The 4th

Jul 4, 2016 | Uncategorized

When I was a young reporter at The Bradford Era, we didn’t print papers on July 5th and December 26th so all of us could take off Christmas and the 4th of July to mark the big religious and national observances. As a kid, the best thing about the 4th was the party...

Kent State and Informed Engagement

May 4, 2016 | Reflection

Today marks the 46th anniversary of the Kent State shootings. I’ll never forget hearing about them, in a barber shop in my home town just before I graduated high school. A guy from a class or two before mine attended Kent State. Wild as these times are, they are...

A Ban on Worry

Apr 10, 2016 | Reflection

One morning during my college years, I dragged myself into my parents’ house at 7 a.m. or so after a night on the town—the next town, actually. My mother was at the door, frantic. As she probed the unprobable fathoms of the teenage male mind to no avail, my father lay...

I’m Old Enough to Remember…

Mar 11, 2016 | Music, Reflection

I’m old enough to remember… …a town filled with World War II veterans, only that’s not what they were to me. They were my dad and my uncles and my aunt and my neighbors and my coaches and the people who owned and worked in stores and shops. Something like 1200...

Pittsburgh, Music and Bruce Irving

Mar 5, 2016 | Music

Speaking of friends, as I was just doing on a Facebook post, I had great ones while I attended Carnegie Mellon University. Crag Collins set up a recording studio in his dorm room and we gathered there often for recording and parties. Eric Maata and Lou Trott were...

The Doors: New Book, Long-Ago Moments

Feb 7, 2016 | Music, Reflection

I’m reading Mick Wall’s “Love Become a Funeral Pyre,” his history of the Doors. The book is wonderful. It pulls together most of what’s been written about Morrison to this point and brings into play Wall’s own relatively recent interviews with the band and various...

Of breezes, snow and breaking free

Jan 26, 2016 | Reflection

I felt it in the warm breeze over snow still on the ground. I was in the back yard just after dark, and it took me back to high school, to the way it felt to run through my hometown of St. Marys, from one end to the other after a date, from her house to mine with no...

A Year On–Remembering Greg Humphrey

Jan 18, 2016 | Uncategorized

“He looked like a character out of The Hobbit,” said songwriter Bob Regan of his old friend and bandmate Greg Humphrey. That is as good a place as any to start when talking about one of the most colorful and beloved characters in Nashville music history....

Marty Rush–Remembering a Friend to Wildlife

Jan 15, 2016 | Animals

Marty Rush, 69, of Mt. Juliet, TN, widely known for her work rescuing and rehabilitating wild animals, died Friday, January 8, 2016, at Summit Hospital after a brief illness. She had dedicated more than 30 years to the care of animals, first as director of volunteers...

Relationship Maintenance

Jan 5, 2016 | Daily Life

Maintenance. It’s not a glamorous subject, but it’s reality. Our bodies, our houses, our cars need to be looked after and tweaked now and then. For those of us in creative endeavors or, really, for anyone with an active online presence, there are virtual realities to...