In a week I will not be sitting here writing this.  I just don’t figure I will be up to it.  No, I won’t be weary or sad or too happy or…whatever.  Just in case I am not feeling the juice on March 18th, I am feeling it now.

I was born on March 18th in 1968.  I never thought 1968 looked that far away.  I still don’t.  It’s not “that” far way…just kinda far away.

What a great 47 years it has been.  No…no…no…don’t start thinking it has all been biscuits and gravy.  It has not.  I suppose I think about the book title that was attributed to Lewis Grizzard.  He died in 1994.  That same year a compilation of his work was released called “It Wasn’t Always Easy, But I Sure Had Fun”.  Maybe Lewis wanted that title.  Maybe he knew what he was talking about.

I can relate.  I have long had a mantra that I don’t even know where I found…I think I made it up.  I could ask my buddy Gus.  He might know.  Still, I think I made it up. It goes like this: “We are not here to have a bad time.”

I attribute the following line solely to Lewis Grizzard.  He would say about someone who found the worst in life: “He’d complain about the rope at his own hanging.”  I use this line on occasion when I have had enough of someone’s sour attitude.

I have had a great life.  I don’t expect that to change.

The key?  Faith in a Higher Power.  I am thankful for my faith in God.  I am thankful for my faith in my family.  I am thankful for my faith in my fellow man.

I feel sorry for bad folks.  I feel sorry for misguided souls that feel they have to cover their faces because their acts are so cowardly.  It happened with the KKK and it is happening now with ISIS…damn those pesky acronyms.  That is where you will find some folks hiding themselves behind a greater entity than they are.

If only they could all get together in a music arena and hear Paul McCartney sing “Hey Jude” and join together with the na-na-na-nanana-nas.  I am convinced peace could be found, if only for a few minutes.

What a fortunate man I have been.  I have been so many places and seen so many things.  It is mind-boggling.

Just like my work I do, I only get overwhelmed when I stop to think how much I am responsible for…so do I think when I think about all the things I have been able to see and do in 47 years.

I had a babysitter kill over on me when I was five.  The last words she said were the ones she uttered as she called out the phone number of her nephew’s gas station less than a mile from our house.  She passed out after I called the number.  She never regained consciousness.  She was declared DOA as they were transporting her to the nearest hospital.  I have always been able to remember phone numbers since that day.  I don’t program numbers into my phone.  I know them.

I have been blessed with wonderful parents.  Many kids I work with these days will never know the love and stability of a home that is filled with discipline, expectations, love, understanding, compassion, and doing the best they can.  My parents offered that to me.  They gave it freely.  Given that I turned out “pretty good”, is a testament to their patience.  I have never been a conventional sort.  Much too independent for my own good at times.  That is polite talk for saying I thought I knew more than others in the room at times when I did not know much at all.  I still have that problem at times, I suppose.

I have seen and done so many things.  I have been a teacher.  I have been a counselor.  I have been a friend.  I have recorded my own music with folks I had no business to be in a studio with.  I have been a radio sports broadcaster.  I have been a columnist.  I have written a novel.  I worked at large department store and got an education there.  I have a degree from a Big Ten School and a degree from an ACC School.  Hard to believe U of L can say that.  Seems kinda like putting perfume on a hog.  Just kidding U of L.  You have helped me immensely.

I have seen The Moody Blues sing 49 times since 1986.  I saw Don McLean sing “American Pie” on a high school football field.  I saw Pink Floyd.  I saw Merle Haggard.  I saw Jerry Clower.  I have seen Paul McCartney four times.  I saw Garth Brooks.  This list is too long.  Thank God Carrie and I found Train in concert on a whim in Virginia Beach a couple years ago.  We have tickets to see them again this summer.

Carrie, my dear wife, has had that kind of influence on me.  I would have been satisfied with seeing The Moody Blues until I could no more and that would have been that.  Carrie likes the group Train.  I do too…thanks to her.  Yes, it was me that got us to that first Train concert.  I did it because I knew she liked them.  We both enjoy them now.  She is the best friend I could ask for.

 

Carrie and I are blessed to have two young men that we are most proud of.  Jarrett and Cody are both service-oriented chaps with good hearts and kind demeanor.  They obviously take after their mother.

To think about mentioning all my friends would be risky business.  I have been too fortunate to think I can mention them all.  But…I will give honorable mention to Dan Goins, John Johnson, Mick Rutherford, Jerry Brown, Kelly Samons, Brad McCammon, Jim Stewart, and Corner King Lincoln…the last two I mention posthumously.

 

I did a post about this guy and his family early this year.

 

 

I met these guys in 1979.  I am so glad I did.  They are still my friends.

 

I have a little league championship trophy from 1979.  I still hold the record for the longest field goal at my high school.  The sad thing there is I don’t plan on ever attending another football game at my old high school.  It’s a long story.

I have been blessed with the opportunity on several occasions to take my sweet Carrie to our favorite spot on earth….a twenty-six mile barrier island in North Carolina.

I took my Dad to Notre Dame Stadium in 2013.

 

 

This past July, when we returned from a long vacation, my dear Carrie, suggested I start writing this blog.  Well…this is post number 133 and I don’t feel like I have gotten started good.

Yes, I know 47 is probably considered “middle-age”.  I laugh at that notion.  In some ways I don’t think I have gotten started good yet…whatever that means.  Just like my work, I don’t think about all the places I have been and all the things I have done.  The important thing is what is left to do!  That is what makes me say: Press Onward!

Speaking the rights.

Danny Johnson