Today my good friend Steve Hanger and I were in the Lloyd E. Scott Gymnasium in Seymour to watch the Regional Semi-Finals.  We came home after they were over.  As I type this New Albany, winner of the second game, and Center Grove, winner of the first game, are playing for the championship.  New Albany is leading in the first quarter.

There were over 8000 people in the gym to watch the games this morning and early afternoon.  It was quite a sight.

I was glad to be able to witness this.  Only in Indiana will you find such crowds for high school basketball. Folks were standing all over the place…in the corners on the floor, around the perimeter up top, it was crazy.  I ran into my radio hero Robert Becker.  He was there to make notes for Monday’s Speaking of Sports report.  Becker told me he hope his sidekick Jim Plump was in the house to help him out on Monday morning.

A young man by the name of Romeo Langford playing for the New Albany Bulldogs is on of those you hope to see come along some day.  He is the real thing.  He is the best high school player I have ever seen.

Langford at the foul line.

When I pulled into Depauw to let Steve out at his house, I told him one of these days we’re going to be watching an NBA game remind each other of the day we went to Seymour to watch that his team play.

If New Albany makes in to Indy, I will be interested to see how many show up at the big barn.  Seymour has the 3rd largest gym in the land.  Bottom line, we in Southern Indiana have not seen the likes of this since Damon Bailey led Bedford North Lawrence to the championship his senior year and they played in front of over 40,000 in the Hoosier Dome. That was over the top.

I hope Romeo Langford plays his college ball at Indiana University.  Word is he is down the IU, Vandy, and Kansas as potential landing spots.  But..if he only wants to play one or two years, I hope he goes to Kansas.

It sure was fun today I can tell you.

Speaking the rights.

Danny Johnson

Working in the recording studio with Rod Wurtele  in the Card shirt and Millard Dunn in the back.  We were working on a song.  Dr. Dunn was my teacher when I first read The Life You Save May Be Your Own.

For whatever reason I was thinking today of the Flannery O’Connor story The Life You Save May Be Your Own.

For the past two weeks I have been charged with overseeing the ISTEP testing of students in grades 9-11 that needed to take the tests.  It is an arduous process and one that is a bit archaic in the days we are living in.  What happened to the learning styles mantra we were given in the 1990s?  Politics.  My mentor and boss of many years ago, Jim Stewart, once said, “Education is the most resilient thing going.  No matter how politicians screw it up, kids still want to learn and that is the best thing going.”

When it comes to ISTEP we give all the kids a cookie cutter of a test that lasts a few minutes and it is supposed to measure what they have learned in a school year that lasts 180 days.  Gee…that makes sense.  We are not talking the SAT or the ACT here.  Those are traditionally taken after most of the high school student’s body of work is complete.

I know that the school house is a bastion of old world ideology and sturdy social and moral fiber unlike much of the world outside its doors.  I suppose it has always been that way.  But today, when it is not uncommon to hear a folk or two fly foul mouth invective speaks around in a department store.  You look around and no one seems too phased by it.  Is that the norm these days?  It isn’t where I work.  I hope it does not get worse.  That would be tragic.  But, I suppose the President talks foul and that gives all a license to also?

A young man was in some trouble today.  I sat down and talked to him about how the English language is situation specific.  I usually only shared this with the English classes I used to teach, but today it was time to discuss again.  Listen closely.

For whatever reason,  the potty-mouths in the store and in the Oval Office never got this.  The English language is a functional, living tool.  It comes out of the breath we offer it therefore it lives.  We need to understand we need to use it to our advantage.  If we are in a job interview we are not going to talk like we are at a Saturday Night card game.  When I go to speak to a 2nd grade classroom, I don’t talk to the kids like they are in the 11th grade.  We must understand our audience and we must address them properly.

I was not taught to talk nasty talk.  That was acquired.  You won’t hear it out of me.  I will, however, when in the presence of a very few friends I can count on one hand, throw around some colorful language that will not go anywhere outside the room.  This is usually in the midst of a euchre game or on the golf course with no one else in earshot.  This is a case of situation specific rules of language.

The only word I ever used in a classroom that could be considered offensive is the word “hell”.  It is in the punchline of a joke I told just yesterday to a colleague.  I told it to 8th and 11th graders in 1999 in a school building that was built in 1897.  I am not sure I would repeat it today.  In 2018 the world outside the bastion that is the school house is eager to criticize the school and put blame on it.

I have witnessed parents that cussed and beat their kids six ways from Sunday, but if the school starts to impart a punishment there is something wrong.  Those are scary parents indeed.

It’s not easy.  It never was.  It may have been easier thirty-five years ago.  I don’t remember such a run on the assistant principal’s office like we have now and you better believe I paid attention.  I was sent a couple times myself.   We didn’t have cell phones then either.  Had someone said the words cyber-bullying or social media…we would have asked “Huh?”  We had pick up trucks in the student parking lot with gun racks in pick-up trucks with actual rifles in them. No one thought a thing of it.  An active shooter drill?  For what?  It was a simpler time.  We talked to each other more back then.  We hadn’t texted yet.

All that said, I like my new phone.

Speaking the rights.

Danny Johnson

As my dear wife, Carrie, and I were in the checkout line of the local Hypermart, she looked at me and asked, “Do you know what you are going to write about tonight?”

I turned my head sideways and said, “Nope.”

Then I looked at her and said, “I think I just found out.”

I came home and did some other creating instead.

Speaking the cookie rights…

Danny Johnson

Inspiration is a wonderful thing.  We know it when we see it and feel it.  What inspires me may not inspire you.  I can look at Edward Hopper’s painting Nighthawks and get lost in a good way.  You might look at it and think you have seen it before.  Nighthawks saved my butt a few times I know.  Maybe I will write about that on, say, Day 49?

A song on the radio  by “fill in the blank” might make your blood start pumping and I might find another radio station.

I don’t know what got me here but I thought about a song today and I could not wait to be able to sit down here tonight and write about it.  Didn’t know what I was going to write, I just knew something was there to be forged.  Then, things changed.  Sometimes they do.  We hope it is for the best.

John Lennon’s #9 Dream is the tune that was in my head today for some reason.

I have never been interested in looking into the origin of the interesting title (#9 Dream). Why get so analytical about music. I just like the song.  It floats like few I have ever heard.

Today I went back and forth via email with my cousin Darrell in Mississippi.  Maybe that was it.  Darrell is a “few” years older than I am.  He turns 57 in three days.  He has assured me that 50 is a good place.  I believe him.  Anyway, when I was a kid visiting them I would look at Darrell’s record collection.  He had some old Beatles albums.  He understands.  I also think he had Jimmy Buffett’s Son of a Son of a Sailor around 1978.  My old friend Tim Krekel played on that album.  Maybe I was dreaming of Darrell’s invite to join him in the press box at Forest High School where he is the game’s D.J. playing tunes for all.  His son, Keith, is the head baseball coach.  I could hear John Lennon singing that song.

So, when the evening started to settle, I came in here and grabbed Lennon off the shelf.  I opened the case.  It had not been opened in a long while.

On top of the Lennon disc was a homemade one I put together.  I think it is the last “best of compilation” I have made.  I made them all the time when I was young with the “dual cassette” players.  It was made in 2008.  I gave up looking for it some time ago.

There are 18 songs on it.

1.  Bruce Springsteen…Radio Nowhere.  I like Bruce’s new stuff too.  This is a great tune that my D.J. friend in Seymour, Robert Becker, played when others would not.
2. Moving Pictures…What About Me.  A Canadian group, this song was on WLS in Chicago when I was 15.  I loved it.  I still do.  I feel for the guy.  Never heard it on Louisville radio.
3. Bob Seger…Traveling Man.  Live Bullet baby.  Great live album.  It’s complement Beautiful Loser comes later on the disc.  Have no idea why I did that.
4. Johnny Cash…Hurt.  My hat is off to Cash for singing when it was obviously ending for him.  Wow.
5. Bob Seger…Wait for Me.  In 2006 Bob Seger got some airplay again with this song.  Becker had sense enough to play the heck out of this one too.
6. Bob Seger…Beautiful Loser.  Crank it up!
7. Tim Krekel…Everything’s Gonna Be Alright.  Tim died in 2009.  I still miss him and it is odd listening to him sing this.  A great song that means more than you thought it could ten years ago.  Tim wrote all his own songs.
8. Jimmy Buffett…Pacing the Cage.  Buffett did not write this song.  I liked it in 1999 when it came out. I still do. That summer Carrie and I saw Buffett’s Beach House on the Moon Tour outside Indy at Deer Creek.  He closed the show with this song and I still remember it well.
9. The Moody Blues…What Child Is This.  Yes, the tradition Christmas song.  It was November and if you have noticed, The Moodies had not shown up yet.  Great rendition.
10. Paul McCartney and Wings…Maybe I’m Amazed.  From Wings Over America, the first time my dear wife, Carrie, and I saw Sir Paul I thought she was going to faint when they started playing this.  She made a sound like all the air had left her. Guess what?  I don’t blame her.
11. Bruce Springsteen…Girls in Their Summer Clothes.  From Magic, the same album that gave us Radio Nowhere, this tune is filled with great images and sounds that take you back and bring you home.
12. Emerson Lake and Plamer…I Believe in Father Christmas.  Greg Lake wrote this one.  There are a few versions but this one is the best for me.  Bittersweet tune.  I saw a video of him singing this with Church in England.  Ian Anderson was there.  A large choir sang along. It was moving.
13. The Moody Blues…I Know You’re Out There Somewhere.  Nothing better than a Justin Hayward song about looking back and looking forward.  My Mom’s favorite Moodies song.  They debuted this song in concert in July of 1988 at Kings Island’s Timberwolf  Amphitheater.  I was there.
14. Don Henley…A Month of Sundays.  I first heard this when I was a junior in high school. Used to place the headphones on and take this one in.  Parts of the song reminded me of my Granddaddy Hines in Scott County, MS.
15. The Moody Blues…Strange Times.  Not a hit.  Heard it in concert in 1997 two years before it made it to a new album.  I was at that show in June with my friend Todd “Corner King” Lincoln.  He died that August.  Strange Times.
16. Green Day…September.  Only Green Day song I want to  listen to.  I don’t like strawberry ice cream either.  But I look forward to this song.  Every September 1st since it came out, Robert Becker plays it first thing in the morning.  I emailed him this year after the tune was finished.  I told him he never lets me down.  He asked if he was that predictable?  No, I told him, you are that good.
17. The Moody Blues…December Snow.  From their last studio release in 2003.  It was a Christmas themed album called December.  Had some great songs on it.  Saw them debut this song live in concert in November 2003 at The Murat Theatre in Indy.
18. Neil Diamond…I Dreamed a Dream.  From his Hot August Night II live release in 1987…I think.  I got wind of it in 1988 and played the daylights out of it.  The song Brother Love’s Traveling Salvation Show is unreal stuff.

That was what I found in the John Lennon case.  Now, I am going to do what I set out to do.  I am going to sign off and listen to #9 Dream and retire for the evening.

Speaking the Rights…

Danny Johnson

I sat down with dear old Uncle Hal today.  Around ordering golf balls and showing the golf coach new playing attire options and fielding a request for Pro V-1 golf balls from one of the two young chaps there with their coach, Uncle Hal and I talked a little bit about life.

We talked about getting older, as this is the theme for these fifty days of writing here.  But, while talking about getting older, we also reflected on days of our youth as well.

I am the second from the left on the back row.  We won it all in 1979.  The same summer we moved to Harrison County.

Uncle Hal and I talked about going back for one day.  He talked of playing with friends, riding his bike, and getting a pizza made by a legendary pizza queen.

The first image that came to my mind was riding my old purple Sears bike up Bridge Street in Brownstown.  My baseball glove was hanging off the handle bars and I was riding to practice at the town park.  My childhood in Brownstown was filled with images out of Norman Rockwell’s Greatest Hits.  Whether is was arm-wrestling with  a pastor after church every Sunday, playing on the tank on the courthouse lawn, or hanging out with the town librarian.

Down the hill from the park on Bridge Street, I had a great-grandmother who looked the part.  In an old dress, swinging on the front porch waiting for me, Grandma was ready to hand me a glass of ice cold water, or lemonade, or on that rare occasion she asked me if I wanted a Coke.  I knew better than to ask myself.  They were in the back of the fridge and they were gold that didn’t come out often.

I had two parents working in a large garden full of Mississippi style produce.  We had purple hull peas and peanuts growing in that sandy Jackson County soil.  When I rolled in on my bike, they told me to grab a hoe and join in.  If I could turn around and ride away before I was spotted, I did that too.  Regardless, time to come home was not negotiable.  That usually got me to hoeing and weed pulling.

We lived in a house that didn’t have air-conditioning.  I have written here before about living in a house a cornfield away from the Jackson County Fairgrounds home of the Brownstown Speedway.  With windows raised, I was serenaded every Saturday night to cars running around the quarter mile dirt track.

My sister filled half of eastern Brownstown with The Sound of Music blaring out the window of the house.  That record has to be crumbling by now. Me, I was listening to the Bay City Rollers.

The son of a high school football coach, I lived that life as a youngster.  Locker rooms and dirty words flying around.  Music from a locker room that has lasted decades later.  Having the opportunity to grab a ball and throw it and kick it.  Grabbing a basketball during basketball practice warm-ups and shooting around with the high school guys.  I was there.  It was a great place to be.  It was what you would hoped it would be.  It was what you wish others could feel and understand.

I shared some of that last May before they tore down the old stadium.

Uncle Hal and I talked about getting older too.

Do I feel fifty?  I don’t know. I snap crackle and pop a bit when I stand up. Still,  I think I have been fortunate enough to hold on to some of these things I have mentioned.  I still love football.  I’d give anything to play a baseball game.  The music of my youth has stayed with me.  I saw my first Moody Blues concert when I was 18.  I saw my last one this past July at age 49.  There were 55 of them in between. Justin Hayward is 71 and can still sing wonderfully and can still flat tear up an electric guitar.  I hope another of his solo shows is in the future.  But…you never know.

We don’t know.

But what I do know is that I am glad I left that Brownstown life.  It wasn’t always easy…but it got me here…

and it got me here…

and it got me here…

with her…

So Happy Birthday to me!

That is…

Speaking the Rights.

Danny Johnson

There is not much I can add to this photo.  My dear wife, Carrie, and I were heading to school this morning.  As we rounded a couple of curves before we got to the Tunnel Hill Bridge, I told her to get the camera ready.  Carrie and I both got new phones this weekend.  Unlike her, I have never had a phone that could take my temperature.  I finally fell of that metaphorical bridge.  The photo from this bridge is, well, spectacular.

I hope you enjoy it.

Oh, and a Happy Birthday shout out to Matt Kellems.  He is leading blocking my way to 50.  Matt is a good guy.  I am proud of his efforts in leading our school.  It is not an easy endeavor.

Speaking the rights…

Danny Johnson

Last night the North Harrison Cougar boys basketball team was bested by the Silver Creek Dragons in a Sectional Final that was played in Ramsey last night.

This photo was taken by my new phone.  The one that lets me ask where the nearest restroom is.

It was a tough battle for the Cougars last night.  I am proud of them.  The night before they beat Brownstown Central in overtime to make it to the final.  It was a tough road to the final and the first quarter of last night;s game looked great.  NH was leading 17 to 9.  In the end the Cougars were defeated 50-37.  It was hard to take.  But I was so proud of the team.  They played great all season and ended the year 17-9.  That is the best season North has had since 2004.  My hat is off to Coach Kevin Jones and his staff.

Sectional Final action.

My dear wife, Carrie, and I just watched a one hour program on television chronicling the life of the great Rev. Billy Graham.  I was fortunate enough to hear Billy Graham at the new Cardinal Stadium in 2001.  I was there with a group from our church.  Hearing the man preach was uplifting.  After seeing him and hearing him on television as kid, I knew I was in for something special.  Rev. Graham had one mission and that was to help people by leading them to light of Jesus.  He will be missed.  The rest of us have some work to do.  It won’t be easy.  Just look around.  We must keep the faith.  We must press onward.  No matter the obstacle or how faith gets twisted, we must spread the love to the down and out and those in need.

Speaking the rights.

Danny Johnson

I

I did it.  I got a new phone.  One of those you can ask questions and listen to stuff on and get directions if you need them.

I got one.  I took pictures with it tonight…but I still need to get up to date on how to move the photos and use them.  What can I say?  I am phone challenged.

Tonight the North Harrison Cougars were bested by the Silver Creek Dragons in the Sectional final.  I took some pictures with my new phone.  I hope tomorrow I can transfer them to here.

The Cougars came out like a house of fire, as they say.  17-9 the Cougars led after the first quarter.   They were behind at halftime 20-19.

The boys played hard.  I am proud of Coach Jones and the team for giving us a season to remember.

Maybe we will have a picture or two tomorrow @ speaktherights.com

That is speaking the rights.

Danny Johnson

Wow.  The brain is running faster than the fingers right now.  So much to process this great night.

Tonight our North Harrison Cougars defeated the Brownstown Central Braves 60-57 in overtime to advance to tomorrow night’s Sectional Championship game.  Our guys played the hearts out and the gym was a raucous environment much of the game.  It was a great place to be.  For Cougars fans it was a classic.  For Braves fans it was painful.  The drive up 135 was a long one tonight.  The Braves first lead of the game was 55-54 in overtime.  That is how crazy it was.

Before the game, earlier in the day, things were not crazy in the gym.  They were quiet.  The place looked like it was ready for the massive crowd that would make it tonight. It was peaceful with a tension to it.

The Cougar was ready.

Braves sideline.

These things saw plenty of action tonight.  In the first game Silver Creek defeated Scottsburg handily.  Tomorrow night it will be the Cougars playing the Dragons.

They gym filled up and thing got interesting.

Starting Lineups.

The opening tip and we had no idea how good it was going to be.

At this point, I was hanging on the rail with my dear friend, and Brownstown Central class of 1978 grad, Barry Hall.  When Barry met me early in the fourth quarter, North has a nice lead.  I was about to tell him to go back and sit down where ha came from.  I didn’t.  I kept the faith….though it was certainly tested. I could kick myself for not getting a picture of me and Barry together right here.

The final score in overtime.  How sweet it was.  Yes, in the sectional format, North Harrison was the visiting team on the scoreboard.

Looking forward to tomorrow night’s final.  I think the Cougars can do it.

After the game, I walked past a couple from Brownstown in the hallway.  I hear my name.  It was Greg Isaacs’ parents.  I had not seen them to talk to them in decades.  Remember, I am an old Brownstown boy from way back.  Greg was in my grade.  We played little league baseball together.  He was one of my cronies.  Many of these old friends, as fondly as I remember, have been lost in time.

They took me to Greg and I was so delighted to see him again.  We stood there and chatted for a while.  He asked me about the music I make and told me his Mom has one of my CDs.  I was dumbfounded.  You just never know.  I got Greg’s address and I am going to send him some more tunes.  He asked for them.  No way I am going to turn him down.  These 50 years being discussed in 50 days seemed a little not so long ago tonight.  I was brought face to face with a piece of the past I did not expect to find.  It was fun.  And it was a thing of youth.

Put that with the exhilaration of defeating Brownstown Central for a second time in the basketball season and you got a night you don’t want to end.

The Cougars have some unfinished business like beating Silver Creek tomorrow night.

Speaking the rights…

Danny Johnson

I have been asked if it has been difficult to keep this up.  I said I would put up a post for 50 days leading up to my 50th birthday.  Difficult?  No.  Demanding?  Yes.  An hours in the day kind of thing.  I wish we had 25.  I would write for the one extra.  Things don’t turn out like that though.  We press onward.  We try to make progress.

What do I like about being near 50?  I like that I know more than I did when I was 40.  Mind you I knew it all when I was 17.  I have been trying to get back to that level ever since.  I suppose that is why I think I can, most of the time, relate to kids I work with.  I don’t know why?  It is because I have held on to the music of my youth and that has crossed over to my understanding of young people?  Some probably think I am clueless.  You can’t please everyone.  I do know I am thankful that I have been able to help kids.  Kids these days face “stuff” I never dreamed I would see in my lifetime.  You can name a few of these circumstances I am sure.

This past Saturday I was in Jeff Carpenter’s Al Fresco’s Place recording studio.  I recorded two songs.  We were so proficient in laying down the tunes, they were done in 45 minutes or less.  My acoustic guitar playing was the best I ever did on a “demo like” recording.  I was pleased.  Jeff and I talked about making more music.

Making music has been a journey for me.  I picked up a guitar and found sounds after my dear friend, Todd Lincoln, passed.  He and I loved to listen to The Moody Blues together.  We saw four Moodies concerts together.

When he died in 1997 my dear wife, Carrie, cajoled me into playing the guitar.  It has worked out.

I look forward to making some more music.  I told Jeff I finally feel I belong in the studio.  For years I was like Minnie Pearl.  I was just happy to be there.  I finally found my way there.  I can hold up my part of the room.  That is a good feeling.  I am blessed.

Tomorrow night the North Harrison Cougars take on the Brownstown Central Braves in the Sectional Semi Final….GO COUGARS!!!!  Send the Braves on a long bus trip back to Jackson County.  I know the place well.

Speaking the rights…

Danny Johnson