I woke up too early. You know how your mind clicks to “On” sometimes and won’t shut its yammer. I usually focus it on reading until I get sleepy and thinking in one direction instead of ten. I’ve been reading Chesterton’s Tremendous Trifles, short essays he wrote for the newspapers back in the early 1900s. His is a mind that sees so many connections between things, so many patterns and symbols in what we think ordinary and mundane. His sense of humor had me laughing in the bunk.
I read until I was sleepy again and slept too late, around 9:30am. I was supposed to kayak at this venue here in Bend with Maldwyn because it is right on the Deschutes River, but it was so late, and today was an early sound check (2pm instead of 3:30 or 4) and early show (6:30pm instead of an hour later).
Hot chocolate, then lunch at catering. Sound check was pushed back to 3pm. Maldwyn and I decided to go kayaking after; the venue had an inflatable two-seater sitting right there. Playing Tele banjo seemed a sensible option, so I took the bait and opened Logic to play along with a couple tracks I had made.
Before sound check I was talking to the runner, a young man named Alex, about taking us upriver afterwards. I asked him where he was from, and he said “Georgia.” His father had taken him on many fly fishing trips as a child and in his teens, just the two of them, and one of those trips was to this area around Bend when Alex was twelve years old. He thought then, “I could live here.” So, it turns out, in his mid-twenties (I think) he moved here. It made me think about the power we have as fathers over our children, the power to name them with various names, not merely by saying words to them but by our actions, by spending time with them, by teaching them, by listening to their dreams, hopes, and fears. We fathers brand them with their identities.
Anyway, Alex seemed to have a good level of confidence, not that false, over-manly veneer of confidence that hides insecurity, but the real thing that comes from being well-loved by a father and mother. He inspired me today to begin planning some trips with the family and the fishing kayaks (I have four and a trailer) in late summer and early fall. I am thinking primarily of Tennessee lakes and rivers: Fall Creek Falls, Dale Hollow Lake, maybe a ride down the Harpeth River, and whitewater rafting on one of the rivers near Chattanooga.
After sound check I went on the tandem kayak with Maldwyn and we spent about an hour on the water. There were a lot of folks out there today on every sort of flotation device: kayaks, boards, tubes, and I even saw a pair of inflatable Orcas.
I made iced Tazo green tea right before we played our set. The sun was out, but more at our backs, and it wasn’t too hot, at least for me. The audience was a good one, listening, appreciative.
Willie’s set came, and I wrote most of this journal listening, then popped out for the medley. Singing on that is always a good time. Went back to the dressing room and got back into my everyday clothes, gathered up my stuff and the daily strawberries, blueberries, kale, and a pint of half and half from the fridge backstage. Then I talked to Mike (monitor engineer) about the sound in my ear monitors – what instruments were loud, too soft, etcetera.
I’m back on the bus finishing this journal while the crew is loading all the gear into the trucks. Our bus call time is 2am but I hope to be living large in dreamland long before then. Tomorrow I want to play a lot more guitar during the day. The last two days I’ve spent much more time on the Telecaster banjo.
There are two days left on this leg of the tour, then a flight home after Redmond, Washington. Stuart Duncan comes to the studio to play on eight or so songs on the bluegrass instrumental record, so I am thrilled about that.
Bedtime reading: G.K. Chesterton’s Tremendous Trifles and Eugene Peterson’s A Long Obedience in the Same Direction.
I read until I was sleepy again and slept too late, around 9:30am. I was supposed to kayak at this venue here in Bend with Maldwyn because it is right on the Deschutes River, but it was so late, and today was an early sound check (2pm instead of 3:30 or 4) and early show (6:30pm instead of an hour later).
Hot chocolate, then lunch at catering. Sound check was pushed back to 3pm. Maldwyn and I decided to go kayaking after; the venue had an inflatable two-seater sitting right there. Playing Tele banjo seemed a sensible option, so I took the bait and opened Logic to play along with a couple tracks I had made.
Before sound check I was talking to the runner, a young man named Alex, about taking us upriver afterwards. I asked him where he was from, and he said “Georgia.” His father had taken him on many fly fishing trips as a child and in his teens, just the two of them, and one of those trips was to this area around Bend when Alex was twelve years old. He thought then, “I could live here.” So, it turns out, in his mid-twenties (I think) he moved here. It made me think about the power we have as fathers over our children, the power to name them with various names, not merely by saying words to them but by our actions, by spending time with them, by teaching them, by listening to their dreams, hopes, and fears. We fathers brand them with their identities.
Anyway, Alex seemed to have a good level of confidence, not that false, over-manly veneer of confidence that hides insecurity, but the real thing that comes from being well-loved by a father and mother. He inspired me today to begin planning some trips with the family and the fishing kayaks (I have four and a trailer) in late summer and early fall. I am thinking primarily of Tennessee lakes and rivers: Fall Creek Falls, Dale Hollow Lake, maybe a ride down the Harpeth River, and whitewater rafting on one of the rivers near Chattanooga.
After sound check I went on the tandem kayak with Maldwyn and we spent about an hour on the water. There were a lot of folks out there today on every sort of flotation device: kayaks, boards, tubes, and I even saw a pair of inflatable Orcas.
I made iced Tazo green tea right before we played our set. The sun was out, but more at our backs, and it wasn’t too hot, at least for me. The audience was a good one, listening, appreciative.
Willie’s set came, and I wrote most of this journal listening, then popped out for the medley. Singing on that is always a good time. Went back to the dressing room and got back into my everyday clothes, gathered up my stuff and the daily strawberries, blueberries, kale, and a pint of half and half from the fridge backstage. Then I talked to Mike (monitor engineer) about the sound in my ear monitors – what instruments were loud, too soft, etcetera.
I’m back on the bus finishing this journal while the crew is loading all the gear into the trucks. Our bus call time is 2am but I hope to be living large in dreamland long before then. Tomorrow I want to play a lot more guitar during the day. The last two days I’ve spent much more time on the Telecaster banjo.
There are two days left on this leg of the tour, then a flight home after Redmond, Washington. Stuart Duncan comes to the studio to play on eight or so songs on the bluegrass instrumental record, so I am thrilled about that.
Bedtime reading: G.K. Chesterton’s Tremendous Trifles and Eugene Peterson’s A Long Obedience in the Same Direction.