One Friday I witnessed a couple of significant milestones.

The first one occurred on the 4th hole at Hickory Hills Golf Course in Brownstown, Indiana.  For the first time in two years, we surmised, I played golf there with my old friend Darrell Persinger.  When I worked at Medora we played there together much more often.  Darrell lives in Medora and is a school board member at Medora Schools.

If you have ever played golf at Hickory Hills you know that if you survive the first four holes, you can breathe easier and remember why you love to come out to the course and play golf again.  The first hole is a par 4…a long one…and should be a Par 4 and a half.  The second hole is an uphill tee shot and a down the hill green.  It is a challenge.  I can report that I parred the hole once with a chip below the hole that gave me no sight of the pin.  Darrell wasn’t watching.  After I hit the ball we looked on around the hole six yards deep trying to find the ball.  I walked over to the cup.  I motioned to Darrell to come closer…but he knew.  We still talk about that shot.

The third hole is a par 5.  Hit it down into the valley and bring it back up the hill to a green that resembles the old Batman TV show, you know, when the picture was running downhill.

That brings us to number 4.  The tee box allows many placements as it is long and narrow.  For some reason on Friday the white tee markers where placed as far as they could be placed…140 yards.  You have to squint to see the green…it is tiny.  What stands out much more as you are squinting is the 50 yards of water in front of the wall that separates the water from the green.  You always reach for a water ball, one you don’t mind losing, if you don’t make it over.  Well, Friday, Darrell went first.  He hit a lovely towering shot that just made it over the wall into the sand trap that comes first beyond the wall on the safe side before you make it to the postage stamp of a green.  I congratulated him.  I then put my water ball on the tee and proceeded to strike.  I was true.  I made it over the water.  I too was in the sand, but I could not be more elated.  This hole has given me nightmares.  Nothing else about golf can claim that.

We went on to the rest of our nine hole round with ease.  I did not play badly considering I have not played since last May.  Don’t ask what my score was.  I do know I was between bogey and made a few 3 overs on a few holes.  We did not lose a ball.  We were winners.

After the golf match that ended at 7:12, I hurried over to Scottsburg to watch the North Harrison Cougars take on the Scottsburg Warriors in a Mid-Southern Conference football game.  Well…I did not know the Warriors, playing varsity ball for the first time since 1983, were now playing their home games at a newly minted field located at the Scottsburg Middle School.  I drove to the high school to find no one.  After a couple of stops to inquire, because I do not have a phone that is smarter than I am, I finally found the place with 3 minutes and 43 seconds left in the third quarter.  I did not feel to smart.  The Cougars made up for that.  47 to 7.  Cougars win.  Good times.  We play Corydon Central at home this upcoming Friday and I can’t wait.

Today, as my dear wife, Carrie, and I were socializing with folks following the service at the Corydon Presbyterian Church, I had to walk over to a place in the room that is important to me.  Many years ago there was a stage where I was standing this morning.  There was a stage and there were lights pointed in the direction of that stage.  I was standing on it playing and singing songs that I had written, a guy there this morning remembered.  It was at least 15 years ago I would say.  But I do still remember.  I remember looking out the door to the left of the stage as I was singing and saw a large red Jeep drive by.  For me it was what I needed to see.

I have been fortunate to record music and play with some very great and talented people. It wasn’t always that way.  In 1997, after my dear friend Malcolm “Corner King” Lincoln (he drove a big red Jeep) died, I was in a bad place.  Carrie suggested I take guitar lessons.  I was always walking around the house playing my air guitar.  Led by much Higher Power, I did that.  It has worked out.  I still think of the Corner King when I place a guitar strap over my head.  He died August 26, 1997.  I was looking for that Jeep this morning.

I wrote a song for the Corner King and recorded it, first in 2001 and then again in 2016.

Don’t Miss The Last Dance

There were so many things that I wanted to say

There were so many times we both had to go our separate ways

But one day the phone was ringing

I picked it up and you’d gone away

Did you ever leave a party without dancing the last dance?

Have you ever stared at the ceiling at night when you knew you had a chance at romance?

There’s a force of nature that science can’t explain and the Lord leaves us to wonder why some go and some remain.

But we’ve got our memories and believe it or not that they see us through

And we got our hopes and dreams where there is still a little piece of me and you

There’s a force of nature that science can’t explain and the Lord leaves us to wonder why some go and some remain.

Did you ever leave a party without dancing the last dance?  Well take the hand of someone you love tonight while you still have a chance…and don’t miss the last…don’t miss the last dance.

This is a photo of me and the Corner King that hangs in my office.  It was taken on February 10, 1996 the day I married my dear Carrie.  That we are looking off in the distance is fitting.  I know we will have speaks again some day.

On October 20, 2017 I will gather with my friends Mick Rutherford, Kelly Samons, and Gus Stephenson, and we will play the 18th annual Corner King Classic Golf Tournament.  We have  1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th place trophies and we just pass them back and forth.  It is a day to laugh, a day to remember the Corner King, and a day to…

Speak the Rights…

Danny Johnson