My Music Journal 2025: June 18, 2025

 

Wednesday, June 18, 2025

 

Time: 6:15 PM

Song: The Train Kept-A-Rollin’

Artist: The Yardbirds

Mode of Consumption: Listening to the Yardbirds Featuring Performances by Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page on Vinyl.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/6pW2lKORQaIC6JR4qBNG9e?si=58463d6a9bda47ff

 

“So, is there a bird called a yardbird, or is it some sort of slang?” Jodi asks. 

 

“I don’t know?” I answer.

 

The Yardbirds are a band that I always have a confused memory about. I remember that Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page were all members, but not all at the same time. I can never remember who came first or how much overlap there was. 

 

I know that when Page left, it basically ended the group, and there are those who resent the formation of Led Zeppelin by Page and Robert Plant. I’ve never quite remember or grasp that connection, and even when I look it up, I usually forget pretty quickly. 

 

But back to the real question: What is a Yardbird?

 

The lazy search to Wiki reveals two possibilities. One might be from Jack Kerouac’s novel “On the Road,” where he refers to railroad yard hobos as yardbirds. They may also have borrowed it from jazz saxophonist, Charlie Parker, who was nicknamed “Yardbird.” 

 

Other slang meanings for Yardbird: 

 

In the military, a yardbird is a recruit assigned to tasks like cleaning the grounds or other menial jobs, often as punishment or due to inexperience. 

 

In a prison context, it can refer to a prisoner or convict. 

 

In the American South, it is common slang term for a chicken, especially one that is free ranging.

My Music Journal 2025: June 17, 2025

 

Tuesday, June 17, 2025

Time: 6:00 PM
Song: Sun King
Artist: The Beatles
Mode of Consumption: Listening to Abbey Road on Vinyl.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/4nwKdZID1ht0lDBJ5h2p87?si=b0f5a4aa678d44bd

During our Write On meeting, we each attempted a Huitain poem. These poems have eight lines with eight to ten syllables per line. The idea is to have a consistent amount of syllables throughout the poem. It has an ababbcbc rhyme scheme.

The first line came into my head immediately, but I didn’t have an idea of where it would go.

Here is what I came up with:

That’s Why He’s King

Something peculiar arrived today
It darted into frame, awkward and mean
With little fanfare or warning per se
A cackle, a grunt, a torso built lean
All near screamed at such a ghastly scene
One standout stayed true, approaching this thing
No bluster, no glory, nothing obscene
But bravery and courage, that’s why he’s king.

 

My Music Journal 2025: June 16, 2025

 

Monday, June 16, 2025

 

Time: 7:32 PM

Song: Black 

Artist: Pearl Jam

Mode of Consumption: Listening to the radio while completing bookwork for church. 

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/5Xak5fmy089t0FYmh3VJiY?si=7402d137e7a04aeb

 

We made hay today. Forty-seven bales to be exact. That’s less than half of what we usually get off our hayfield on the first cutting of the season. 

 

“It’s been like that everywhere,” Ken said. Ken brought his tractor and baler this afternoon. Jodi and I managed on the rack, stacking the bales four high, two columns parallel to the standard, and one in the middle perpendicular.

“A husband and wife making hay together, that’s just asking for trouble,” Ken joked. 

 

“It’s worked out so far,” Jodi answered. 

 

“It’s not our first rodeo,” I added. 

 

There are fewer bales this season because we had a dry fall, followed by a dry winter, followed by a dry spring. Just not great conditions for growing grass and alfalfa. 

 

It’s hard not to feel a little let down. The hay field was one of the domains of Jodi’s father, Lee. This is the second season that we’ve managed the field since his passing. 

 

It was the first where we had our own tractor (also formerly Lee’s), and Jodi learned how to mow the hay and to rake it. 

 

I prefer to be the guy on the rack, although my duties have increased. I pulled the elevator over to the barn to unload, and then lined up the rack next to it. Then put all the equipment away afterward.

 

I’m alone in the mow now, back in the old days, Lee would have started on the rack with Jodi and then moved up to the mow with me. It was an event. Usually, Jodi’s Aunt Betty would be around to help where she could, and her mom, Kathy, would stop by near the end with a box of pizza. 

 

After Ken left, it was just Jodi and me. I drank a beer, something Lee liked to do after finishing. 

 

We warmed up some leftover tacos, cleaned up the dishes and went about our evening. 

My Music Journal 2025: June 15, 2025

 

Sunday, June 15, 2025

Time: 8:10 PM
Song: It’s All Right
Artist: The Impressions
Mode of Consumption: Listening to MP3s on shuffle between Freeport and Sterling, IL.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/62PQXBFeAgS3iUseNRVPpF?si=f27be872190d44d3

 We are riding back from our niece’s high school graduation party in Eagle, Wisconsin. It’s about a 2 ½ hour trip from Sterling to Eagle, when skipping around Rockford. We are carpooling with my parents.

“You know this was probably the last party,” Jodi says. “We are going to have to find a reason to go up to Matt’s now.”

She’s right. Our niece is the youngest of two children of my brother, Matt. We’ve been heading north for the better part of twenty years, usually twice a year for birthday parties.

His son, Logan, just graduated from college and is starting a career. The high school graduate, Haley, is heading to the UP for college in the fall.

It’s the end of an era.

I hadn’t thought of it that way until then.

In the coming years, there will probably be weddings and college graduations and other things, but the regular trips are over. Certainly, a new phase of life for my brother and his family. Also, a change for us.

I think about how my own relationships with extended family changed as we aged, got married, had children, moved around and away.

I think about how my grandmother used to ride with us up to parties, and that it’s been ten years since she passed away.

It’s heady. Maybe even sad. Bittersweet.

It’s also all right. We’ve had a good time.

 

My Music Journal 2025: June 14, 2025

 

Saturday, June 14, 2025

Time: 11: 45 AM
Song: Burning Heart
Artist: Survivor
Mode of Consumption: Eating at Burger King in Rock Falls 

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/2VN7uPrbryJ7nE2MXX3f9a?si=1c5cb0c34e1c457f

“You know I don’t really get the deal with McDonalds. They are always busy.” I say, biting into a Whopper.

“I think they put something in the food,” Jodi said. “Drugs or something. Makes people crave it.”

There is one other table occupied at Burger King nearing the lunch hour. Maybe people are eating healthier, but I can’t quite figure out the dedication to the golden arches. I realize that some of it has to do with the way McDonalds has marketed toward children in the last fifty years. Families will go there to please the kiddies even if they don’t like the food too much.

I think there is more to it, but I don’t know what.

The last time I ate McDonalds I thought the quality of the food had changed, and not for the better. It also took a few minutes before we received our order, and it’s clear they are pushing for people to use their self-service kiosk rather than ordering from the human standing two feet away.

At Burger King, we ordered from a human. I paid her, and before I could put my change in my wallet, our tray of food was placed on the counter.

“I think Burger is becoming my favorite fast-food restaurant.” I study the fresh lettuce and tomato on my Whopper. The burger is warm and doesn’t take like it’s been sitting in a drawer for an hour to be served. Maybe it has been, but it doesn’t taste like it.

“They are fast.”

Will Burger King or any other chain ever break the stranglehold McDonalds has on the fast-food industry. Maybe, but I doubt it will be in my lifetime. That battle, much like the Cold War, was lost sometime in the 1980s.

My Music Journal 2025: June 13, 2025

 

Friday, June 13, 2025

Time: 1:43 PM
Song: Love and Affection
Artist: Nelson
Mode of Consumption: Listening to the Playlist Pandemonium Playlist “Famous Dads” on Spotify.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/3JjY2L2bqql54j1SjnjQ23?si=fc1edbd98b8a4747

A couple days ago I mentioned that I didn’t think that Jakob Dylan had ever recorded one of his father’s songs. Today, I am listening to the playlist generated by our Facebook group and this Nelson hit came on.

I remembered that sometime in the mid-90s I saw Nelson perform in Rockford. They opened for either America or Three Dog Night. I can’t remember which group. I am pretty sure I went to the Metrocenter twice with my parents and saw concerts.

What I do remember is that by this time, it had to be 1994 or 1995, the Nelson boys had cut the long blond locks that was their staple when this song was a hit in 1990. It’s kind of amazing to think that in a few short years they had gone from having a hit song to opening for bands from the 1960s and 1970s.

This post isn’t to rag on Nelson. On the contrary, I seem to remember enjoying their set.

Unlike Dylan, the Nelson boys had no qualms playing their father’s hits. In fact, the set was filled with Ricky Nelson hits. While I am sure they played some of their other originals, “Love and Affection” is the only one I remember. It made sense as the opener for an older band for them to play a playlist of their father’s songs. It fit the crowd.

The other difference being that Ricky Nelson had died in an airplane crash in 1985. Undoubtedly performing his songs was one of the ways that the Nelson twins were still healing from the loss of their father. Bob Dylan is still touring, so it might not hit quite the same for Jakob Dylan to drop a setlist with “Like a Rolling Stone,” “Lay Lady Lay,” and “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door.”

My Music Journal 2025: June 12, 2025

 

Thursday, June 12, 2025

Time: 6 PM
Song: Red Rain
Artist: Peter Gabriel
Mode of Consumption: Listening to the radio on way to work night at the Carroll County Fair. 

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/3RpKyeQWrZFwX2fomsq2Y8?si=e5bd40b25bb64617

“We could have made the hay tonight,” Jodi said.

We are heading to Milledgeville to work at the fairgrounds. It’s a warm, hazy evening. The sun lost behind a thin veil of clouds, possibly smoke. We’ve experienced a week or two of hazy days due in part to smoke blowing south from fires in Canada.

“Well, that’s how it goes.” I said.

We had decided not to mow the hayfield earlier this week because there had been rain forecasted for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. All of those chances dissipated as the week progressed. It remained dry as we drove north.

“Yeah, but I was always pretty good at that,” Jodi continues. “Guessing when it would rain or not.”

Hay is a guessing game. Preferably, you won’t get rain after you mow before you are able to bale it. If it rains, you must wait to get the hay dry, otherwise you run the risk of it molding once you store it away.

We guessed wrong in thinking it might rain, meaning we could have mowed it early in the week and bailed it likely tonight.

Instead, we were available to work at the fair, painting one of the booths under the grandstand.

We’ll have to make hay another day.

My Music Journal 2025: June 11, 2025

 

Wednesday, June 11, 2025

Time: 3:13 PM
Song: God Only Knows
Artist: The Beach Boys
|Mode of Consumption: Listening to Pet Sounds album on Spotify.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/17QTsL4K9B9v4rI8CAIdfC?si=a5993e026b494af4

When I was in seventh or eighth grade, a quilt rack I made for a 4H project was selected for the state fair.

This meant taking the rack down to the fair to have it judged against other woodworking projects from other counties around the state. The state fair occurs in mid-August in Illinois, and my best friend, Jake, was able to go along.

Leading up to the trip, we found out that the Beach Boys were playing the night of day we would be there.

My parents must have mentioned that we might try and get tickets, because I remember Jake and I being pumped about it.

The trip has many memories for me.

• My parents basically were going to let Jake and I roam around the fairgrounds on our own. They kept reminding me that I had to be at the judging on time. I made it to the judging on time, talked to the judge, and it was my parents that strolled up a few minutes after, having missed it.
• Jake and I played a lot of laser tag that day. I think it remains the only time I have ever played laser tag.
• There was girl at a booth selling sunglasses, who took off her top. She had a sports bra or bikini top underneath, but that was enough to get two junior high kids excited.
• But… We did not go to The Beach Boys concert. I don’t remember why. I am also not sure what incarnation of the band this would have been. I wish we had, just so that I could say that I saw them.

Brian Wilson died today. He was the songwriting backbone of The Beach Boys, the guy responsible for the harmonies that was their signature. Paul McCartney calls “God Only Knows,” the greatest rock song ever recorded.

The Barenaked Ladies even wrote a song about him entitled “Brian Wilson.”

I will always think about that state fair trip though when I think about Wilson and the Beach Boys.

My Music Journal 2025: June 10, 2025

 

Tuesday, June 10, 2025

Time: 9:32 AM
Song: Nearly Beloved
Artist: The Wallflowers
Mode of Consumption: Researching songs for this week’s Playlist Pandemonium 

Link to Song: https://open.spotify.com/track/2M1DWzeAgME4rzLTSGNkfH?si=8354052539214a84

This week’s theme for Playlist Pandemonium is songs by artists with famous fathers. When the prompt was posted on Monday, we had a quick flurry of song nominations from the offspring of Frank Sinatra, JJ Abrams, Bono, Rob Schneider, Ravi Shankar and more.

I had few ideas come to mind including the Wallflowers, the band of Jakob Dylan – the son of Bob Dylan. We saw the Wallflowers live last year in Little Rock.

There’s always been a clear resemblance between Jakob and his father. His voice at times is similar also. Beyond that, not a lot is the same other than they paint in the landscape of popular American music.

Bob Dylan was a folk hero in the 1960s, but he morphed away from the folk scene. A chameleon, Dylan’s sound evolved over the years, earning him a Pulitzer, Grammys, and pretty much every other accolade a musician and songwriter can be bestowed.

Jakob has predominately stuck to pop rock with a bit of country twang. During the live concert, the encore was almost entirely covers of Tom Petty songs. I realized then that the Wallflowers sound a lot more like Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers than Bob Dylan and The Band.

I am sure it’s complicated for Jakob, wanting to pave his own way, and likely knowing, he’d never fill the shoes of his father. While he doesn’t avoid answering questions about being the son of a famous artist, I’ve never sensed it’s a topic he’s all that enthused to discuss.

I wondered after the show, if after Bob passes away, Jakob will consider recording any of his father’s songs. To my knowledge, he’s never done that.

I remember growing up and feeling like I had a father that was naturally good at anything he tried to do. I always felt awkward and clumsy and too dimwitted to accomplish the simplest tasks. I remember feeling like I was coming up short to my Dad’s legacy.

My dad wasn’t Bob Dylan. He was a farmer who worked a second job at a feed plant. An honorable person and a good father, but I’ve never had people knocking on my door asking about him, much less reporters probably a hundred times a year for the last thirty years.

I imagine that must be tough.

My Music Journal 2025: June 9, 2025

 

Monday, June 9, 2025

 

Time: 5:20 PM

Song: Drinkin’ in the Morning

Artist: Trampled By Turtles

Mode of Consumption: Listening to MP3s on Shuffle on the way home after selling some records. 

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/7vCSpR1O4fnSuIByysisan?si=cd151dfee22a430b

 

I sold three lots of records off of Marketplace today, and I dropped them off to the buyer at Sterling Towers in Sterling. It’s a tall building (for Sterling) designed to be a retirement community. I think I had only been there once, many years ago when I helped a friend move his grandmother into an apartment there.  

 

After making the sale, I turned onto Freeport Road heading north out of Sterling. 

 

It was a familiar route. 

 

Back in the journalism days, I made that trip quite a few times early in the morning after deadline. 

 

Some nights we would go to Johnny’s, a bar and grill just south of Sterling Towers on Freeport Road. 

 

We’d buzz over from the newspaper, sometimes two or three of us sports department junkies, still wired from deadline, maybe even from games that were covered a few hours earlier. 

 

Usually, we’d arrive about midnight with closing time an hour later. We’d down a few beers. Watch highlights of national games where we likely knew the winners and maybe a scoring leader or two from the roundups we’d just printed. We’d talk about local sports. About journalism. Blowing off steam, hoping there weren’t any big errors in the section likely just hitting the presses.

 

When the taps were capped for the night, we’d wander out to our cars. Probably mumbling farewells and rambling about things to be done the next day. 

 

I’d crawl behind the wheel, the glow of the dashboard before me, and drive home north on Freeport Road. Quickly out of city of limits. 

 

I’d drive thinking something would need to change eventually. Some nights wishing the change would come the next day. Some nights hoping things could always stay this way.

 

I don’t drink much anymore. 

My Music Journal 2025: June 8, 2025

 

Sunday, June 8, 2025

 

Time: 11:25 AM

Song: Come on, Let’s Go

Artist: Richie Valens

Mode of Consumption: Playing at June Daze car show in Milledgeville.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/4cRfSR0QxDlXRHTKyEOu93?si=3fa5821b07ef423e

 

They came from all over the Sauk Valley and other parts of Northern Illinois. Shiny chrome of red and green and blue and purple and about every color you could think of. So bright you wonder why every new car lot is loaded with bland vehicles adorned in white, black and gray. 

 

A stage was set at the main intersection of downtown Milledgeville. A band was setting up and doing sound checks. Down one street, tractors were lined on each side of street. It is a farming community, after all.

 

Before the band played, music played over speakers. Most of it from the fifties and sixties. The sounds of the era where muscle cars were the rule rather than the exception. 

 

I’m not a car guy. Never will be mistaken for one.

 

I do wonder where we lost our way when it comes to vehicles. Not only are the new models generally blandly colored, but they are boxy hunks of plastic. 

I realize this is the past that so many want to cling to. Of bright, bold vehicles made of steel and mostly constructed within the borders of this country. All designed so that a guy (or gal) could take a wrench in his garage and fix when needed without a lot of unnecessary action. 

 

Now there are cars where you have to drop the engine out just to replace the headlight. I’d call it stupid design if it weren’t intentional. Nothing fixable without paying someone at a dealer shop $150 an hour. 

 

That’s not even taking into the account the computer components of new vehicles, the shiny screen, all things that cost extra and even more when the inevitably stop working. 

 

We’re enslaved to technology, most of it making us dumber and lazier rather than actually enhancing our lives. 

 

None of it that can match a blue sky, a bright sun, a gentle breeze, and a small-town street a buzz with mechanical marvels of the past. 

My Music Journal 2025: June 7, 2025

 

Saturday, June 7, 2025

 

Time: 9:20  AM

Song: Young Folks

Artist: Peter Bjorn and John

Mode of Consumption: Listening to radio on the way to garage sales in Milledgeville.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/4dyx5SzxPPaD8xQIid5Wjj?si=bd78b832951f4ef0

 

We debated about staying home. We each have projects to work on, and things to do about the yard. The responsible thing would be to stay home. Yet, the call of a few garage sales was too much. 

 

We’re in our forties, are we still young folks? 

 

At the second sale, the hosts were related to me. We talked about summer trips we had planned, and I bought five records for three dollars.

 

It was a steal. The top record in the stack was a near pristine copy of “Born in the USA.” I knew I could flip that for at least ten dollars. Probably closer to fifteen. 

 

They also had a copy of “Nebraska.” That one is going in the personal collection. There were two Stevie Wonder albums and one Jackson Browne.

 

It was a good start to the day. 

 

We hit a few more sales. I bought a couple Christmas games at one. I host a Christmas game each year at the Hinrichs Christmas. These should provide some material, at the least. 

 

Jodi grabbed an old suitcase at one. 

 

We closed the day out at a sale that had two boxes of CDs. The seller was our age and relating how much she loved CDs, but that she couldn’t keep them all. 

 

Jodi and I bought about a dozen, and long with another eight or ten CDs that didn’t have cases. I’ll rip songs off all of them, and most of them will go back in the sale pile. 

 

We made back home by 11:30, and spent the afternoon working in the yard before a late afternoon rain hit. 

My Music Journal 2025: June 6, 2025

 

Friday, June 6, 2025

 

Time: 8:40 PM

Song: Tragedy 

Artist: Bee Gees

Mode of Consumption: Watching Saturday Night Fever stage production at Timber Lake Playhouse.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/6UXXeFqMBGiqjkzQzkMT3E?si=6fbf5997cf6d4d43

 

The secondary character, Bobby begins to sing this near the end of the first act. He’s just confessed to the female lead, Stephanie, that he has impregnated his on-again, off-again girlfriend. 

 

He’s conflicted about leaving his gang of dance-loving ruffians to become a husband and father. 

 

Foreshadowing. Have him sing a song called tragedy. 

 

Spoiler: Bobby dies in the end. 

 

I’ve never watched the film of “Saturday Night Fever,” so I am not sure how faithfully the stage adaption follows the film. 

 

My initial reaction is that it’s clear the music is what propped this script up. 

 

The stage production had this secondary melodrama of Bobby and his girlfriend. At times, Bobby seems to be the level-headed, mature one of the gang while at others he is vapidly against marrying his sweetheart (or even acknowledging her existence). He eventually dies drunk, trying to jump from pier to pier on a wet Brooklyn Bridge. 

 

I suppose from a 1970s male prospective, this movie hit the mark on issues they had with maturing from running with the buddies to settling into grownup relationships. From a 2025 prospective, it felt a bit uneven (don’t get me wrong, the performances were solid as usual from Timber Lake). 

 

The main character, Tony, is supposed to be the likeable leader of the group. At times, he’s this guy committed to dancing and wanting to do the right thing. Other times he’s downright terrible to the people in his life. The most glaring example is his sometimes dance partner, sometimes love-interest Annette. 

 

Tony in the same scenes would disparage her for being prudish, and then warns her against becoming a slut. 

 

Ultimately, he scorns her for a new partner and love interest in Stephanie. This leads Annette to drinking heavily on the night of the big dance off, and then essentially being raped by two of Tony’s buddies in the back of a car. 

 

Tony, again, admonishes with one hand and consoles with another. Seemingly ignoring the boorish behavior of his gang members. 

 

After his friend’s death, Tony resolves to move to Brooklyn. Maybe to continue dancing, but seemingly hoping to find an office occupations job. 

 

It’s a musical, so resolutions are often flimsy. The music was s trip back to the 70s. The story was just a bit of head scratcher. 

My Music Journal 2025: June 5, 2025

 

Thursday, June 5, 2025

Time: 5:40 AM
Song: Raging Fire
Artist: Philip Phillips
Mode of Consumption: Listening to MP3s on shuffle while working out.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/3Q2tKt6gKdn9LUMcHFxNJy?si=3a327320a76c47ed

Jodi’s alarm goes off at 5 AM. I wake momentarily as she exits the bedroom.

Falling back to sleep, I drift into a dream about a plane flying over my parents’ house. It has a flat back with people sitting outside. It barely clears the house and then the same with the barn, before doing a loop-de-loop and landing on the road that runs in front of the house.

From there, it backs up into the lane, and the pilot claims he can park the plane in my father’s barn. I dispute this claim and then wake up.

It’s 5:03. How is that possible? All that dreaming in three minutes.

I drift again to sleep. I woke up later and rolled over. I read the bright red numbers of the clock as 5:45. Time to get up.

I get out of bed. Make it with bleary eyes and then change into my workout clothes. After a stop at the restroom, I descend the stairs as Jodi enters the kitchen with wet hair. The clock on the microwave reads 5:30.

It’s amazing. Most of the time such little time difference makes little difference. In the morning, I feel robbed of valuable sleep, and yet also feel like it’s probably for the best. I should put more time into my workouts. A little more cardio. An extra lap with Millie around the yard.

Could I do this every day? Should I do it?

Would I lose that extra five or ten pounds I carry? Would it make no difference? Will I tire out earlier?

My Music Journal: June 4, 2025

 

Wednesday, June 4, 2025

 

Time: 5:26 PM

Song: The Logical Song 

Artist: Supertramp

Mode of Consumption: Listening to MP3s on shuffle on the way home from work.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/2IOeOJyiuzwF8BRAK9jJyj?si=a05d7ac6b6f746ae

 

I remember there being a point in my school career where I wished I could go back to third grade. There was something about that grade that was so wonderful. Better, apparently, then whatever grade I was in at that point. Heck, maybe it was fourth grade. 

 

I remember having these thoughts. 

 

I don’t remember what was so great about third grade, or what was so bad about the time I was thinking this. 

 

It’s entirely possible that eventually I spent time wishing to go back to the grade I was then thinking was bad. 

 

I think that’s the thing with memory. It’s probably why thirty percent of the country wants to return to a time before this, but usually can’t name what time that was. Or, if they do, it conveniently erases things that were bad in that era, likely because it wasn’t happening to them personally. 

 

It’s fiction. That golden past. There were good times. There were bad times. And, both were likely happening simultaneously. 

 

It’s all about what you put in your head. I try not to linger on the bad, nor let it stay in my head for long. I just try to temper the nostalgia with the reality that not everything was perfect then either. Possibly, and likely, not even better than the present. 

 

During last night’s Write On meeting we discussed a passage from Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road.” 

 

The man tells his son: “Just remember that the things you put in your head are there forever.” 

 

A few lines later, he says, “You forget what you want to remember, and you remember what you want to forget.” 

 

I’m not sure there’s much logic in what I’ve just written. In fact, it’s contradictory in parts. It’s a ramble. 

My Music Journal 2025: June 3, 2025

 

Tuesday, June 3, 2025

Time: 9:07 PM
Song: Holiday Road
Artist: Lindsey Buckingham
Mode of Consumption: Listening to Alice’s Attic Radio show on 94.3 FM on the way home from Write On meeting. 

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/38i0QcGQ9hu8PMk4QObUTj?si=6935f68698fd42fc

I’m driving through Sterling as Alice Cooper’s show begins on 94.3. I assume this is some syndicated show that the station pays some fee to run on a nightly basis. I don’t know how long it lasts, but I wager it’s an hour or two.

He mentions something about acting, and I hope he talks about his appearance in “Wayne’s World.” He does not.

A few minutes later, he’s introducing “Holiday Road” being in the original “Vacation” movie and asks if we know who performed this song. I knew it was Lindsey Buckingham. Really once you know, you can’t not know it’s Lindsey Buckingham.

The road ahead of me isn’t a holiday. It’s wet. Today, we’ve finally received some much-needed rain, and there’s a steady rain coming down on my twenty-minute drive home. Still, it’s not bad.

It’s been a night of talking about roads.

At Write On, we discussed portions of the opening chapter of Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road.” On a gray, stormy evening, it certainly fits. McCarthy’s tale is a bleak, dystopian tale, and it opens with a man and his son trying to survive as the travel a road on foot. There are multiple mentions of ash, gray, and dark, and an overall sense of hopelessness. It’s a study in how to use words to develop a setting and how to use a setting to develop characters.

We concluded talking about the flash fiction piece that I wrote last weekend for a contest. The prompt was that I had to write a ghost story set in a driveway – a kind of road.

About halfway through my reading, the electricity went out at Harvest Time. Such a perfect thing when you are reading a ghost story. Ha.

We finished the story by the flashlights of our cellphones and then dismissed the meeting.

My Music Journal 2025: June 2, 2025

 

Monday, June 2, 2025

Time: 8:15 PM
Song: Crazy
Artist: Patsy Cline
Mode of Consumption: Listening to Patsy Cline’s Greatest Hits CD while cleaning vinyl albums in the basement. 

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/3zpj9dvJABiyMrmLCPw6i8?si=78a5635996c64f7e

I am working through the second box of records that I bought at an auction at the beginning of the month. This is the batch of records that I sorted through, and I’ve designated as likely being $1 records.

 It’s a mix of very old country. Hank Snow. Jim Reeves. Ferlin Husky. Eddy Arnold. If you find the right person, they’ll love it, but that person can be tough to find.

A few years ago, I did sell an entire box of country records to a gentleman that ran a YouTube radio station where he essentially played old country albums like this.

There are also three albums by a country comedian named Jerry Clower. The first album I looked at the first track and it included the words “coon” and “feminism.” He seemed to market his brand of comedy as “Clower Power.”  I thought, boy, this could be some deep redneck stuff.

Then the next album of Jerry Clower included an actual racoon on the cover, and I thought, well maybe he is talking about animals and not being racist. I didn’t listen, so the jury is still out.

I did think I might be able to put a collection of comedy albums on Marketplace to sell. I must dump some inventory; I just have too much right now.

This latest buy is 137 albums. I estimate I have somewhere around 600 or 700 albums in the sale pile.

Am I crazy? I am spending my few free hours cleaning these. I’ll need to spend time pricing the ones worth more.

We paid $15 for this lot. I hope to make over $100 on all of it. Closer to $200 if things go real well.

Yeah, I’m crazy.

My Music Journal 2025: June 1, 2025

 

Sunday, June 1, 2025

 

Time: 10:30 AM

Song: Sally, When the Wine Runs Out

Artist: Role Model

Mode of Consumption: Listening to the radio as we drive home from church.

Link to Song: https://open.spotify.com/track/2J051fjLklkoPbzOoTAACZ?si=12b7f9fb21ca411d

 

I click the info button. 

 

“I think it’s by Role Model, or something like that.” Jodi said. 

 

“What’s it called?” 

 

“Sally, When the Wine Runs Out, or something like that.” Jodi smiles. “Look at me knowing new songs.”

 

We ride one. 

 

“I think it’s new, and I can add it to my list for the year,” Jodi said. “I am not sure how much it played though before it caught my ears.” 

 

Well time to do a shallow dive. 

 

Role Model – The stage name of Tucker Pillsbury (I mean I probably would have went with the stage name of Doughboy but we’ll chalk that up to a missed opportunity). He self-released album in 2017 and then signed with Interscope records. He’s from Maine. I guess he started as a rapper. 

 

That’s probably about all I need to know about him at this point. This song is on the top-songs list right now. 

 

The Jack White song “Archbishop Harold Holmes” follows. This is getting a lot of play right now, and it’s the first of two times we’ll here in the truck while running around today. The second time I realized the riff reminds me of something from Led Zeppelin. Can’t think of the song right now. 

My Music Journal 2025: May 31, 2025

 

Saturday, May 31, 2025

 

Time: 9:15 AM

Song: Fields of Gold

Artist: Sting

Mode of Consumption: The radio playing the dining room while writing in the game room.

Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/0I1DJdLt9BKOb7GWmWxCjo?si=0165da276f7245f3

 

I’ve been assigned to write a ghost story for the NYC Midnight flash fiction contest. I’ve only just opened a blank word document as this song begins to play. 

 

There’s something haunted about this song. The ripple of wind through the stalks of yellow grass. 

 

It’s wistful. It’s lonely. It’s sad. 

 

Could my ghost story be that? 

 

How? 

 

The story has to take place primarily on a driveway. I think of our driveway. It’s a long gravel drive that inclines at about 45 degrees. To the west of the lane is a pasture. To the east, a hill the rises dramatically, tall grass has sprouted. With grass on the left and the right, the ascension can sometimes feel like a tunnel. One where even you know what is at the top of the hill, you can still let your imagination run wild. 

 

If I have a character walk such a driveway, recalling something that’s haunted him. What could it be? 

 

The last object that needs to appear in the story is a rag. 

 

That’s a curve ball. 

 

**

 

Later, I have a draft, but it’s not hitting the right notes.

 

I walk our dog out in the big pasture. The grass has grown to nearly hip height. 

 

On the way back, I begin to take a step. Something brown is curled in the grass. Is it a fox? 

 

No, it’s a fawn. Its gangly legs pulled up around its body. Completely still. 

 

Millie hasn’t smelled it, so I keep moving. I don’t need her scaring the fawn, and the mother could be anywhere close.