BEGINENDINGS - speaktherights.com

George Harrison sang it. All Things Must Pass.

I was taken aback on a walk a little more than a week ago. I came across a spicebush swallowtail butterfly in waiting. He looked like this:

This little guy looked like a fish crawling on the pavement.

In earnest, I don’t recall seeing one of these little guys before. He looked at me like he had good sense.

Even when I startled him on purpose, he rared back and looked startled.

I’d like to think I came across this little guy two days ago as I was walking on my regular South St. Louis Rd course.

I asked if he was the one I came upon recently. I swear he looked at me and acknowledged…

I then told him that I have read up on his short lifespan which is 6 to 14 days.

If this is not him, I am sure it is a close relative.

All Things Must Pass…

Justin Hayward made the announcement a few days ago. All 2020 concerts are cancelled. No great newsflash there.

Rescheduling for 2021 is in the process I have heard, providing we make it to 2021 in one piece.

On a phone call with Aunt Barbara this past Friday I told her this will be the first year Carrie and I had not heard Justin sing, either as a solo artist or as a member of The Moody Blues since November 12, 2003. I went on to tell Aunt Barbara, as a point of perspective, that this was eleven days after she and I watched the Ole Miss Rebels beat South Carolina in Oxford when senior quarterback Eli Manning threw for his most yards in an Ole Miss win.

At the time I was taking a graduate statistics class taught by a big shot professor at the University of Louisville. One of those profs you don’t speak to until spoken to. He was a stickler for attendance. So imagine my angst when I actually stopped him in the hall before our Monday class to tell him I was not going to be there on Wednesday.

Me: Dr. Cunningham, I know you have a strict attendance policy. But I want you to know I will not be here on Wednesday for our next test.

Him: Why not?

Me: My wife and I are going to Indianapolis to see The Moody Blues at the Murat Theatre.

Him: That’s the best excuse I have heard in three years. I wish I could be there. Go have a good time. We’ll get the test made up.

A few years later, after I had met Tim Krekel and made some music with him and made a point to go to listen to him around town wherever he was playing, more times than not Dr. Cunningham would be there enjoying Tim’s music. We nodded at each other a few times. He knew the face. He didn’t know my name.

Our 17 year run of hearing Nights in White Satin is over for Carrie and me. It sure has been fun. I hope we get there again. And I hope when that day comes that Julie Ragins is still playing with Justin. It is always a delight to visit with her. She and I went back and forth via email a couple days ago. If you are a member of AARP go vote for her on the AARP Superstar Contest:

https://www.aarp.org/entertainment/music/superstar-2020/.

If you are not, become one! It doesn’t cost a thing. Voting goes until September 11th. You can vote once a day.

One day I will get Julie and her husband Curtis Brengle into a studio to make some music together with Jefferson Carpenter. That is a personal goal.

From Indianapolis to Denver to Newberry, South Carolina to Chicago to Wilmington, NC to Louisville to Durham to Elizabeth, Indiana in our own Harrison County.

Crowds of 10,000 at Red Rocks