Something About Nothing, or, Some Things About No Things

Clinton, South Carolina, Tuesday, February 14, 2017, 11:45 a.m. It’s closing in on noon, and my chief accomplishment is half-watching Polly Bergen play the first woman president in a movie made in 1964. Also, I prepared and consumed breakfast, and delved deeply into the latest doings of Twitter and Facebook. As is the case 99 …

Continue reading Something About Nothing, or, Some Things About No Things

Lord, Coach Lombardi, What Have You Done?

Clinton, South Carolina, Saturday, February 4, 2017, 9:43 a.m. The weather has cooled, though it’s still a poor excuse for winter. I just got through playing “Facebook Friends” on my Pawless guitar. Earlier this morning, I wished a few of them – the Facebook friends, not Pawless guitars -- happy birthday. I had almost exactly …

Continue reading Lord, Coach Lombardi, What Have You Done?

You Can Hear the Music Burning Down Copperhead Road

Clinton, South Carolina, Monday, January 30, 2017, 6:59 p.m. It was about ten years ago, at Robert’s Western World in Nashville, where I was working on a chapter of a book called True to the Roots: Americana Music Revealed, and the subject of the chapter was Jesse Lee Jones, who owned Robert’s. I was sitting …

Continue reading You Can Hear the Music Burning Down Copperhead Road

Things Could Be Worse, but It Takes Imagination

Clinton, South Carolina, Monday, January 16, 2017, 9:52 a.m. On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, I write. On Inauguration Day, I shall write. Other than that, the bookends of the weekdays have nothing in common. Writing must be the tie that binds. Writing must be the salvation of sanity. I must find comfort in writing. …

Continue reading Things Could Be Worse, but It Takes Imagination