "Don't make me tell your father about this."
I still refuse to buckle up. I wear cut-offs and go barefoot at work. I smoke this and that (much more of This than That) - and I'm serious: Do you honestly think that Monet could have done what he did...and Kerouac, and Picasso, and Rembrandt, Emerson and William Burroughs ... without breaking the rules? I'm thinking not so much.
It's all a gamble. You never know what's going to happen. In that Dustin Hoffman movie ("Little Big Man") that old Indian said over and over, "It's a good day to die," meaning that he had lived well THAT day and it was all good by him. I think that may well be the way we are supposed to take this: One falling star at a time.

Back to Kansas

I've traveled a few thousand miles to be here. And, here is so fundamentally good and soul restorative I find myself having trouble wrapping my brain around it (much less trying to put it into words).
So rare are the moments when I wasn't able to articulate something (read: I never shut up) and since I've been pretty elusive in my tweets and status updates, I'm going to attempt to bring you up to speed and NOT lose you in the details.
The shortest story I can think of goes like this: A few years ago everybody I knew started to die, within a couple years everybody was gone but my kids and a couple of faithful friends. But, in the three years that it took that holocaust to pass, I'd buried my mom and my dad and more beloved memories than I've ever cared to count.
The best and only response I could come up with was to sell everything I owned (but my guitar, laptop and cell phone) and hit the road. I really didn't care all that much about much at all, and it had become abundantly clear that that which wouldn't just freakin' kill me forgodssake, would just make me stronger.
With a completely unfounded belief that I was unstoppable, I traveled. Then I traveled some more, and a little bit more for good measure.
I've met so many people and seen so many things, that I can only smile a bit and shake my head from side to side.
Seriously. For real.
I think it's imperative that we all step outside our comfort zones, and my adventures have proven that we are all way more resiliant than we think we are.
I am a horrible homeless person. I can suck it up and do the stiff upper lip thing as good as (well, technically: MUCH better than) the average bear. But, I simply can't ask anyone for anything. It just kills me. So there was that.
And then recently I remembered that I could write well enough to sell that talent, and not everybody can do that. Some people do algebra, some knit - I write. I did what I've done for 3 years: Craigslist. Long story short, I'm sitting in a 70 year old limestone building in Perry, Kansas. I am now paid to be a Marketing Director.
I can drive the old red Dodge beater truck with a manual transmission. There's a sweet brown lab named Rachel that comes in and I can pet her and throw her sticks.
Out the front door the trains roll by with certaintity, out the back is the Delaware river (no mamby pamby river either, it's way bigger than the Arkansas.) Go a mile either of the other ways and it's nothing but milo and soy and fields of tart prairie grass. There are a lot of guys on tractors.
If I'm so inclined, Lawrence is just 20 minutes away and there are all kinds of attractive things to be had there.
There is a herd of Red Deer (who look just like Reindeer to me) and they're having babies. I've heard of the sheep, but have yet to see them. Supposedly it's not the best lamb you can eat, but it doesn't suck either. I learned that you can't wrangle deer, you have to trick 'em. That could be fun.
The concern for whom I write is a well-established family business and it reminds me so much of what I knew and learned to love growing up in a family-run business. I can swear AND take showers here. I have a room and a soft padded place to lay my head at night.
Just up the street is the Perry Bar and Grill where they still allow smoking indoors. On Thursdays they have $5 steak nights. I don't even like steak, but I'm really looking forward to Thursday next - my son and his wife and my perfect grandson are meeting us there for dinner. And, I have never in my life been so grateful to know that I can buy them all dinner.

Ode to the Hobo

As far as I can tell, through countless hours of research, there is no definitive line that separates the Hobos from the Homeless. The statistics (which I consider to be somewhat outdated) indicate that on any given night here in America there is between one and two million people sleeping on the streets, in boxes tucked away in alleys and in the drainage ditches available in almost every city in the country.
From my personal research, I've found these misplaced and discarded humans to be considerably more generous and beneficent than the average middle-class American. They've given me their last ten or twenty cents and I've returned the favor every time I have any change in my pocket (which, much to my dismay, is not all that often anymore). The times I've felt unsafe have been few and far between.
I am beginning to believe that the disparity between privilege and poverty is most clearly defined by the kindness of those who've known poverty. Back in the day (the late 1800's) the very first Hobo Convention was held and a code of ethics was developed that still holds true today. I believe the consequences of our economy have increased the homeless/hobo numbers ten fold (at least) and there are now new considerations and symbols.
I am a hobo who travels with a laptop and a pre-pay cell phone. I have had great success in finding free wireless in every city I have jungled in, thanks to warchalking.In addition to those symbols, there is a whole new set of symbols that make it easier for the modern day hobo to identify safe harbor from danger.
The vagabond lifestyle is not something that I'd wish for my best friend, but it has provided me with an entirely new perspective on our culture and our priorities.
While there are times that I miss owning stuff (clothes, electronics and a cat) there are more times that I am ridiculously grateful to know that I'm not a burden to my children. Should you see a homeless, humble and dignified person in your path, don't go out of your way to avoid them. Even a smile given freely to someone sitting on a street corner can make a day so much better.

Mother's Day Eve

This is that night when we set out a plate of cookies and a glass of cold Whole Milk.
If we go to sleep early, she'll show up.... looking like Jackie Kennedy.
Moms all across America are thinking they will get roses or breakfast in bed or a phone call.
Maybe chocolate... maybe beer.
I miss my mom.
Almost every single day.
She was all that and more.
Happy Mother's Day.
WaHoo.

Saturday Night Secret

Well Hi boys and girls. Welcome back.
Shut th'door, you're gonna let in the flies.
It's been an eventful and adventurous week.
Wow. How I've missed you.
Man. Lets bake some brownies.
Most relevant discovery of this week is that when I get sick I turn into at least 4 of the 7 Contemporary Dwarves:
Pissy, Crabby, Cranky and Weepy.
Yea. My four least favorite dwarves.
I guess that's a good thing to know.
And, now I have that.
OH yea! and, I have absolute proof that, indeed, the best laid plans of mice and men (blah blah blah). Insert unreasonably long diatribe here for yourself. I'm exercising discipline and practicing the "Just Shut Up" approach. But, c'mon. Seriously?
And, the last thought for the night is this: how could it possibly be that expectations are just premeditated resentments? I've heard that often, and am just curious about how this works?
I mean, I think living with no expectations somehow devalues your personal investment in your own well-being. Just a thought. Any insight would be greatly appreciated. Other than that, lots of action, adventure, no police activity no injuries.

GOTTA BOUNCE GARAGE SALE.

I have a vision.

One day soon I see me on a train headed south then east then really far north then maybe back south again. And, possibly west and then south.
As luck would have it, I've (yet freakin again) acquired more stuff than I can or would want to carry with me.
And, I could use a bone or two so I'm posting everything on Craigslist and selling what I can (Freecycling the rest). My capacity for finding cool stuff is legendary and this would be a great time to reap the benefits of my amazing cool-osity radar.
The pictures here don't represent everything (by a long shot) so email me if you want to see anything/everything else. My favorite thing in the world would go like this: You know some young person that's getting their first apartment. You know you're gonna go spread some benjamins around Target. You want a random collection of eclectic crap to make it feel more homey.
You offer me one BILLION dollars for the lot.
Okay.
So maybe the one billion part was too aggressive.
But, you get where I'm going with this. Get your cool on now while the economy has driven down the prices! And, as usual: Thanks!