I hear that Train a-coming.

Details this weekend.

This Train really speaks the rights.

Danny Johnson

When I was a youngster, the principal of my elementary school was the most intimidating figure I thought existed on the planet.  His name was Harry Spurgeon.

Looking backwards, I am delighted Mr. Spurgeon was what he was.

One day when I was in kindergarten, I was a little too rambunctious for the teacher’s good.  I was probably fine with it. She was not.  There was almost a hint of devious glee in her voice as she took me to the hallway and left me there to myself for a little while.  Her words are still piercing to my memory cells. She said, before she quickly shut the door, “You better hope Mr. Spurgeon doesn’t find you out here.”  At that moment I was wondering how far a five year old could go on a Greyhound Bus.  I was ready to run.  Fortunately, my teacher had pity on me and allowed me to rejoin the fray in short order.

As much as we feared the man, we loved him also.  By this time his career was winding down; he retired after my 4th grade year.  Our elementary school had 5 grades.

Mr. Spurgeon had a gleam in his eyes when he talked to you.  The truth is…he could not hear very well.  He looked at us and smiled  a great deal.  When you tried to talk to him he would shake his head in agreement….and give you some verbal affirmation.  If he did not have a good feeling about what was being said and needed more information he would yell “WHAT!?”

He always told us to “BE NICE!” when we were eating in the cafeteria.  It just came from nowhere.  “BE NICE!”

“EAT THOSE GREEN BEANS!”  “EAT THAT CORN!”

When he would yell those edicts out, forks and spoons moved at breakneck speed.

He also had a reputation of being a fair swat with the old paddle.  It was said that if Pete Rose could have used Mr. Spurgeon’s paddle as a bat he would hit .450 in 1976.

There are urban legends.  Like how Mr. Spurgeon paddled Craig Lewis for puking on the new carpet.  That never happened.  It just sounded good.

I can tell you, however, it did not feel good in 1978.  It was to be Mr. Spurgeon’s last Springtime to Swing the Paddle.  I capitalize those words in honor.

My dear friend Jerry and I got a personal meeting each with Mr. Spurgeon and his board of education.  I think he gave us three swats each.  What was the crime, you ask?

We got caught chewing gum in music class.  I told you Harry was old school.  Was he ever!  I am in earnest when I say Jerry and I were his last board meetings.  Knowing he paddled half the kids in Brownstown our age or older, we consider ourselves to be the last two home runs.

I don’t regret any of it.  Neither Jerry nor myself had to attend therapy to calm ourselves of Mr. Spurgeon.  Our biggest chore was not letting word get back home about the incident.  Remember when a Dad would say “Whatever you get from the principal at school, it will be much worse when you get home.”  We might as well of signed our own death certificates.

Our folks never found out until years and years later.  Jerry’s Dad died in 1991 (I loved that man).  I know he never found out.

Be nice.  That was the mantra over and over and over again.  Mr. Spurgeon told us to be nice.

I wish more folks could have spent some time with Harry Spurgeon.

I recently had the misfortune of dealing with a lady in a professional setting…a college campus to be exact.  It was her job to assist me.  She gets paid to help folks when they need certain services that are of a clerical nature.  She was nasty.  She was not nice.

Her directions were not clear.  Her posture, her voice, and her attitude all matched: mean.  She had a secretary I talked to on the phone and she had emailed me some stuff.  That same lady was there trying to be helpful as that old battleaxe…oops…I know, I need to be nice.

I will be nice.  I think I am going to send that lady’s secretary a sympathy card.

Today and tomorrow do us all a favor: “BE NICE!”

As we…speak the rights.

Danny Johnson

Ratings.  Most ratings are a bunch of hogwash, the best that I can tell.

Music critics try to rate albums…it is their job to be, well… critics.  How do you think that’s gonna work out?  I read a critic that once called Justin Hayward of the Moody Blues vocal style “basset hound sounding”.  This is a man crying out for a punch in the stomach.

My dear wife, Carrie, and I stayed at a place in the Berkshires this summer that had a 3.6 rating out of 5 according to multiple internet rankings.  We thought the place was a 6.  Guess we are just not as hard to please as others.

Football season is coming on.  I have decided to rate the best football stadiums, be they college or pro, that I have seen the game played in.  I am doing this in part because living in Southern Indiana can be depressing if you are a football fan.  I made the mistake of watching the local (Louisville Market) news at 6 PM today and when they came to sports the two lead stories were about college basketball.  Hel-lo!  Football season is just around the corner.  Why are you making me listen to Tom Crean talk about IU Basketball?   It is a long time before I will walk out to get the morning paper and be able to see my breath.

Blessed is a good word to describe my travels to different stadiums across the country.

Before I get into the best, let me just point out and try to forget about a couple of the worst.

Worst:  University of Louisville’s Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium.  Why?  Because they sell beer and hard liquor at a college football game.  If someone is going to partake, they should be given the option of sneaking it in knowing it is not available at the concession stand.  Though I do not practice said option, it only makes sense.  Also, how many times do we need to see a capital D held up next to a faux picket fence?  That is so yesterday…but you will find plenty of them in Papa John’s Cardinal Pool Hall.

Worst #2:  University of Kentucky’s Commonwealth Stadium.  Why?  Because fans talk too much about basketball during a football game.

Now…on to the good stuff.

The speaktherights.com top ten college or pro football stadiums:

#10  Cincinnati Bengal’s Riverfront Stadium 1970 to 1999.  Why?  Because I watched Ken Anderson play quarterback there.  I saw his last start there in 1985.  The pro game changed for me after that.

#9  University of New Hampshire’s Cowell Stadium, Durham, NH.  Why?  It is small.  There are no lights.  If you kick off at noon you better play fast.  It gets dark in New Hampshire in a hurry in November.  Also…folks will pass around a plate of hot fresh cut french fries for no other reason than to offer them to you.  I passed the plate.  But it was nice of them to offer.

A great place to watch a game. UNH Wildcats.

#8  Minnesota Viking’s Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome 1982 to 2013, Minneapolis, MN.  Why?  I saw Brett Favre heave a great pass or two there in 2009.  Like the RCA Dome, the Metrodome was LOUD!  The had a great song to sing “Skol Vikings!” every time something good happened for the Norsemen…and the people there were just glad to be indoors having a good time.

#7  University of Tennessee’s Neyland Stadium, Knoxville, TN.  Why?  Even though my Ole Miss Rebels got creamed, it was cool to hear as much enthusiasm for one song, “Rocky Top”, in the fourth quarter as it had in the first quarter.  The close quarters of Neyland Stadium have caused some to call it “One Cheek Hill”.  Sitting is a challenge at times.

#6  Ole Miss’ Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, Oxford, MS.  Why?  If for no other reason, to listen to the locals break out in the “Hotty Toddy!” chant.  It is a thing to behold, especially if the Rebels are obviously going to win.  I saw Eli Manning throw for over 390 yards against South Carolina in a 43-40 win his senior year.  My Aunt Barbara and I have seen a few games there together.  That is even more fun.  The sight lines are not the best as the seats along the sidelines go out more than they go up.  Regardless.  This is a special place for anyone who loves college football.

#5 Mississippi Veteran’s Memorial Stadium, Jackson, MS.  Why?  The sight lines are better than they are in Oxford.  The Rebels don’t play here anymore, which is a shame.  Have seen both college and pro games here and it is just a great place to watch a football game.  A horseshoe design, the stadium is easy to negotiate throughout.  High on my nostalgia list just because of the Rebels and my family in the area.  Would like to go back some day.

#4  The Hoosier/RCA Dome in Indianapolis.  Why?  It was a great place for Indiana to start a pro football team, although we stole this one from Baltimore.  The Dome was loud.  The dome was filled with excitement and people were piled on top of each other…which was great when Peyton Manning was playing quarterback and we were all having a good time.  I have not been to Lucas Oil Stadium…it looks like such a big barn compared to the confines of the Hoosier Dome.  It is gone now, and I miss it.

#3  The Joan.  Marshall University’s Joan C. Edwards Stadium in Huntington, WV.  Why?  While not the most historical, maybe one of the most special.  Why?  The people there have a connection with their program like none other I have seen.  Is The Joan filled every game?  No, not even close.  But witness once the “We Are Marshall!” chant and you too will be hooked.  It’s about the town as much as the stadium…which is in the town.  Everywhere you go in Huntington people are talking football.  The fans can be serious grumps too.  They like things to go their way and will raise heck if they think they know how to do it better, which is…all the time.  Can’t wait to go back this year.

A Game vs. East Carolina.  Go Herd!

Marshall at home vs WVU 2010…the largest crowd in Marshall history.

#2  Notre Dame Stadium, South Bend, IN  Why?  Wake up the echoes!  That is why.  Though I have never been a great Notre Dame fan, I was elated to be there last November with my Dad as the Irish handled BYU in snow and COLD.  Thought I was gonna freeze.  Dad smiled and bounced up and down through it all.  History?  You will find it here.  Be it the statues around the stadium or looking in the direction of a piece of real estate that reminds you of what happened during the game in the decade of your choice is humbling…at least it was to me.

Wake Up the Echoes.

#1  Indiana University’s Memorial Stadium, Bloomington, IN.  Why?  Good question.  If you go there to watch a game you will know why.  If you are lucky enough to be there when the Hoosiers win a game against an opponent other than Pea Ridge State or Squash Hollow Tech, it is a great deal of fun.  I was there in the best of times…the late 1980s when Anthony Thompson actually ran better than his legend has.  Bottom line:  It is the best place to physically watch a game.  The sight lines are great.  The place has a concave design that gravitates to the middle.  The rows go up instead of out.  When you walk out of one of the tunnels to get to view level you feel like you just opened a great present in front of you.  The best football?  What do you think? It’s IU.  Still, it is the best place to watch a football game if your stomach can handle it.

IU vs. Minnesota 2013.  The Gophers won’t be back until 2018.

IU vs. Iowa in 2010.  The Iowa game in 1988 was the greatest college football game I have ever seen.  Indiana won 45-34.  Iowa’s quarterback threw for 551 yards.  What can I say, I like offense.

We spoke the rights.

Danny Johnson

Tonight is the Major League All-Star Game.  It is the traditional game that pits the National League All-Stars against the American League All-Stars of Major League Baseball.

The notion of a Major League All-Star team is kind of oxymoronic to me.  Given there are so many minor league teams out there…look it up…it will amaze you, it seems to me that any player making a major league roster is somewhat of an All-Star.

Still, I know, they have to play an All-Star game and every year there are clear cut selections to the team, head scratching selections to the team, and questions as to why some guys were left off the team.  No wonder these little league all-stars have the problem they do…they are already trying to be like major- leaguers…at least their Dads are.

For me the 1979 Major League All-Star Game still holds forth in my memory unlike any other I can remember.  Though I do remember one ended in a tie about a decade ago and seems like Dave Concepcion or was it Ken Griffey…hit a homer at Dodger Stadium and won the MVP Award in 1982… I think.  I’ll have to look that up.

On July 4th 1979, a midst fireworks in the background, I was part of a moving caravan that moved my great-grandmother from her house on Bridge Street in Brownstown, Indiana to a house next door to her son (my grandfather) on Alma Street in Shreveport, Louisiana.  My grandfather and I were in a U-Haul truck; it was no big deal as my grandfather was a commercial truck driver.  My grandmother and her mother were in a Dodge pick-up truck with a cab on it.  My great-grandmother, whom we were moving, was in a Cadillac with Illinois license plates that belonged to her other son.  He was driving his mother down along with his son.

If you are keeping score I was in the midst of two great-grandmothers, one grandmother, one grandfather, one great uncle, and one second cousin.  It was a real good time.

After the move was finished, I stayed in Shreveport with my grandparents.  It was a bit of a strategic move, I suppose, on the part of my parents.

My Dad was looking for another job at the time.  My mom was looking forward to selling our house in Brownstown.  It was most convenient for all involved if I was 800 miles away.  I was.  I I was in Shreveport.   And I was there for a good while.

Earlier in that same year, March to be more specific, my Dad was told he could no longer be the head football coach of the Brownstown Central Braves.  Dad wanted to continue coaching and I am glad that he did.

On July 17th, 1979,  the  Major League All-Star Game was being played in the Kingdome in Seattle, Washington…the then home field of the Seattle Mariners.

The phone rang at 1439 Alma Street in Shreveport as I was watching the All-Star game with my grandmother.  It was my Dad.  He called to tell me that we were moving to Harrison County,  Indiana.  He was to be named the new head football coach at North Harrison High School.  I was puzzled…not sure where he was talking about.

“Remember the place we went to last basketball season.  That old cracker-box of gym with the rims you made fun because they shook so much.” he said.

Well, I did remember.  I ended up graduating from high school in that same cracker-box in Nineteen hundred and eighty-six.

I also told Dad under no uncertain terms that we would go back to Brownstown and “kick their …uh…butt.”  I was eleven at the time.  It was the first time I ever used such language so freely when speaking to my father.  But…we did.  In 1982 we took a 6-1 North Harrison team into Brownstown’s Blevins Stadium to take on a 7-0 Brownstown team that was ranked #3 in their class.  We won 27-14.  It still ranks as the most impressive win in North Harrison history.  I was a freshman player on the team.

As vivid as that 1982 football game is in my mind, none of it stands out like the throw Dave Parker made from right field to get Brian Downing out at the plate to help the National League preserve a 7 to 6 victory in the 1979 All-Star Game.

That is why I am going to turn this computer off now and go find a piece of 1979…if only in my mind…as I watch a little All-Star game action.  They are in the bottom of the third and the American League is leading 3 to 2.  Where is Dave Parker when you need him?

Danny Johnson

When I first saw this page a few hours ago as it appeared to me as a mental picture, I thought for sure I would be writing about toilets.  My dear wife, Carrie, pokes a little bit of fun in my direction because of a word I use whilst trying to be proper when asking where I can relieve myself… shall we say.  I can’t help it.

Today was no different.  While at a place of professional business, I asked a receptionist if there was a “facility” handy.  She looked at me and asked, “Is there a what?”

Of course this throws one’s attempt at subtlety straight down the toilet.  After a little bit of coaching, and some slight embarrassment on both of our parts, I was correctly directed to the room I needed at the time.

How I got from there to wanting to share a poem may be beyond psychological help.  Still, that is where I am.

Where do you come up that stuff to write about?  That is a question I have been asked on a regular basis since I was in high school.  Answer:  I don’t know.  I would really like to think it is more a matter of inspiration finding me than my looking for it.  A partnership is in the mix somewhere, for sure.

I enjoy writing.  All kinds of it.  Songs, poems, these little columns; I even wrote a 74 thousand word novel.  It is unpublished mind you…until the right treatment for it comes along (if ever).

A few reports have already come down the line that I will tire of this (blogging) in three weeks time and not have enough steam to keep it up during football season.  Hopefully more about football will be written then!

In earnest, I have been looking for this writing chance again for some time.  In my first post, “Why Speak the Rights?”,  I gave my dear wife, Carrie, thanks for inspiring me to write more again.  Now I must give her the credit too.  She doesn’t want it, mind you.  But it certainly doesn’t belong to me.  So, I’ll just thank the Good Lord for giving me the opportunity and the ability to share.

In my younger days I fancied poetic verse over all others.  The romance of it all, I suppose.  We all have passions that run so wild when we are young.  To this day my favorite poem is by James Wright.  The poem is called “Autumn Begins in Martins Ferry, Ohio.”  It is a poem that melds the human condition and the game of football, unlike anything I have ever read. I have always loved football.  If you played and still love this game, you understand what the term “suicidally beautiful”…with all apologizes to that word’s use in other connotation…can begin to mean and you celebrate it!

The following poem is of a brighter nature.  I wrote it in March 2012 as I was looking at the Atlantic Ocean off a lovely porch in North Carolina.

Carrie and I visit the North Carolina shore…one little piece of it in particular…as often as we can.  The two or three times a year we get down there is much more than we deserve.  Such a sentiment brought forth…Ocean Visit.

OCEAN VISIT

My spirit is lifted                                                                                                                                     My breath purposeful                                                                                                                              My eyes see colors                                                                                                                              They will not see again                                                                                                                          Unless they return                                                                                                                                   Hope and pray they will                                                                                                                         When I close my eyes                                                                                                                          When I ignore my breath                                                                                                                      A serenity greater still                                                                                                                          Overcomes my soul                                                                                                                              Thus the sounds of the                                                                                                                           Wind acquiring my ears                                                                                                                      Pelicans that swoop and glide in formation                                                                                        Waves that sing in and out                                                                                                                  And occasionally crash about

March 29, 2012

Danny Johnson

Tim Krekel …friend and music master

The Dubois County Bombers baseball team had a game tonight against the Madisonville Miners.  My dear wife, Carrie, and I were in attendance in the small town of Huntingburg, Indiana in Dubois County.  Also with us were our two sons Jarrett and Cody, and Carrie’s brother Stevarino.   It was a hot night for baseball with a temp well into the 90s at the 6 PM first pitch.  A cold front is on the way now as it is after 10 PM.

The Bombers were winning after 7 innings by the score of 6 to 3.  Minor League Baseball, even a college league game like the one we saw tonight, is usually a great thing to behold.  Though we have not been there but a few times, the visit to League Stadium where the Bombers play is a treat.  It was the “home stadium” of the Rockford Peaches in the movie about women playing baseball during World War II.  The movie was called “A League of Their Own”.

In between innings there is usually some wholesome tom-foolery going like a musical chairs contest or kids trying to hit the most water balloons…or the obligatory musical numbers that play before the next batter.

Tonight the song “I Can Help” by Billy Swan was playing in between innings.  I can say that other than the music I listened to in church…we actually talked about Zacchaeus this morning during preaching, you probably remember the song about the “wee little man”…Billy Swan’s 1974 hit song “I Can Help” is THEE song that caught my attention and opened up a new world of sound for me.  I was six years old when I heard that song the first time.  It left me wanting to hear it over and over and over and over again.  I stayed as close to the radio as I could.

There is a guitar lick in the middle of the song that repeats a couple of times.  If you know the song, you can hear it now.  If you don’t know it, well, it’s not hard to find these days.  It would be worth listening to.

Though it is a very long story and one I will no doubt divulge one of these days,  I, at the age of thirty, began to write words and music to go along with them and eventually did some recording.  I still enjoy playing immensely.  I pick up my guitar often.  My guitar playing  prowess is nothing like I wish it was.  Seems every time I pick up the guitar I want to write a song.  I have let others do the heavy guitar lifting.  My favorite guitar player to play on my material was a guy called Tim Krekel.

If you have heard the studio version of Jimmy Buffett’s “Cheeseburger in Paradise” you have heard Tim Krekel play guitar. His handy work is all over Buffett’s “Son of a Son of a Sailor” album.  I add this reference for the sake of mainstream recognition.  Tim was much more than this.  He was one of the greatest guitar players I have ever seen or heard.  He was economical in his playing.  He could get a great deal out of minimal effort.  He was a virtuoso of the rock and roll guitar. He was also a gifted songwriter and released many great solo efforts.   Look into it.  You won’t be disappointed.

Tim Krekel had recorded some albums with my friend Jeff Carpenter.  When Jeff knew I was wanting to get back in the studio to record another cd,  he told drummer Mike Alger I was down for another session of recordings.  Tim Krekel was in the room.  He asked if I was the guy that recorded a song called “The Lewis Grizzard Highway”…as it gotten some local airplay on the public radio station in Louisville.  Jeff told Tim I was that guy.  He then asked Jeff if he could talk to me about playing on and producing my next cd during those recording sessions.  I have never been so flattered in all my musical life.

One day, late in the recording process, after all the rhythm  tracks were finished, Tim, Jeff, and I were sitting in the studio chewing the fat as we were trying to decide what direction we were going to take some of the numbers.  Tim scratched his scraggly little beard and said, “I got a call from Billy Swan last night.  He said he’s tired of the L.A. scene and he is moving back to Nashville.”

I immediately quizzed Tim about Billy Swan.  It turned out that Tim played lead guitar for Billy as they toured Europe with Willie Nelson in 1974 and Tim routinely played the guitar lick on the song that changed my life.  And here we were in a recording studio together.

Tim produced my finest musical recording work.  “The Best Thing You Did Yesterday” is a cd with my name on it.  It was a finished product thanks to Tim Krekel and Jeff Carpenter….the best recording partners a guy could ever ask for.

Tim Krekel died of cancer on June 24th, 2009.  Carrie and I saw him on his wedding day, June 14th, 2009.  We told him we loved him.

In his music, Tim Krekel always spoke the rights.

Danny Johnson

Her name is Vallerie King.  I have not seen her in some twenty-five years.

It was summer of 1989.  I broke a personal land speed record to get from my home in Harrison County, Indiana to a crowded funeral home in Forest, Mississippi to call on the family, myself included, of one Paul F. Hines who was laid out at the Ott and Lee Funeral Home in Forest.

Uncle Paul was an older brother to my mother, Tressie Hines Johnson.  Uncle Paul was the second of seventeen brothers and sisters to go.  His brother, my beloved Uncle Durwood, died in April of 1988.  They are sorely missed.

So is Vallerie King.

On the way home from Uncle Paul’s funeral, I drove my ’66 Mustang (3 on the floor) off of Interstate 57 to the college town of Carbondale, Illinois.  I was there to see Vallerie King.  I hadn’t seen her in over three long years and I so wanted to see her face to face once more.

Vallerie was working as a pastor at the time at the University Baptist Church in Carbondale, the home of Southern Illinois University.

While I may be an afterthought to Vallerie’s memory bank, she holds a personal vault all her own in mine.

Vallerie King was a student at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky around the time I was a sophomore, junior, and senior in high school.  Her field charge at the time was to serve as the youth minister at the Palymra Baptist Church in Palmyra, Indiana.  I was one of the youth there that she ministered to.  Did she ever.

Know this…I have always had a strong mind of my own.  Thanks to Vallerie, it was softened just a bit.  Formative years?  Is that what you call them?  For me, the years I spent with Vallerie King were the Wonder Years and the Living Years all in one.  Vallerie had a way about her.  She was calm.  She was deliberate.  She did more listening than she did talking.  She did things that would make most of the Baptist preachers I knew at the time swallow their snuff.

We listened to music at our parties at church.  We listened to the soundtrack of the movie “Footloose” for heaven’s sake!  Not only that, but we watched “Flashdance” and “Footloose” at the church during a lock-in.  No matter, Pastor Vallerie always had a way to tie things together in a biblical sense.  She made us examine not ourselves, but how we were treating others.  She was a great influence on a great many us…I know she was and still is important to me.

Maybe it was because I was the oldest and most vocal in the church group.  The girls in the group were more concerned about hair conditioner than the human condition.  I remember Vallerie and I arguing about politics; how she could not support a candidate based on moral views and how I could not support a candidate whom I thought spent too much time “talking out his rear-end”.  Yet…Vallerie let me make a fool of myself and never made me feel foolish.  She took her time and found the right time to interject the moral and biblical high road and provided a masterful example of just that.

She’ll never know how many times I have looked out into space when I was so confused by the ways of this world…wondering where she was and what she might say to me to clear some things up.  She could do that.  She had that charisma that is bestowed on just a couple of people you will come across in your lifetime.  For me, I am blessed to count that time in years instead of just moments…though those years seem a bit fleeting twenty-five years on.

Still…when I am still…and I listen just a little bit better and think about so fondly the words of wisdom and love she poured out to me like she was spreading butter on an ear of corn…I feel better.

I thank God for the opportunity to know Vallerie King.  She saw the Beatles at RFK for goodness sake!  More importantly, she saw through so much of my personal aggrandizement and she loved me anyway.  She showed me the way.  If she hadn’t, I wouldn’t be typing these words twenty-five years later.

I am thankful for the information age.  I found Vallerie today. It felt good.  Like the seasons that change every year…she’s always been there for me.  Thanks Vallerie.

Walden Pond…fall of 2011

Winter of 2009…LutherSpring 2011…The Rockies

Summer 2010 Hatteras

Today a colleague asked me if I wanted another dog.  I told him no.  There was only one Luther. Another colleague, and dear friend we lost in late November 2012, Norm Taylor, used to ask me….how is old Luther?  Norm had read the following column that ran in 2006.  He asked about Luther often.  I post this for Norm and for Luth.

Luther

Don’t be so morbid, my wife, Carrie, will tell me.  I’ll tell her I just can’t help it.  Do the math, honey, I’ll impart.

When the math is complete, the number is 70.  Pro-rated over the course of the year, it’s more like 76.  Translation: my dog is getting old.

His name is Luther.  He was adopted from the Floyd County Animal Shelter in March of 1996.  He was about eight weeks old when we invited him into our home.  The very adoptive act was a minor miracle to me.

I wasn’t too hot on procuring an animal that I would take home and share my environs with.  Animals make particular smells, especially during the housebreaking stage.  I wasn’t thrilled at the prospects of smelling these odors.  In fact, the day Carrie, and our boys Jarrett and Cody, and I went to the animal shelter, I’m not so sure I wasn’t just going through the motions to shut them up without the intentions of really following through with taking a stinky dog home.

Carrie had grown up with a dog around the house.  I had two dogs growing up.  One was a beagle puppy named Rebel.  I loved that dog.  I also remember the disappointment I felt the day my Dad told me Mom ran over Rebel as she was backing out of our garage on her way to work. I was five years old at the time.  Dad went on to tell me Rebel was given a proper burial in the garden.

I still have a picture of Rebel and me.  I cherish it.

Daisy was my other dog.  Another Beagle.  She survived getting hit by a car and wound up on three legs.  She did not, however, survive being hit by the train.  Daisy was a good dog.  I don’t, however, believe intelligence was on her side.

My dog history mattered not when I laid eyes on Luther.  He was ten kinds of pitiful. But did he ever grab my heart when I first looked at him.

Luther is a mutt by some standards and a mixed breed by other standards.  I call him a corgi-retriever.  He has a sawed off body and the thick build of a corgi and he has a face of a golden lab retriever…or a reasonable facsimile thereof.  I have a picture of Luther laying on the floor of a hallway in our house pinned to my bulletin board at work.  “Man, he’s a big one, isn’t he…” is a comment I got one day.  I went on to explain that Luther is a short dog in a short hallway.  Pictures can be quite deceiving.

In the ten years we have had Luther he has become a celebrity.  Gus Stephenson and I lived in the Briarwood subdivision North of New Salisbury at one time.  To this day Gus asks about Luther often.  Gus, an avid runner I am prone to calling Forrest Gus, was the only one who ever made Luther bark incessantly.  If Gus showed up at the house, Luther would bark.  If Luther saw Gus running down the road, he would bark.  And I’m telling you he would really turn loose.  How anything that small can be that loud I’ll never know.  It got to the point that Gus would call me and let me know when he was going running so I could close the blinds of the bay window.

When I talk to Mick Rutherford on the phone, he lives in Sellersburg and we see each other much less than we ever planned, he will ask how Luther is.  So will so many of my other friends and family, even Aunt Barbara in Jackson, Mississippi.

This year has been a tough one for Luther.  He’s had allergy problems and it really brought him down for a while.  He’s had to take medication and he falls asleep watching the Food Network and he always liked watching that channel.  But, like all of us, he presses onward.

Carrie insists that we will get another dog when Luther is gone.  And I mean the word “insist” in the calmest of connotations.  But, man, I just don’t know.  I don’t want to think about life without Luther.  Mealtimes would be lonely without him hovering below the table working each of us over until he gets a scrap.  And I don’t think I’m quite prepared to not have to watch my step in the yard.

Carrie also nixed my idea of having Luther stuffed when he gives out.  She didn’t think that was very reasonable.  In the meantime, I’ll just watch my step in the yard and love every minute of it.

P.S.  Luther died on September 5th, 2010 on the Sunday before Labor Day.  It was a good thing Carrie and I had Monday off.

This is one of the last photos ever taken of old Luther.  I miss him.

He would speak…or at least bark…the rights.

Danny Johnson

I was fourteen years old and the victim of a back injury that still plagues me to this day.  I did a stupid thing in a school weight room and it sent my L-4 and L-5 vertebrae into a stormy mess that…like I said, still brings a little rain every now and then twenty-one years on.

Boy am I glad it happened.

I had a doctor’s appointment on March 18th of 1983.  I turned fifteen that day.  The Doc was trying to figure out what was wrong with my back for sure.  He didn’t get it right.  Fate, however, did.

My mother was with me.  She took me to the doctor’s office.  After the appointment, a shopping mall was not far away.  We went shopping.

While she sifted through the latest bargains she could find in the women’s apparel section, I was drawn to a end-cap bin of music cassette tapes (google it if you need to).  I tossed a few cassettes here and there.  Aerosmith, Pink Floyd, Chicago…and then…suddenly, an image…the cover of the cassette…albeit a paint chip of what used to be 331/3 album art…caught my eye.  Man, that looks cool, I thought.

It was the cover of The Moody Blues’ first album “Days of Future Passed”.  On the old version of the cover and the spine, it said “Day of Future Passed” in big letters and “Moody Blues” below that in smaller font.  But what caught my attention were the words in the right hand corner of the cover that I could not read without a magnifying glass these days…”Includes the song Nights in White Satin”.  So these are the guys that sing that song, I thought.

Understand that while I turned fifteen that day, Nights in White Satin and Days of Future Passed were a year older than I was.

I took it home.  I was hooked.  Wow.

I enjoyed The Moodies in anonymity for years.  My pals did not get it.  They didn’t hear it.  They heard Hank Williams Jr. and that is fine.  Their tastes have varied over the years.

A few years later in the spring of my senior year of high school, the Moodies made a little more sense to my friends and others who thought I was “out there”.  The Moody Blues scored a top ten hit with the song “Your Wildest Dreams” and they won Billboard’s Video of the Year award for said song.  That fall, in November, I saw my first Moody Blues concert at the Louisville Gardens…it was November 23rd, 1986.  I was not disappointed.

It is interesting that over the years I have heard Justin Hayward, the lead-singer and guitarist of the band say that The Moody Blues are a band that people have discovered for themselves…given no great media push for the band.  CHECK.  In recent years I have heard Justin Hayward say that people love listening to The Moody Blues and still attend their concerts because they want to hold on to the music of their youth.  CHECK.

Here’s the thing, in 1986 when I saw The Moody Blues take the stage for the first time, I, at age 18, thought they were a bunch of geezers.  Graeme Edge, still going strong in 2014, was 45 in 1986.  Justin Hayward had turned 40 the month before and John Lodge was 41.   They were over the hill!

Guess what?

I am still enjoying the music of my youth.

I am the geezer now.  I am older than Graeme Edge was when I saw them in 1986.

Guess what?

My dear wife, Carrie, and I are planning to see them again at the end of August this year…2014.

So what if Graeme Edge is 73.  Who cares that Justin Hayward will be 68 this year.  They are just getting warmed up.

And me, well…I am still young.  I am still actively listening to and looking forward to the shows of the music of my youth.

Nights in White Satin.  Tuesday Afternoon.  I Know You’re Out the Somewhere.  The Day We Meet Again.  Ride My See-Saw.  The Voice.  Your Wildest Dreams.  I’m Just a Singer in a Rock and Roll Band.  Question.  The Story in Your Eyes. You and Me.  I never get tired of them.  These are songs about love, peace, optimism, hope…goodness.

On the way home from a concert in Dayton, Ohio in April of 1992, my good friend Tim Mullins said something about The Moody Blues not getting any younger.  He asked me how many more Moodies concert I thought I would see (that being my 6th).

I studied his QUESTION carefully.  I paused.  I remember telling him I will be delighted and satisfied if I get three more.  That would make nine.

Providing all goes well, the August concert…also just outside of Dayton…will be the forty-eighth time I have seen the Moody Blues in concert and I would not trade a moment of listening in person, on the radio, on a CD, or on an ipod.  I have been more than than blessed to be able to hang on to the music of my youth in such grand fashion.

Peace to all as we speak the rights.

Danny Johnson

Gads.

I never thought I would be here today…pecking away on a theme about FACEBOOK.

At this writing, I do not manage a facebook account.  This is a direct derivative of what used to be our internet capability at home.  For the very longest time while most of our environs had moved into the 21st century with their phones (still can’t get much cell service where we live) and high speed internet through phone lines (I tried…we are not important enough to warrant a few feet of wire), we were relegated for years to depend on dial-up internet, land-line phones, and a very punctual mail delivery and the morning paper (after years of begging for delivery of that).

You get the picture.

We just were not equipped to facebook.  I heard a great deal (the previous two words serve as a better alternative to the mundane “a lot”…what can I say, I was trained to be mindful of the English language)  about facebook  and it sounded pretty cool.  Carrie, my dear wife, and I even tried to get a facebook account to work after much deliberation.  We started one and got so frustrated waiting for the dial-up to get going, all the ice melting out of my tea glass that by the time we were ready to start facebooking  we were both tired and ready to go to bed.

We had an account and we ignored it.

Folks, however, did not ignore us…though they obviously thought we were ignoring them.

Translation:  when we got high speed internet to our house, thanks to yet another satellite receiver that protrudes like a large booger off the face of our screened-in back porch. When we checked said facebook account after we spent the same amount of time waiting on the old dial-up trying to formulate our passwords and such…that when we got it right…it was so overwhelming.

Carrie and I  pride ourselves in trying to be friendly sorts regardless of the circumstances; we had managed to ignore over 500 people whom had tried to “friend” us.  Not friendly at all on our part.  So we did what we had to do at the moment.  No sooner did we get capacity to facebook, we felt so bad about the folks we had ignored we cancelled our account.  How pleasant of us.

So what to do what to do?  We did nothing.

Carrie and I both work in the education field.  We are both observant when we want to be.  We were without facebook for so long it just did not matter.  Before too long, however, we were hearing accounts of facebook that we did not enjoy listening to.

Example:  Two students are into it at school because one called the other a “potty-mouthed lover of bad fiction” (I politely paraphrase here).

Example:  A friend of mine is a basketball coach and  ball coaches apparently take their facebook serious.  To me it is also serious when my friend says “Boy,  I really got blasted on facebook last night.”

And this is supposed to be a good thing?.

As time has gone on…quickly, I might add…attitudes about facebook have changed.  It is a permeated part of our society.  Nowadays when someone asks if I facebook and I tell them no, it seems like I am some sort of a snob.  “I don’t facebook” just sounds a bit class- conscious.

Well.  I don’t feel class-conscious.  I started a twitter account recently for goodness sake…and today upon learning about my new “speaktherights.com” page, I was asked if I have a related facebook page.

So there you have it.  It is time for me to join the facebook age…if only for a few minutes.  We’ll see, maybe it will go better this time.  In the meantime, I am going to try to figure out how to start up a facebook account that might help all of us to speak the rights.

Peace to all…and wish me facebooking luck!

Danny Johnson