CH 1-10

Summary

Do you believe in destiny or freewill? Do you believe in Happy Endings? Do fairy tale myths of romance still have a place in a 21st century world? This is a love story about an uncommonly handsome man and an arrogantly self-reliant woman with a paranormal twist. Through these characters the novel explores the larger philosophical question of romance including the question of fate vs. freewill. The uncommonly handsome man is Dwayne Hucks. He is a singer/ songwriter/ poet college professor with two failed relationships in the past. He is living a less than life and settling for the 8 weeks on the road he gets to perform. He is having odd dreams of a world of blue and a woman he has never met. He is suffering from writer block. The arrogantly self-reliant woman is Sandy. She does not believe in love, romance, or silly romantic movies, books or songs. Her life is defined by the sacrifices she has made as a single mother. She is having odd dreams of a blue screen with poems, song lyrics and music written. She is suddenly a romantic poet and song writer who writes from a male perspective. There are two sub plots in the novel. Dwayne’s best friend is dying, but has not told Dwayne. He has a plan to make Dwayne a star as his dying gift to his friend. Sandy’s teenager daughter wants a male role model in her life.

Section 1: Dreams of you.

I dream of a world

Inhabited by two –

Just me and her-

Surrounded only be blue.

Me and her at different ages

Her dancing on stages.

Looking a bit lost

Independent at a cost

Hair Turning Gray

At the end of a long work day

In Warrior stance

Never in romance.

We don’t meet in this world

Where there are only two

Surrounded by blue.

I repeat the dreams of a world in blue

Inhabited by just two.

Awaking I wonder

Each morning I part

From the stranger in my heart.

This woman in my dreams

Does she also dream of me?

Chapter one: Sandy’s Dreams

Duke’s, a bar in downtown Albuquerque, is housed in a short in width, but long in length, building. The Fire Marshall sets the capacity at 75, but 50 fills it up nicely when the 50 are large and in charge Western men. The bar’s regulars include a few old power-houses of the business community and a few ranchers from around New Mexico. The proximity to the convention center provides foot traffic of guests from out of state. Duke’s isn’t the largest or trendiest establishment in the metropolitan area. If you are an up and coming rising star in the business or social world of Albuquerque, you will want to go elsewhere. If you are an established business owner, politician, or rancher, then you will go to Duke’s in order not to be seen. The game is never on. There is no live music. There is stable bar staff who will get to know you by name and, if you are a tipper, will pour stiff drinks.

After 10 p.m., when the regulars are gone and the tourists or out of towners are tired of the other bar scene, Duke’s is happening! It is usually over packed and noisy with music blaring from the stereo speakers. Sandy, the assistant manager for the last three years, is a stern, no-nonsense type of woman who believes in keeping control. She is usually successful. If not, she has established a good working relationship with the police patrol. The patrol routinely has concerns with other bars in the area in terms of over-serving, under-aged serving and narcotic trafficking. Precisely because they so seldom have that type of trouble with Duke’s and are grateful, police response to any issues at Duke’s is especially quick.

Sandy never thought she would be working in a bar let alone managing it, but she doesn’t mind working the long hours, closing shifts or even split shifts. Her requirements are that Monday through Friday she is at home when her daughter gets there from school.

It had been an adjustment three years ago to have her, then 12 year old daughter, stay alone at night by herself. The fact that Sandy is able to cook Isadora breakfast, help her prepare for school and can be there when she comes home from school makes it a better job than the clerical jobs she had worked in since moving to Albuquerque. Plus, she is a few blocks away in an emergency and the neighbors in the condominium complex keep an eye out for Isadora. Sandy likes that she works when Isadora is sleeping and naps when Isadora is at school. Still, rotating shifts, long hours on her feet and disjointed sleeping hours often leave this 46 year old single mother sleep deprived and tired.

This Saturday morning in May, Sandy leaves the bar in early morning. There is a verse repeating in her mind. It is the first poem she has ever written and it started with a strange dream.

When Sandy woke on Friday morning, she listened to see if Isadora was up. All was quiet in the condominium. Why in the hell was she awake so early? Sandy was used to waking up with a drowsy feeling of wanting to snooze, but forcing herself out of bed. This morning there was no drowsiness, no restless feeling of aches or pain, no memories of a dream-bad or good, no recollection of a noise – wind or a siren that might have roused her from her slumber. She had been sound asleep and now was awake. She decided to try and return to sleep. As she closed her eyes, her mind’s eye saw only blue.. Sandy had seen a green screen on a movie set she visited. The actors acted in front of a green screen where images could be portrayed onto the screen later. The image in her mind was that all around her was a sky blue. She did not notice a screen. She assumed it was a blue screen (like the green screen of the movie set) because it wouldn’t make sense for her to see everything against a background of blue unless she was looking at a blue screen. She saw a brief image of herself as a teenager, as if on display, on the blue screen. Her hair was the bright red it was in her youth. Then she faded. Words began to repeat over and over in her mind. Her brain was repeating words which she also saw displayed on the screen of blue in white blocked print. She felt a sense of urgency. It was really important that she remembered these words. Why else would her brain be repeating them? .Sandy sat up, turned on the reading light above her head, and grabbed the notebook she kept on the nightstand. She wrote the words down as if waking up and jotting down a grocery list. She wasn’t really aware that she was writing a poem. She simply wrote down the words she had seen on the screen.

When Isadora come home from school Friday afternoon Sandy asked the mother’s routine question: “how was school?” Isadora groaned, they had been studying poetry, so boring! Yes, Sandy thought, that was always her reaction to studying poetry.

Now, walking home from work Saturday morning and repeating the verse from her dream, the words are not a shopping list, but a poem that she wrote. Then, she stops. Did she write this poem? Did she conjure it up from some subconscious place she visited in her dreams. Did this poem come from her? No, more like it came through her. Through her describes it better. She ponders the verse, as she mentally repeats it. Is the poem any good? How in the Hell would she ever know?

Sandy stops short. The woman in his heart? It is a song of romantic love! She snorts in derision and continues her walk. She has never been in love. No way, no how. It was not something she wanted. Sandy’s has had relationships. Her daughter’s father had been married. Now, at her age, she likes to keep a younger man around. She makes no pretense that any of her relationships had ever been more than physical. Why did she write a poem of romantic love? The images of the woman in the poem are of her, but the sentiment and heart of the poem are from a man. . How could that be? How could she write from the point of view of a man? Is she so vain she imagines a man dreaming of her?

Sandy speeds up. She has reached a block on her path on which she dares not idle. The walk clears her brain. By the time she reaches home, she thinks “why does it matter?” It wasn’t her nature to think long on her dreams. Still, she felt a pride. It had been so long since she felt it, it seemed an alien emotion. Since her dance career ended, she has accomplished nothing more than raising her daughter on her own. Half the time she felt like her head was barely above water. From her or through her this poem was hers. Of course, it is about her. What she knows is herself. What other topic could she write about? Poetry are usually about love aren’t they? Or death or war or flowers? So, love it was.

The creative process! Sandy has always had creative people around her. She was a dancer when younger. Her daughter is the result of a love affair with a married choreographer. Her current boyfriend is a sculptor. Artists create without always knowing the reason for the creation.

Artist? Poet? Sandy wonders if she might create other poems. She hopes so. For now, as she prepares for bed, she repeats her verse softly out loud to herself. After every third or fourth time of mentally repeating the poem she thinks: I am a poet. She imagines what it would be like to tell people, “I work at a bar, but I am really a poet.”

Chapter Two: Dwayne’s Dreams

Dwayne is having beers with the drummer in his band, Henry, and some of Henry’s friends. This is the typical Wednesday hump day gathering for Henry and his friends to which Dwayne has an open invitation, but to which he comes only sporadically. The bar is a mega, select the game you want to watch establishment with televisions in every corner and a large screen for a featured game above the bar. The table of men are at the large round table in the middle of the bar. Dwayne came tonight because he wanted to talk about dreams. He guides the conversation. Did they ever dream of people they didn’t know? No, not celebrities or historical figures, but common people they had never seen and didn’t know who they were? Dwayne explains that recently he has been seeing a woman, the same woman, in his dreams every night. After some laughter and some questions related to what she was wearing, Henry says, “You have to have seen her before, you just don’t remember.” Henry says he just read something about it online. In dreams you remember things you couldn’t awake. They live in Los Angeles. How many people did they pass in the street each day? Dwayne presses because it seems like too easy of an answer. Why would one person randomly passed on the street show up in a dream? Is it something special about this woman? Does it mean that a person could have meant something more if he had consciously noticed her while walking by and stopped to talk to her? Could dreams mean more than what we typically think? Dwayne says he read that dreams were answers to questions we didn’t know we needed to ask. Or maybe he had heard that our dreams today answer questions we would only know to ask tomorrow. Dwayne avoids telling these men about his recent research on dreams and that these theories were based on the work of the psychologists Freud and Jung and the psychic, Edward Cayce. Dwayne hasn’t found the answers he is seeking in this research. He is hoping these men could provide more real world answers. He asks a more general question. When you dream what are your dreams about? These guys are used to talking sports, but not used to divulging personal information. In a very short time, the men are talking sex dreams.

Guys are bad enough exaggerating about their actual sexual activities. It is interesting they feel they have to embellish in their dreams as well. This conversation offers no answers to Dwayne’s questions. He mentally withdraws a little from the conversation and begins to look around the bar. He notices a leggy blonde, years younger than him, looking directly at him. Dwayne never really likes talking about sex. He doesn’t see the point. It is one of the topic areas that causes Dwayne to label himself as a social introvert. Sex is one of several topic areas which made him often feel like he is on the outside of a group looking in. No one else in a social gathering would see Dwayne as an outsider. He has a great sense of humor and an ability to make others feel comfortable and at ease. People are always happy when the charming and handsome Dwayne Hucks accepts an invitation to a party or a group event. It just that he doesn’t think that social gatherings like this are usually the best use of his time. These guys are nice enough to be around, but he doesn’t expect that he would ever get to the point with any of them, except Henry, that he would really call them his friend. Henry is his friend because they play together in the band. Dwayne thinks of all the people in his band as friends, but in the way he had always thought of team members in sports as friends. Most of the people he calls friends he doesn’t take the time to get to know well. When he takes the time to think about why he doesn’t have friends who he feels especially close to he always thinks that it is just the reality of being a guy. Few guys he knows ever talk to each other about anything real.

Dwayne’s one exception to this is another band member, Alex. Alex and Dwayne talk about music and that is as real as it gets for Dwayne. Alex never comes to Henry’s Wednesday night hump day gatherings. Dwayne and Alex see each other when the band plays or practices. During the eight weeks a year when the band travels on tour, Alex and Dwayne are constant companions.

Dwayne used to think of himself as a loner, but changed his self-label to social introvert. A loner is someone who avoids the company of others and prefers to be by himself. He is a song writer and a poet and he needs to experience people to write authentic songs. He is not a loner, but he often wants to be alone. He doesn’t think of himself as belonging to a group of friends or any one set of people; except for his band. So while Dwayne is not a loner, he is not by nature, a joiner.

The sex talk now reminds Dwayne, again, of the reason he feels like an outsider in social situations with other men. He has tried unsuccessfully for years to figure out why men like to talk about sex so much. The guys seem to be bragging about how often women ask them for sex. He has to admit there are some funny stories, but he doubts the accuracy of most of the stories. Henry gives Dwayne a knowing look, but Dwayne stays quiet. Henry knows that Dwayne gets more than his share. His band members often tease him about it. Dwayne has never been able to talk casually with men about sex. Someone makes a comment about Dwayne’s age and he gives them a funny reply. Dwayne thinks to himself that most of what young people think getting old means is all ass backwards. He is the oldest man in the group by twenty years probably. He will be fifty this summer, but he has as many physical needs as he has ever had and is enjoying sex just as much as he ever had. The leggy, younger blonde is still looking directly at him. She drinks from a straw seductively when she sees he notices her. She is wearing tight jeans and a tight black t-shirt. He does like black on a blonde woman. The more the men talk, the more he realizes he is probably getting more than any of them. Making fun of him for being older! A few funny comments run through his head, but why make them feel bad? What is the purpose in that?

Dwayne thinks to himself that the blonde cannot be thirty yet. He wonders if he should approach her. What the Hell? He excuses himself from the table of men and tells them he is going home. Of course, there are more comments about his age and needing to get to bed early. On his way out of the bar, he approaches the woman and invites her back there tomorrow night for a drink. He walks out of the bar wondering why guys talk about it so much when it is so easy just to do? Doesn’t it feel better to do than to talk about it?

Dwayne asks his neighbor, Eugene, as they jog the next morning, if he ever had people in his dreams he didn’t know? Are his dreams realistic or did he ever dream about a place he could not imagine? Eugene asks if he couldn’t imagine it, how could he dream it? It is a damn good question.

Thursday night Dwayne meets up with the tall blonde who turns out to be much younger than he had thought the night before; barely twenty two and a student at the college where he teaches. She is wearing a black low cut blouse and high stiletto shoes which makes her even a little taller than he is. As he sits down, he notices, peaking from under her blouse on the left shoulder, a star tattoo. It occurs to him that younger people think more openly about things in general and that this is an opportunity to question a younger person about dreams. He asks her, “Are you always in your dreams?” Her face indicates she is uncomfortable and he realizes he phrased it awkwardly. He tries to figure out if she could have interpreted it as a sexual innuendo and then tries to figure out what innuendo that might have been. He rephrases the question, “do you dream from a first person’s perspective?” She giggles and says she doesn’t understand what he means when he says first person. What are they teaching these kids in college these days? He realizes that the question is one only an older person would ask. This makes him think about exactly how young this woman is. He usually does not date women younger than 30 unless they made the first move. He remembers she had looked at him first, but still, she is really a child playing grown-up. He rephrases the question. “Do you dream like you are looking out of your own eyes or do you ever dream and see yourself? Are you an actor in your dream or an audience member simply looking on?” He didn’t really get an answer to these questions. When she decides she has to make an early night of it because of work the next day, he understands and thinks to himself that it is probably for the best.

He notices a different blonde woman, leggy and more age appropriate, looking at him and goes over to buy her a drink. There are plenty of leggy blondes in LA. He decides he better not talk about dreams anymore tonight, but to concentrate on other needs. It is not difficult for Dwayne to get female attention. He is tall, brown hair, brown eyes. His nose, passed on from his paternal side, is a little over sized for his face. Both he and his brother have all the same family traits and coloring. Yet people said his brother wasn’t nearly as handsome. He couldn’t figure it out. He looks just like his brother, but he is somehow more handsome? In his teen years, before he married at age 18, he had been readily seduced by women much older. Today he has scars, skin a little tough from too much sun, wrinkles at the eyes. People say it makes him more handsome and, in the last five years, younger women seem to like this older version of him. At the age of forty, he seldom attracted attention from women in their twenties. Now, approaching fifty, twenty-something year old women were trying to seduce him. He doesn’t quite understand why and is often embarrassed by it. People’s reaction to him had somewhat embarrassed him ever since he was a kid. People had always wanted to talk to him (young people and adults) as if being handsome made him more congenial and more interesting as a person. He always preferred books to people. For a while he had been irritated because he wanted so much to be smart and he didn’t think you could be handsome and intelligent. He realized, as he aged, that a person could be handsome and smart, but that you needed to hide the intelligence a little or people would find you intimidating.

Dwayne returns home from his “date” thinking about dreams. He is a little obsessed about dreams these days. His dreams have changed. His dreams had always been from a first person perspective: looking out through his eyes as he participated in the dream. His dreams had always been realistic as dreams go. He might dream that he was riding a bull even though he never had. He might dream he was back in the stock room of the restaurant where he lost his virginity 36 years ago, but the bull was a typical bull, the stock room looked like a stock room and the 20 year old waitress he lost his virginity to still looked the same. She hadn’t grown a third boob or anything. He had never dreamed he was walking on clouds, that the sky was orange, or that he had super-human powers. Before the last few weeks, his dreams had been normal; sometimes about the past or about something he wishes he had done differently. He had always been in his dreams and experienced them through his eyes.

He wonders if dreams change with age. There was nothing about that in the research, but it seems plausible. His dreams stay with him longer and he remembers the details; even though there are fewer details to remember. These days he dreams from an outside perspective. He is in his dreams. He can see himself, but he isn’t seeing through his dream’s self’s eyes. There is only one other person in his dreams; a tall woman. She is always moving just out of his vision. The world of his dreams is only the color blue surrounding him everywhere, the color blue in a world without shadows, hues or dimensions, an image of himself walking somewhere in the blue, and this woman in another area of the blue. The two of them never meet in his dreams. They are always in different parts of the blue world.

They are different ages at different times. He believes that, if this woman exists in real life, she is near his age. He isn’t sure why he thinks this. He sees himself at age 14 and he remembers the shirt he is wearing. He remembers the day he used his own money and picked it out himself. Geez, it was an ugly shirt. He sees himself older than he is today which he thinks is an interesting experience. He can always focus in his dreams to see himself. It is the woman he wants to see clearly, but she seems always to be turning her head or her body or floating to a different part of the blue just as he is focusing in on her. He sees her dancing. She wears her strawberry blonde hair in a bun. She is twirling and kicking. Professional dancer! She is sometimes blonder and closer to his age. Her body language is a little defeated. He sees her once sitting cross legged, yoga style, but she floats out of view. Only once has he seen her clearly. She is a teenager sleeping. Her hair is red, long and thick floating out from around her against the blue. She has such long legs and arms. It occurs to him he is staring at a teenager sleeping and he looks away. When he looks back, she is gone. He wants to see her more clearly; especially when she appears as his age. He wants the he in his dreams to see her and talk to her. He wants to know why he is suddenly having dreams of her.

He finds himself not concentrating as well as he should while teaching the music appreciation classes at the community college or while giving guitar lessons. He is glad the summer is almost here. In the summer his country band tours a little. They travel either to the Pacific Northwest or into the Southwest and Rocky Mountains. It is mostly during this time that he writes songs and poems. He gave up long ago on fame. He had a little taste of fame once and it almost destroyed him. Giving up on fame has not lessened his desire, his need, to perform and to write songs. In terms of the poetry, he thinks it is a little ridiculous; a man almost fifty and writing poetry. He couldn’t seem to stop though. How ridiculous to spend his time that way! He jokes that there ought to be a twelve step program for poets. Who would write poetry if they could avoid it?

It makes him happy just thinking about the summer. In the summers, he is his most authentic self. It is his reason for living. The only thing he feels great passion for are those eight weeks when he gets to travel, perform, write songs and, yes, poetry. He plays local bars year round and writes a little, but it is in the summer in the tour bus with the guys driving through a desert or through a mountain pass when he most feels like writing. He hasn’t written much in the last few weeks. He started a poem-wasn’t sure of the inspiration-but hadn’t seemed able to finish it.

He wrote the verse the morning after his first dream of the woman and the blue world.

In the darkness of a new moon,

I did not see her eyes take flight.

Her fright was hidden from my sight.

She hugged me once quite tight

Whispered I had asked too soon

Before she turned to flee

From me on bended knee.

Wasn’t sure why he had felt like writing about a proposal. His ex-wife had answered yes quickly, so this wasn’t a memory. He also didn’t understand why he couldn’t finish the poem. Seems like the next verse should be clear. The man would pursue the woman, try to find out why she was so afraid. Strange how he hadn’t written anything else since he had been having these dreams.

He isn’t sure why he is having these dreams now or why his dreams changed, but he tries to tell himself that it will turn out to be a good thing. Hell, they could drive him crazy as they have been or he could reckon them a good omen of the summer to come. He might as well be positive. The woman is sure to become clearer in his dreams and be the inspiration for one or two great songs. Why else would he be having these dreams? He thinks again about Jung, Freud and Cayce. Are dreams the answers to tomorrow’s questions or to today’s questions which he hadn’t known needed to be asked? If she is the answer, what is the question?

Dwayne thinks about the color blue. In his dreams the world is a sky blue. The more he thinks about it, the more he is sure the color blue will be part of his summer songs. There is a lot of imagery in the color blue and a lot of great rhymes. He gets ready for bed anticipating eagerly tonight’s dream.

Section 2: Blue

Blue was the color of his true love’s eyes

Which he once compared to a summer’s sky

In the days when they were young

And their love had just begun.

Blue was the color of the dress she wore

Which she said she had bought at a second hand store

On the afternoon that he got down on one knee

And she blushed and kissed him before she agreed.

Blue was the color of the quilt on the bed

He took off and folded on the day that they wed.

He waited for her under the sheets

And that first time he still remembered as sweet.

Blue was the color of that old guitar

The one that she claimed would make him a star.

The first thing he did was to write her a song.

That was a time when their love was strong.

Blue is the color of sun kissed skies

Blue is the color of my lover’s eyes

Blue is the color of hurt and pain

Blue is this song’s only refrain

Blue may be happy and sweet

But for me the line to repeat

Blue is the color of hurt and pain

Blue is this song’s only refrain

Blue was the color of the bruise on her hand

The day that she punched that little night stand-

So angry that he couldn’t seem to share

Thinking silence meant he didn’t care.

Blue was the color of the suitcase she packed

Before she told him that she wasn’t coming back.

She said he had grown so cold.

That was the time when their love was old.

Blue was the color of the ink when he signed

His marriage away on the signature line.

He knew his heart would mend.

It was time for the love to end.

Chapter 3: Why a country song?

Juanita picks Sandy up at the bar at 6 p.m. Sandy pulled a day shift this first Saturday in June due to an event at Civic Plaza which brought extra foot traffic to downtown Albuquerque. Isadora is at Juanita’s house with Juanita’s oldest daughter, Carmen, Juanita’s three younger children, and her husband, Bernie. It is the monthly ladies night out for Sandy and her best friend; except tonight it is ladies night in. Sandy wants to share the song she has written with Juanita.

Sandy was surprised when she woke up a few days ago not only with a rhyming, pretty poem, but with a melody, tune and percussion beat in her brain. She didn’t wake up with her brain saying the words. She woke up with her brain singing the words and both words and musical notes written in white on a blue screen. Sandy was stunned. It took a few minutes after waking for her to comprehend this accomplishment.

Sandy’s knowledge and interest in music is long in the past. At the age of six, Sandy had been enrolled in ballet and piano lessons. The ballet lessons, from her mother’s point of view, would allow Sandy to have grace of movement as an adult. The piano lessons served to assure that Sandy could entertain her parents’ guests at holidays and other social occasions and, by such, allow Sandy to be seen and exclaimed over before being sent away to her room. Sandy’s mother believed that, by enrolling Sandy in these classes, sending her to private school where she would learn French and art history, and by taking her to Episcopalian services on Sunday, she was fulfilling all her maternal obligations to assure that Sandy could marry well. Her father’s name, money, and connections fulfilled his paternal obligations to secure the same outcome. The world was changing in the mid-seventies, but Sandy’s parents lived the type of insulated privileged life-style that sheltered them from having to accept those changes. At the age of fifteen, Sandy informed her mother that she was through with piano lessons. She wanted to replace them with modern dance. Her mother thought she was indulging her daughter’s teen-age rebellion and agreed. Sandy didn’t see dance as rebellion. She saw it as living. There was something about dance that made Sandy feel alive. Typically Sandy felt numb. Her world, so full of privilege, only provided Sandy with custodial care. Her parents were emotionally distant and she had learned early that displays of emotion would only lessen her parents’ willingness to interact with her. She learned not to depend on anybody and to restrain her emotions, but dance was a physical release for the feelings she couldn’t otherwise display. She majored in dance in college with a minor in music theory. Her parents paid little attention as they assumed after college she would marry one of the suitors interested and approved by her father. When, instead, Sandy quickly became a professional dancer in New York, they were dismayed. When she became a single mother, they were forced to consider if they could adjust to the modern social realities of the new millennium or find a way to retreat into a continuation of their distorted, privileged reality. Their simple and obvious decision was to disown Sandy and pretend that they never had a daughter or a grandchild.

Sandy reads music well. This is a skill that stayed with her from the piano lessons, that she had honed in college, and served her well in her career as a dancer. Conversing with professional musicians about the musical accompaniment and demonstrating her knowledge of music theory helped with networking and opened up some doors. When she found herself in Albuquerque with her dance days behind her, any interest in music stopped. She knows people who surrounded themselves with music, but Sandy sees no point in music that isn’t accompanied by dance. Forced to listen to different genres of popular music at the bar, she is nothing but annoyed. Popular music, she thinks, seems to be about escapism and Sandy’s form of escapism is still the physical: yoga, bicycling, jogging, kick-boxing, and sex with her younger partner, Mike. An occasional Zumba class is the closest she got these days to a personal connection to music or to dance.

It has been twelve years almost to the day since Sandy left New York in a used car with her three old daughter to drive to Los Angeles. A former dance partner offered her a job in his studio teaching dance lessons to children. A move to LA was a drastic and desperate attempt to become a healthy human being. Sandy was still dancing professionally in New York, but knew that her time was short. Still, she could have found a job teaching in New York. The motivation for the move was cowardice. She knew the only way she could get away from the married man who did not acknowledge his daughter, but still wanted a good time with Sandy, was if she got clear across country from him. It is not at all that he wouldn’t let her go, but that she couldn’t let him go. She had to make it impossible for herself to give in to her own temptations. The used car she had purchased for $5000 in New York died in Albuquerque and needed $3000 worth of work. Juanita was working as a clerk in the mechanic’s shop where Sandy pulled in. She invited Sandy and her daughter to spend the night with her and her family. They had been best friends ever since.

Sandy was just going to stay in Albuquerque long enough to get back on her feet and out to LA. Twelve years later and now Albuquerque is just home. Isadora will be graduating high school in three years. Juanita’s oldest daughter, Carmen, had been in Isadora’s pre-school, elementary and now high school.

When Sandy woke up having written a song in her sleep, the feeling of accomplishment and pride was even stronger than when she had written a poem. Sandy quickly pushed questions about why she had written a song to the back of her brain. Isolating the questions she didn’t want to ask herself was as easy as restraining her emotions had become over her 46 years. The feeling of pride and accomplishment is not something she wants to restrain. Her song needs to be shared with someone and who else would she share it with then the only person she had ever dared to lean on- her best friend, Juanita.

Juanita had helped Sandy find her first job in Albuquerque, had told her what neighborhoods to avoid when selecting apartments, had helped her learn the bus system and its limitations. Sandy is ten years older than Juanita. When they met Juanita had been a young mother barely in her twenties and Sandy was in her thirties, but it was Juanita who had been the guide and mentor. Twelve years later, Juanita has three additional children- 10 and 7 (girls) and 5 (a boy).

Juanita worries about Sandy. It is the dynamics of their friendship that was fully established on the day Sandy and the three year old Isadora drove into the mechanic’s shop with no money for car repairs and nowhere to stay in Albuquerque. Juanita had thought about what she would do without a husband or family stranded in another city and had decided to be their guardian angel. Now she knows Sandy well enough to know that only sheer desperation would have allowed Sandy to accept help, but she has always, ever since, accepted help and criticism from Juanita. Why now, Juanita thinks, has Sandy written a song? It is so unlike her.

The friends eat Frito pie and drink a margarita while sitting on Sandy’s balcony overlooking the downtown area. Sandy tells Juanita about the app she found where the piano and percussion beat could be entered and the song would play back. It was Juanita who bought her friend a tablet last Christmas and encouraged her to move into the 21st century.

Juanita: I didn’t even know you played the piano.

Sandy: I did when I was young.

Juanita: How long since you played?

Sandy: About fifteen.

Juanita: You haven’t played since Isadora was born?

Sandy: No, I haven’t played since I was fifteen.

Juanita: You haven’t played in over 30 years?

Sandy is familiar with Juanita’s worry look, but Sandy doesn’t understand why Juanita is wearing it now. Why would Sandy writing a song cause Juanita to worry?

The friends go inside and pour another round of margaritas. Sandy pushes the play button on the app and begins to sing. She is unaccustomed to hearing herself sing. She hopes she is singing this song well enough so her friend could imagine what is would sound like if someone who could sing was singing it. Juanita likes the song- a lot, but hearing the song only increases her worry for her friend. As surprised as Juanita was about Sandy writing a song at all, she is more surprised after hearing the song. It is so unlike Sandy. Sandy teases Juanita about crying at sad movies. The only way Juanita can convince Sandy to go see romantic comedies is by agreeing to buy her the largest tub of popcorn possible and by giving her permission to make fun of the movie after. Despite the popular music Sandy hears nightly at the bar, she never seems familiar with any of the songs or artists. Sandy has absolutely no interest in country music, popular music or romantic notions. It is the type of song of which Sandy would usually make fun, but now suddenly has decided to create.

Juanita: You wrote a country song. Why?

Sandy: Well, it just kind of came out that way.

Juanita: You don’t like country music. You don’t even like songs with words. I kind of thought you had written something more highbrow.

Sandy: This just seemed like it was a good country theme. I can’t really imagine I would know how to write a classical composition.

Juanita finishes her margarita to give her a chance to think. Sandy is eager to hear her friend’s impression, but is trying not to push her. She wants an honest impression of her song and so does not want her friend to know how much she hopes she likes it. Juanita still has that worried expression. Sandy understands now why Juanita’s children always seem to confess their wrong doings when confronted by Juanita. It is that expression! Juanita is studying Sandy and trying to prompt, if not a confession, at least a more complete explanation.

Juanita: So why the color blue?

Sandy: What?

Juanita: You always wear red. Red is your favorite color. Why not red was the color of my true love hair, of the dress that she wore, or the sunset or the blanket. Why blue?

Sandy: What’s wrong with blue?

Juanita: It’s not that there is anything wrong with blue, but why blue?

Sandy: I think it is supposed to symbolize sadness. This is a sad song so it is a blue song, but all these other things are also blue.

Juanita: You think?

Sandy: Yes, it’s strange. It’s like I had to figure out why I had written it after I wrote it, but artists create work and sometimes don’t recognize the symbolism until later. Mike tells me that all the time about his sculptures.

Juanita: Is the song about him?

Sandy (vehemently): no.

Juanita: Who is it about? Did you meet someone new?

Sandy: No. It’s just made up. I decided it was more interesting from a male’s perspective.

Juanita: But how about the story? You were never married. This is a song about divorce. Why the reference to the guitar? Did you play the guitar, too?

Sandy: I made it all up.

Juanita: The woman with the bruised hand from hitting the night stand is pretty specific. Where did that come from?

Sandy: I made it all up.

Sandy is weary of Juanita asking for a more detailed explanation. Sandy doesn’t know how to explain about waking up with a poem\and now a song fully written in her brain. She doesn’t want to tell anyone about the blue screen in her dreams. Besides what is the explanation anyway except that Sandy created a song while she slept. The brain is an amazing thing and the sleep and dream world can be very creative. The questions Juanita are asking makes it hard for Sandy to keep her own questions isolated and away from the front of her thoughts. Sandy wants to keep the pride at the foreground of her thoughts instead of the questions. It seems best not to question the process too much. She just wants to be proud and to share her accomplishment with her best friend. There is no other explanation than this and Sandy only knows what she knows which is that she wrote this song. She doesn’t want to analyze it beyond that.

Juanita is glad to see her friend, usually so in control of her emotions, excited about this song, but as happy as Juanita wants to be for Sandy, her sense of responsibility for Sandy’s protection is winning out. Juanita had just been telling her husband that Sandy and Isadora have no one else to watch out for them except for Juanita and Bernie. Juanita has felt since she met Sandy that Sandy is too self-reliant and, yet, never fully realizes how vulnerable she is to life’s circumstances. No family and driving across country in a rundown car with a three year old! What would have happened to them if they hadn’t pulled into the mechanic’s shop where Juanita had been a clerk? They might have ended up homeless. Even now, what would happen to Isadora if Sandy got sick? Juanita hates to think of Sandy closing the bar and walking home in the early hours of the morning as if she is invulnerable to harm. Sandy is so self-reliant and yet so stupid about how dangerous it is to be so damn independent. Juanita is trying to decide if there is a danger or trouble in Sandy’s life that she might not be telling her. Why would her friend suddenly become, not just a songwriter, but a romantic country songwriter? There is more to this than Sandy is telling and Juanita feels she owes it to her friend to dig a little deeper.

Juanita: How long did it take you to write it?

Sandy: Only about fifteen minutes. I know that sounds crazy but the whole thing took me about fifteen minutes to write down the lyrics and imagine how the song would sound. It took longer to figure out how to use the app, but in terms of writing the actual song, it took about fifteen minutes.

Juanita has a practiced expression that she uses when she is shocked by something that her children or her spouse has told her, but doesn’t want them to know she is shocked. She struggles to keep that expression on her face now. WTF? Sandy has never written anything in her life and in fifteen minutes she imagined this whole story, the rhymes, the melody and music. It is just not possible. Why would Sandy lie? Juanita is even more nervous for her friend and decides that the shortest distance to truth is often alcohol. Juanita goes into the kitchen and grabs the bottle of tequila and two shot glasses.

Juanita: I think your first song deserves a shot.

Sandy: Straight?

Juanita: Damn, Sandy, you wrote a country song from a man’s perspective about all the things blue in his life.

Sandy can’t tell if Juanita is making fun of her or not, but takes the shot, clinks the glass with Juanita, and shoots it back. She makes a face. Sandy typically only drinks margaritas or sunrises and only because tequila is Juanita’s drink. Since working at the bar, Sandy has lost much of whatever desire she might have had for alcohol. She has seen too many sloppy drunks. These days her only social drinking is this once a month girls date with Juanita. Sandy goes into the kitchen for some lime and salt when she sees Juanita is pouring two more shots.

Juanita: When was the last time we really hit the tequila?

Sandy: Oh, I think you had a few and spent the night right after you weaned Miguel. Would that have been four years ago?

Juanita: Long past time for another sleep over. Isadora is planning on spending the night at my place. She and Carmen can help Bernie with the kids. Why don’t I spend the night?

Sandy: Really?

Juanita: I think we have something to celebrate.

Sandy smiles and bites into a lime. She and Juanita used to be more spontaneous before Juanita had three additional children. Now they have such a routine. It is nice to do something a little different and she does have something to celebrate! Juanita has not been as enthusiastic about the song as Sandy might have liked, but is glad she sees it as something to celebrate. The friends have a few more shots and before long they are giggling like their teenage daughters. They talk about the time they met, how they became instant friends and argue over stories about riding the bus together for the first year they knew each other. Sandy remembers the bus driver having the crush on Juanita and Juanita is sure the crush was on Sandy. Juanita reminds Sandy of the time she took that job as a telemarketer. Worse job ever! Sandy tells Juanita how happy she is now working at the bar the last few years since she feels like she can be home when Isadora needs her most. Juanita says becoming a stay at home mom when Miguel was born was the best thing she had ever done, but now that he was going to school in the fall she would need to think about returning to work.

A couple of hours later, Sandy finds Juanita a shirt for her to wear to sleep and gets into her own two piece light pajamas. Juanita calls and make the arrangements with Bernie. The friends settle into the opposite ends of the couch; their feet crossing in the middle. Even though Sandy and Juanita still see each other a couple of times a month, Sandy misses the days when her and Juanita could be more spontaneous. Those first years in Albuquerque were a bit of normal after a life of strange in New York where life was obsession about her career and her married lover. Sandy hadn’t known she could take so much satisfaction just watching television, gossiping while their toddlers played, exercising while the kids took naps. Such great times! Her mind turns to the future. Sandy hopes Isadora will stay at home and go to community college, but when Isadora turns 18, she could easily decide to move out. Sandy wonders how many years it would be before she became a grandmother. Sandy is starting to drift off to sleep when Juanita decides it is time to ask some direct questions.

Juanita: How’s Mike?

Sandy: Fine

Juanita: Work?

Sandy: Same.

Juanita: Everything ok with Isadora?

Sandy: What’s with the questions?

Juanita: I think you might be depressed.

Sandy: What?

Juanita: Think about it- a blue song about a man who’s even more alone than you. It’s a good song, but a really depressing song.

Sandy: Excuse me? I’m not that alone. It’s a country song. It’s supposed to be sad.

Juanita: Have you seen a doctor lately? You know some women your age start menopause.

Sandy: Shit, Juanita. You think instead of having hot flashes I’m going to start writing songs.

Juanita: I’m just saying- why from a man’s perspective? You’ve always want to have more control in your life. Maybe this is your way of asserting your authority. You think people will pay more attention if you speak from a male’s voice. Or maybe you finally realize that it’s time you had a man to take care of you.

Sandy is no longer sleepy. She sits up straight and looks at her friend. They say alcohol could get to the truth of a matter, but she doesn’t like the truth her friend is hinting at. Sandy thinks of her life as just fine. Is Juanita insinuating that she is a loser because she doesn’t have a man? Sandy has never needed anyone; not her parents and not a man. Sandy had watched her mother and her mother’s friends sacrifice their identities and their decision making to their husbands. She had decided long ago that this was not going to be her fate.

Sandy: I think no more tequila for you.

Juanita: I’ve been hydrating for an hour now. Sandy, I don’t want to offend you, but think about your life for a minute. Can’t you see your own pattern of behavior? You haven’t had a real adult relationship since Isadora’s father and that wasn’t a healthy one at all. He wasn’t anyone you could rely on. Mike is 12 years younger than you. Why would you date such a younger man if it wasn’t for control? What kind of life mate is he?

Sandy: He isn’t. I don’t need a life mate. I need a man for sex.

Juanita: You know sometimes people fall in love and still have sex.

Sandy: With Mike the sex is as hot as it gets. I am in my mid-forties and I am dating a 34 year old, fucking hot man. When I was 30, I was dating Isadora’s father because he was a fucking hot 34 year old man. There is just something about that age which is perfect for sex. They are mature and experience enough, but they still want to do it all the time. You know, I have tried to keep myself in shape and that means I can still attract a 34 year old man.

Juanita: Just because you can doesn’t mean you have to.

Sandy: I’m a woman who likes to fuck. It’s like when you dance or bike or kick-box. You feel alive then. I like to fuck and I might as well be fucking a 34 year old man. Why would I give that up for some old, washed up, sexually spent life mate?

Juanita wants to say something smart and sarcastic about Sandy’s monologue ode to sex and hot 34 year old men. However, she wanted alcohol to bring out the truth and Sandy is just being honest. Juanita has always admired how physically fit and attractive Sandy is and knows that Sandy works at staying fit. Sandy is a more physical being than Juanita. Maybe sex means more to Sandy than it does to her. Juanita can see that. Still, the time will come when Sandy isn’t going to attract the younger man anymore. It might come sooner than Sandy realizes. What will her life be like in three years when her daughter would be gone and the sex might be gone? What would her best friend’s life be like then?

Juanita: My husband is 34 and most nights I just wish he would go away and take care of it himself. Aren’t you voicing the man’s point of view? Younger men want older women. Older men want younger women. You are a woman who I know could benefit from love. Don’t roll your eyes. Don’t you want to find someone to grow old with? You might need someone to lean on someday.

Sandy: I can lean on myself. There’s a part of me that envies you and Bernie finding each other in high school, but I’m already old. I’m too old to find that man who I can lean on.

Juanita: It’s not too late. You could join a singles club.

Sandy: I would rather shoot myself. It’s so much like putting yourself on the market. Might as well have a sign saying I can’t take care of myself.

Juanita: I think the problem is that you are too proud of being so self-reliant. It’s like you are afraid to have someone take care of you. You think you would be giving something up, but everyone has to give something up to get something back.

Sandy: I’m ok. I’m used to taking care of myself and Isadora.

Juanita: Isadora’s father must have been some piece of work for you to still be alone after all this time.

Sandy: I have Mike. I’m not lonely.

Juanita: But you just said you only have Mike for sex. Isadora doesn’t even know about him. Sex is grand, but where will that get you in the long run? A time will come when having someone to hold is more important than someone to fuck. You don’t want to wait forever. Why don’t you take up country line dancing? Maybe that’s the reason for writing a country song. Cowboys are hot. Find yourself a cowboy.

Sandy thinks of the cowboy types who are so plentiful in Albuquerque. She thinks of the real Cowboys, the ranchers, who are regulars at the bar and the want to be cowboys who sometime wander in. The younger ones are always braggarts. The older ones take off their wedding rings. She certainly didn’t need another married man. Young or old, the cowboy type all seem to like the bottle a little too much. She likes listening to them talk to each other. They could be awfully funny with each other, but they never seemed to talk to women in a way that was natural. They liked each other’s company, but really only liked the company of women for one reason. Sandy realizes the hypocrisy of that thought as soon as she thinks it. Isn’t that the speech she had just given Juanita about the only reason she needed a man?

Sandy tries to imagine finding a cowboy type to settle down with and what that would really mean. Sandy imagines herself cooking. The man watches television. There is no real conversation between them. They have sex on birthdays and Valentine day. Just to say she had someone! Well, a cowboy is the last man she would ever end up with. She shivers at the thought of having to worry about a man, but not getting anything of meaning back from the relationship. Cowboys! For the first time the questions she has been avoiding asking herself comes rushing unanswerable to the front of her mind. The primary question? Why in the hell did I write a country love song?

Chapter 4: The Country Song Writer

The Lonely Players end their evening at their regular bar gig in the valley with Johnny, the Lead Singer, introducing the band members before singing the song everybody wants to hear: “The First Time”. The bar is full for the last night of the band before the summer tour. Tonight is a bittersweet moment for Johnny. The band plays the lead up to the song.

Johnny: I’m Johnny Agnew, it’s been my pleasure to sing for you tonight. On bass we have Tom Carson. On drums we have Henry Edwards. The old man of the group with more energy than any of us who currently is playing steel guitar, but who you have seen playing banjo, fiddle and a little bit of everything tonight, Alexander Francis Gregory. And our fearless lead guitarist, as well as leader of the band and songwriter extraordinaire who wrote the song you are about to hear: Dwayne Hucks.

The audience cheers when Dwayne comes forward and wails for a few minutes on the guitar, but as Dwayne backs away and plays the familiar three chord intro to his most famous song, the applause, as usual, is the loudest of the night. Then Johnny sings his final song with The Lonely Players.

The band has played together for six years. For the last five, they have spent eight weeks out of every summer on the road. , The band has a pretty strong following both in their local area and in the towns where they travel during the summer. They have a quality sound. Plus, there is Dwayne’s celebrity status. Dwayne wrote the song he is known for over twenty years ago. A country legend recorded it in the nineties and made it a hit. It has been covered by just about everyone and the band plays it nightly along with one or two other songs people might have heard of that Dwayne wrote in his Nashville days. They always incorporate some of Dwayne’s newer music and then they do crowd favorite country covers; new and old.

Dwayne is the band leader and the best known of the band. The heart and soul of the band, though, is Dwayne’s best friend, Alex. Alex is somewhere between sixty and seventy years old and sees no reason to be specific, but he has been between those milestones since the band formed six years ago. He grew up with music in his blood in New Orleans. He relocated to LA following Katrina. He doesn’t talk much about it except to say he just didn’t want to be in New Orleans any longer. He has never been legally married and, to the best of his knowledge, has no children. He has three loves: music, cooking and basketball in that order. Sometimes he adds a fourth love: giving Dwayne shit. Mostly he gives him shit about being an “intellectual”. Dwayne has a PH.D in music history with a specialty in Appalachian root music. He is originally a city boy from Louisville, Kentucky. He thought he would be a full time professor at one point, but minor success in Nashville led him astray. Dwayne wrote his doctorate dissertation on: The Evolution of the Dulcimer. Dwayne and Alex are constantly battling about the dulcimer. Dwayne wants Alex to play the dulcimer; just one or two songs. Alex says no, he doesn’t play the dulcimer, and teases Dwayne that only intellectuals like him think that the dulcimer is a real folk instrument. Dwayne argues that since Alex can play anything, there is no reason why he can’t play the dulcimer. The argument is one they have had many times in the back of the tour bus long after all the other guys have stretched out for naps.

The two men could talk for hours about music. Dwayne loves hearing about the Cajun music Alex grew up around. Dwayne opens up with stories about the Appalachian root music he grew to love while in graduate school. Dwayne has met many similar old timers during his years in Nashville, but, since moving to Los Angeles, Alex is the only person Dwayne has met who seems to love the music as much as Dwayne. Alex and Dwayne are kindred spirits on the road and both men look forward to their summers. The rest of the band members are in their twenties. They are LA born and bred. As Dwayne thinks and plans for the upcoming tour season, he thinks the rest of the guys are good guys, especially Henry, but are they serious about the music?

Dwayne and Alex often talk about the fact that being in a band is a little like being on a sports team: each player has their role and relies on their team members. Dwayne and Alex never argue about the best sports team in history. Both men are clear that there has never been a better team than the Showtime Lakers from the eighties. Alex likes to think of himself as Kareem, the old man on the team, and Dwayne as Magic. It is a ridiculous piece of conceit, but lately it has been on Alex’s mind a little more. Alex had read that in Kareem’s last two years he had pushed Magic to stretch himself more; become an even better player and not rely on past success. Alex believes that Dwayne could be a country star and, the rare thing in country music, a star on his own terms. He knows Dwayne had some bad years in Nashville, but thinks it is time for him to get back in the music game for real. What the Lonely Players have been doing is more of a hobby than anything else. Alex believes Dwayne can be as big of a star as anybody. In the last week, Alex has developed a plan that might motivate his friend to perform at the level of which he is capable. As the tour season approaches, Alex feels a great deal of investment in this plan. About a month ago, Alex had a routine checkup, followed by a bunch of tests, followed by the awkward conversation when his doctor informed him of his pending death. Alex has about four good months left. For those four months, he will feel good most days and no one will know he is ill, but after that he should expect a fast decline. There is a possible treatment, but it is experimental and he would need to begin immediately. Then the four good months would be lost as the treatment would likely make him feel sick enough to wish himself dead.

Alex doesn’t have to think before turning down the treatment. Perhaps, if he had been diagnosed at a different time of year? The timing of the thing has to mean something. Alex wants a last eight weeks on the road with his best friend’s band. He wants to see if he could improve his friend’s “game” enough to change his friend’s fate. He wants to see Dwayne back in the music game for real before Alex dies. Alex is determined to accomplish that without telling Dwayne his news. There will be time enough for that after the eight weeks. Why spoil these last eight weeks for himself or Dwayne? About a week ago, the lead singer, Johnny, took Alex into his confidence with his news on leaving the band. Johnny wanted advice on how to tell Dwayne. Alex heard Johnny’s news and thought to himself that sometimes destiny puts all the cards into play.

Alex has thought long and hard about his friend’s temperament and habits. He has concluded that Dwayne is complacent about playing the “game” in the same old way. The best way to engage Dwayne to improve his performance is to challenge him to change the sound of the band. Doesn’t even matter how the sound will change, Alex thinks, that isn’t the point. The sound they have now is fine, but Dwayne has played it much too long. It is the act of reinvention that Alex believes is needed to challenge Dwayne. Before Dwayne will be excited, he will need to be just a little afraid of failure. Nothing gets a person to succeed quite like the fear of failure. With Johnny’s news, Alex has a second challenge for Dwayne. Dwayne needs to build his confidence in his voice and confidence in his ability to be a front man.

Dwayne often thinks about the fact that he is a very minor celebrity in a town abundant with real celebrities, near celebrities and want to be celebrities. Everyone in LA seems to be only interested in moving up, down, running to stay in their spot. Dwayne hadn’t moved to LA for a celebrity status. A few weeks before he graduated with his doctorate and a teaching position already offered, a country music legend called to say he wanted to record “The First Time”. He offered Dwayne a spot in his band and an opportunity to write more songs. Dwayne’s Nashville years began. They ended ten years later when Dwayne, tired of the lifestyle he had created for himself, decided to move to LA, start an extensive exercise regime, and settle for a lifestyle that allowed him to make music and hit the road in the summer. He might be the only person to move to LA to get away from fame and a drug dependent life-style. Somehow Dwayne just knew he would live healthier in the sun. Most importantly, he would still to be able to play the music he wanted. Los Angeles has been good for Dwayne in accomplishing these goals.

From time to time Dwayne is contacted about joining up and coming bands. He is still well known enough to play an occasional concert with a star when one he knows from the past travels through LA, but Dwayne likes being the one in charge of his band. It is the music he loves. He doesn’t need the moving up and down. He has his royalty checks, his job at the college nine months a year, his guitar lessons, occasionally writes travel or music reviews for a local magazine, sometimes even gets a paycheck for a poem he writes. Dwayne understands he will never be wealthy, but life has its moments in this simple world of his.

Two weeks from now they will be on the road. Gigs are lined almost every night through California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico and Colorado. This is the route for this year. Some years they would travel more Oregon, Washington State, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. He likes to vary it so he can see different scenery. They play small venues; never more than 200 in the audience. Sometimes they play a festival in a bigger city; usually before the second stage headliner. Those are fun with larger crowds and a carnival atmosphere.

Whatever money Dwayne saves during the year is gone at the end of the eight weeks. Dwayne pays for the bus and the gas himself. He arranges college credit for a couple of interns to act as roadies. The gigs pay for rooms, expenses and minimal money to the band. He can’t pay what most of the band members earn in their day jobs and realizes most of the boys are losing money. They are taking vacation days or unpaid leave for the experience. At the end of the eight weeks, the business end of the band always has a loss, not a profit. Dwayne is the business owner of the band and takes the hit. Whatever, Dwayne thinks, for the business of being a band owner. This is his life- what he lives for- all that matters. His life could be summed up into the eight weeks of the year on the road performing and, hopefully, writing songs. These are the eight weeks that make the mediocrity of his life worth it. It is ok that he teaches community college after once being on his way to teach at a major university with a tenure track. It is ok giving guitar lessons instead of playing with great musicians. It is even ok that he writes music reviews and travel guides for LA magazines after having been published years ago in scholarly journals and with the dream of writing academic books. This is his life now and it is all ok as long as he has the eight weeks on the road.

Dwayne is 49 years old. He will turn 50 on the road. He is a little over six feet tall. His brown hair is still full and wavy. Women often remark about his dark brown eyes and long eyelashes. He is in the best shape he has been in since his early twenties. He jogs every morning, bikes as his primary means of transportation, lifts weights and boxes three times a week to keep his upper body strength maintained. He eats healthy, drinks alcohol, but not to excess, and hasn’t used any drugs in ten years. More recently he picked up a new hobby. A woman had taken him salsa dancing on a date. They had been out only a couple of times, but he found out that he liked dancing. Now he finds himself going to salsa bars or country bars for a little dancing once or twice a week. None of that line dancing for him. Dwayne likes dancing with a partner. He enjoys it when a woman could anticipate where he would lead her or swing her. He thinks of it a little like sex. Performance isn’t the goal, but a good performance always results in increased pleasure and sometimes one partnership would lead to another.

The crowd at the bar is heading home after last call. Several regulars come up and wish the band good luck on their tour. The next week will be about getting ready. Dwayne has arranged a vacant music room at the community college for weekend days of rehearsal. The week between typically allows the younger guys to put in overtime at their jobs and spend time with their girlfriends or wives.

Johnny asks Dwayne if they can step out back for a talk. Alex realizes Johnny is giving Dwayne the news. Outside in the back of the building, Johnny lights a cigarette.

Dwayne: Don’t know why a singer would ever smoke, Johnny. You sounded good tonight.

Johnny: There’s no easy way to say this. Stella’s pregnant.

Dwayne: Shit, man, congrats or I’m sorry?

Johnny: Been married for three years. Time, I guess. I think she decided it was time, but she said she just forgot. We wanted kids eventually.

Dwayne: Well, congrats.

Johnny: You know what it means.

Dwayne: It means all kinds of things. What specifically?

Johnny: I have to quit the band.

Dwayne: When is she due?

Johnny: Too soon for me to save up the money I will need. My employers have been good about giving me time for the road, but it’s eight weeks I’m losing out on money- and the vacation I do get- I will need that for the due date. I can’t be traveling eight weeks with you.

Dwayne: You’re quitting now? We already have gigs set up. I can’t find another singer and get them up to speed that quickly.

Johnny: You don’t have to. I already checked with the other guys. You should take over as lead singer. It would save that extra money and the sound would be better.

Dwayne: Except I’m not a singer; back-up, maybe.

Johnny: You are thinking old school. These days it’s the looks of the lead more than voice. You are handsome. You have an authentic style. You know your songs come across best when you sing them. The time I got laryngitis and you filled in- our crowd doubled the next night. Move those hips, shake that ass, that’s all you need.

Dwayne: Stop looking at my ass, you faggot.

Johnny: Stella is constantly telling me how she would do you.

Dwayne: Well, let me know if the kid looks like me…Seriously, I can’t sing well enough to be lead. This is about the music. I’m not trying out for any boy band.

Johnny: People like a singer who struggles a little. Your own songs have the right emotion when you sing them. “The First Time” -I can’t approach the original and neither can you, but when you sing it, people hear it anew even though they have heard it 100 times before.

Dwayne: I hate singing that damn song. Give me a month on the road. We can audition, hire before we go. He’ll learn from you on the road. I will fly you back.

Johnny: What do I tell Stella? What’s in it for me? You always say you don’t want to record. It’s not about fame.

Dwayne: Remember, I’ve been there.

Johnny: But then for the rest of us this is a hobby. It’s been great. I met Stella here at this very bar, but I have to grow up. Even for a month – leave her pregnant and lose four weeks of pay, hell, now?

Dwayne hears the voice of his ex-wife asking about starting a family. He doubts the decision he made every day and at least he made that decision for fame and fortune. What choice did Johnny have really? Dwayne shakes his hand and wishes him the best.

Inside the other band members are waiting to push an agenda with Dwayne. Alex has told them Johnny’s news and has already talked them into the fact that Dwayne should be the lead singer. More than that, he has persuaded them that they needed to change the sound. Alex hasn’t shared the true reasons with any of the band. Alex is just pretty good at convincing people that his ideas are actually their ideas. Alex has the two week-ends and week between before the band leaves to get Dwayne to raise his performance and then the eight weeks on the road to make Dwayne a star. Somehow this parting “gift” to his friend, if he could be successful, will give his death some meaning. The other band members are simply convinced that their sound has grown old. Dwayne walks back in and realizes that a mutiny of sorts is in the works. Dwayne tells them repeatedly that he simply cannot sing well enough to be a lead singer.

Alex: Willie Nelson can’t really sing.

Henry: Bob Dylan- Garth Brooks sang one of his songs and then Adele- neither do it as well as he does even though they are both better singers.

Tom- Hell, actors are writing their own songs, recording albums, going on the road. If they are famous and handsome and can shake their ass, then that’s what they need. You’re handsome. You have a good ass.

Dwayne – You all are way too impressed with my ass. I ain’t Willie, Dylan or any damn actor.

Alex- You are a song writer and audiences likes it when the singer is also the songwriter. We’ve been thinking that we would enjoy it more if we could vary it a bit. We want to make our shows mostly originals with less covers. The covers we do we want to do more Hank or Cash- and we want to add different sounds; maybe a little Working Man Dead. I’ve been working on my fiddle-maybe some heavier fiddle-do a couple of instrumentals.

Dwayne: Who exactly is in charge of this band?

Alex: Put it this way, we can do it your way- find a new singer- stick to the plan the way it has always been. We will do it that way one last time for old time sake, but we all agree then that it will be our last year together. You could find other members for next year, but as stubborn as you are about change, you will like new band members less than you might like being lead singer. Try it our way this time and whatever you want to do next year or the next, I’ll stick by you.

Tom: Me too.

Henry: Hell, I’m not married and I’m snipped. I could do this with you forever.

Alex wonders if this would be the lie that would tip the balance and send him to Hell. It is his last summer with the band anyway. It is his last summer of his life. He is determined that this summer they are going to do things his way.

In the six years Dwayne has known Alex he has never seen him set his chin that way, hold his mouth that way. Really? He wants to change the sound that much? The other band members all seem determined as well. Dwayne thinks, how do we change the sound and pull off having me sing with the tour about to start. These eight weeks are his life. What really are the options if they all want it this much? Dwayne nods. Guess he just became the front man. Better learn to shake his damn ass.

Chapter 5: Arrogant Self-Reliance

Sandy opens the door to her house Sunday morning at 4 a.m. after a long Saturday night at the bar. Isadora is almost asleep on the couch watching the Spencer Tracey’s version of the movie “Father of the Bride”. Saturday night, when Sandy called from work to see what Isadora was doing, she was watching the Steve Martin’s version. Next week is the last week of class and Monday Isadora has a paper due. She has procrastinated until the last possible moment and is having to work through the week-end to complete her assignment. Isadora has complained and whined and cursed the history instructor who the week before she thought was the best teacher she ever had. Sandy just shrugged and told her that we all do what we must. Sandy knows this is simply a teenage rite of passage. We all have to learn the lessons of procrastination and consequences. Wasn’t a bad assignment really. Watch an original and remade movie and compare and contrast. How did the original and remake differ based on the time in which they were made? Two page paper. “Suck it up, daughter” had been Sandy’s parental guidance. The possible reasons why Isadora might have selected this choice of movies causes Sandy fear and sadness. Father’s Day is only a couple of weeks away.

Isadora is an unusual young woman at the age of 15. She is mature, wise, confident, and an independent thinker. Yet she could easily break into silent tears and appear years younger at the strangest and most unexpected of times. Sandy knew even when pregnant that it would always be just the two of them. She made some parenting decisions early. She had never talk to Isadora as if she was a child, had never read her fairy tales or had imaginary tea parties with her. There was no Santa Clause or tooth fairy. The things that Sandy had been provided by her parents, comforts of privilege and constant supervision by a nanny, were things Sandy could not provide. Very early, far earlier than normal, Isadora had been taught independent self-care skills, stranger danger, emergency procedures, cooking, laundry, changing a lightbulb. While Sandy had child-care support from Juanita and Juanita’s mother, Isadora was going to too often be left alone to not be confident in her ability to survive and problem solve. The things Sandy’s parents had withheld from her she gave Isadora in abundance; all the time she could spare, laughter, hugs, kisses, long conversations and lots of playtime. At the age of 13 when their neighbor had a stroke while walking up the stairs from the community laundry room and Isadora had found her, she had called 911, stayed by the woman, remembered to get her key from her purse when the paramedics came so she could go into the condominium, find her phone, called the neighbor’s daughter and had gone back to the laundry room to take the woman’s clothes out of the dryer. Amazingly calm is how the neighbor’s daughter had described her to Sandy. A week later Isadora called Sandy in tears and Sandy had left work to come home when Isadora found a dead pigeon on the balcony and didn’t know what to do. Just leave it for now, it’s only a pigeon, I’ll take care of it when I get home, but Isadora repeated over and over crying, but its dead. In the last year Isadora had taken on a protective air with Sandy. Sometimes Sandy would come home to find a flower and a note on her bed. At other times Isadora would be sleeping in Sandy’s bed, said she had a nightmare and got scared, felt better in her mother’s bed.

Last year on Father’s Day, Isadora asked for more details about her father. For the first time in her life, Isadora’s mother, Sandy, lied to her. Isadora knows her mother has lied to her but isn’t sure what specifically was true and what was false. Sandy does not know that Isadora knows she was lying, but fears the day when Isadora will press for more details.

Sandy had told Isadora that she and her father had a five year relationship, that they had loved one another and that he had simply been unprepared for the responsibility of fatherhood. Now she worries about when to tell her daughter the truth. How could she explain that he had never claimed to love her and she does not believe she loved him? How could she tell her daughter that her father was married to another woman and had never offered to leave his wife? Would Isadora want to meet her half-siblings? Could she ever tell her daughter that, when she told her father she was pregnant, he had only offered to pay for the abortion? Yet all of that is not the worse. How could she explain to her daughter that her and her father did have a five year relationship, but she became pregnant a little over a year into the relationship and didn’t stop seeing him until Isadora was three. In the last few months of the pregnancy they had stopped seeing each other, but had picked up again once Sandy returned to work. In the three years after Isadora was born, her father showed no interest in knowing her and never asked about her. Yet, Sandy continued to fuck him. Sandy was so obsessed with how he felt, how he looked, how his voice sounded that, when she did finally give him up, it took all she had to find some resolve and she had to move across country to keep herself from going back to him. If, at any time, he had tracked Sandy down, she was sure she would have surrendered back to her obsession of him. What would it do to a young girl’s psyche to know the truth about her conception and her father’s lack of caring? Sometimes Sandy thinks Isadora deserves the truth and that not telling her is proof that Sandy is a coward. Sandy is a caring mother. She does care about how the truth would impact her daughter. She is just as concerned as what knowing the truth would mean to the mother/daughter relationship. How can she ever expect her daughter to respect her again? How can she ever give her daughter advice on love or life when she herself had been such a whore?

Then, there is Mike. After years of abstinence, a younger, handsome man wanted to take her in his arms. The first time he grabbed her ass with both hands she knew she was going to use and be used by him. Eventually she will have to decide to break it off or introduce him to Isadora, but truly, nothing there but sex and he is younger. What kind of role model is she for her teenage daughter? She doesn’t want anything more from Mike but sex. Is that the lesson to teach her young daughter?

Why did Isadora choose to write a paper about “Father of the Bride” and so close to father’s day? Sandy looks at her daughter falling asleep on the couch while trying to watch the movie. Isadora looks a little like Sandy did at that age. She is going to be tall like her mother. In fact she is only an inch or two now from her mother’s height. She looks as if her arms and legs had grown faster than the rest of her and she often doesn’t know what to do with them. Sandy remembers that awkward stage. Sandy’s hair had been that stand-out red color. Isadora has her father’s beautiful black hair. Sandy kisses Isadora on the forehead, tells her to try and nap for a couple of hours before she works on her paper.

Most Sunday’s when Sandy gets home from work, she stays awake. Sunday is her day off. Isadora would get up around seven and mother and daughter would go for a bike ride, stopping for breakfast somewhere along the way. It is Sandy’s favorite time of the week: Sunday morning, mother/daughter bonding bike rides. She always feels a little like a kid again when she rides her bike and her daughter is beautiful with her long legs on the bike. Isadora has inherited her mother’s athleticism. She will be taking Flamenco dance lessons this summer. Sandy can’t wait to see her dance at the end of the summer in the recital.

Sandy sees Isadora’s poetry textbook and picks it up to read. It has been two weeks since she wrote her poem. She skims through it and randomly stops at the section on Robert Browning. Sandy reads, stops, frowns, returns to the beginning of the section and reads again from the beginning. These are not the poems she was expecting. These “love” poems are compelling. They make her stop, think, and occasionally blush. These poems remind her a bit of her own life not quite about romantic love, but about things love-like, but out of kilter. “My Last Duchess” seems to be about his wife’s infidelity. The Duke seems a bore and she is glad that the Duchess had managed to keep her life interesting. Who cares about a 900 year old name? Would that make your toes curl? It is “Porphyria’s Lover” which when she reads she finds herself laughing aloud: “I found a thing to do and all her hair in one yellow string I wound three times her little throat around, and strangled her.” She has to read it again to be sure she really understands. Yes, it is a poem about a man strangling a woman with her own hair and it isn’t intended to be a scary poem. It is a love poem. She tries to read the boring critical analysis at the end of the section. The thought is the man strangled her to keep her from committing sin. Oh, hell, no, she thinks, he was just a freak! She takes her own long strawberry-blonde hair and thinks it is long enough to strangle her, but would not wrap three times around. No, this is definitely not the love poetry she expected. It is a line from another poem that makes her think of the things Juanita said to her the other night. It is a line in “Paracelsus” that she thinks sounds the most like her. “Perchance, I perished in an arrogant self-reliance ages ago.” This is how she is going to die, she realizes, in an arrogant self-reliance. It sounds like a horrible way to perish, but that is what her friend, Juanita, was warning her about. The stanza of the poem, it turns out, is really about reincarnation. This man who had perished in an arrogant self-reliance sent up a prayer “so earnest so” that it was answered with another chance in another life. Sandy thinks to herself that she might be even more arrogantly self-reliant than this man. She can’t imagine sending up that prayer at that minute of death, because how pathetic would it be if there is no one there to hear it. It would be too much of a failure to offer up a prayer at death and then not have it answered. It is braver and better, she thinks, to go out the way you lived your life. Go out self-reliant and damn proud of it.

Maybe poetry really isn’t her thing, after all. It doesn’t seem like she is reacting to it the way she thinks the poet intended or in the way the critical analysis tells her she should be reacting to it. Is she supposed to laugh at strangulation, congratulate the wife on finding a way to enjoy life despite the Duke, or swear to herself no earnest prayer will escape her lips upon death? No, these are not the reactions poetry is supposed to inspire. Sandy realizes the conversation with Juanita has gotten to her a little. The book still on her lap open, she forgets about it as she ponders her reasons for being so self-reliant.

Was it growing up an only child with a work obsessed father and a mother who always had some function to go to? She had been raised really by a string of nannies. Was it her fire red hair that made her seem so different from everyone she knew? Now her normal color is strawberry blonde. It turns out fire red hair often goes blonde with age. Sandy thinks it is a little pathetic to blame her faults and life decisions on her hair color, but she knows the experience of being so teased and so different had scarred her a little. Great grandmother was a red head who had been from Salem, Massachusetts. She still remembers the nanny who told her that red heads were all witches. Her great grandmother was not one of the Salem witches. Great grandmother was an Episcopalian from a wealthy family. The nanny hadn’t lasted long. Still, there was no one else in the private school she attended who had her brand of hair, maybe light red, but not the fire hair which her mother had insisted be kept long. Sandy never really wanted friends, though. She liked solitude. Is it her nature, her upbringing, circumstances that has caused her to be so independent; so odd in how she approaches life? Is it that her parents always made her think love was something that needed to be earned and she was never quite good enough?

Sandy thinks about the last time she had seen her parents. She went home three months pregnant. She told them she needed to talk to them and on Friday when she arrived they had sat formally in the living room as Sandy told them the news, the whole news, that she was pregnant and the father was married. There had been no recriminations, scene, or questions. She was not, she said, having an abortion. Would she consider marrying someone else, her father asked, as if that could be so easily arranged. There was a young man he knew. No, she did not want to marry anyone else. She was hoping they would help her with money, she said, that’s what she needed. Her father said they would need a day to think about it. Somehow they managed, within the same house, not to see each other until Sunday afternoon. Her father in simple narrative and declarative sentences made it clear that she was on her own. A week later her mother came alone to the city. She had organized the things Sandy would need from them: her birth certificate, vaccination records, legal papers and one heirloom, her great grandmother’s bible. Her mother’s eyes were red and puffy. This time there were recriminations on both sides. Sandy begged her mother in a way she never had before. ’Please, please…I don’t know if I can do this alone.” Her mother blames Sandy for her pain. Did Sandy realize how much it hurt her to have to do this? It wasn’t her choice. It wasn’t easy for a mother to walk away. Why then, Sandy asks, why? It is your father’s decision. Will then stand up to him. Tell him you can’t just walk away from me and your grandchild. Please. Her mother snapped at her, shaken and distressed, that’s not possible. “I wouldn’t survive without your father. Women get married and men take care of them. In exchange they do what their husbands tell them. It is the way of things. Decent women get married and do what their husbands tell them to do.” “No matter what the cost”, Sandy screamed, “shouldn’t your child come first?” Sandy’s mother lived a privileged life-style and was from a different age. It gave her pain, but she couldn’t survive without Sandy’s father. Decent women get married and do what their husbands tell them. No matter the cost.

The book, falling from Sandy’s lap, brings her back into the present time. Sandy thinks again that if she is to die a death of arrogant self-reliance, she would. She wouldn’t risk sending up a prayer if there might not be a God to answer

Section 3: It’s the First Time (Song)

It’s the first time.

It feels comfortable.

It seems familiar, like we found ourselves home.

It’s the first time.

Unless we’ve lived before

And finally found ourselves back home.

It’s the first time.

This love we’ve never shown;

This undressing, revealing our bodies, hearts and very souls.

It’s the first time.

I have danced this dance before

Without sharing my heart and very soul.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

Should I say it?

Those three simple words?

Would it give it too much meaning?

Would it come out as absurd?

It’s the first time

For those three simple absurd words.

Can’t I show you:

In a kiss, a touch, embrace?

Can’t you see all it means to me?

It is screaming from my face.

It’s the first time

And all it means can be seen in my face.

I don’t say it.

It would cheapen the embrace.

I want you to know it

By my touch and by my gaze.

It’s the first time,

I am vulnerable and yours.

It’s the first time.

It feels comfortable.

It seems familiar, like we found ourselves home.

It’s the first time

Unless we’ve lived before you

And finally found ourselves back home.

Chapter 6: The Past

Dwayne arrives at home both a little angry and a little scared. He is scared that he will look like a fool. Damn Alex! The boys would never have gone along unless Alex was behind this. Alex does this thing where he manipulates you into thinking you had an idea and it’s not until later that you realize it was Alex’s idea all along. Damn Alex! Dwayne can admit that it might be a good thought to change the sound a little. Every band can do some readjustment now and then, but to change the sound is hard right before beginning the tour. To change the sound at the same time that he is going to become the lead singer is ridiculous. It is too many changes all at once. Didn’t they know he could barely sing? He sings backup vocals or lead if Johnny was sick, but every night for eight weeks? He isn’t a singer. He is a songwriter and guitar player.

Changing the sound! He might be ok bringing in some of the older stuff. He should have known Alex would want that. Playing Hank and Cash isn’t going to be a problem. This fiddle stuff Alex was into these days, though, sounded to him a little like fiddle on steroids. Could Alex play that fast nights in a row? He was getting up there in age! Alex has taught Dwayne a little banjo over the last few years. He can play a little banjo, not as good as Alex, but maybe for a couple of instrumentals, he plays the banjo while Alex fiddles. That changes the sound. It could be fun, but they both better get their old fingers flying. Who else did he mention? Avett brothers, Lumineers? Americana – right? That is the implication of the bands Alex mentioned. Dwayne has to admit there is some logical sense in an Appalachian scholar playing Americana music, but the band has always been a country band. He has always been a traditional country songwriter. Nothing wrong with changing the sound to more Americana over time, might even be fun, but how could they do it this quickly without falling on their asses? How is he going to get up to speed or sound half decent on any of those songs? Did Alex suggest some Dead? Where did that come from? He couldn’t remember Alex ever listening to the Dead. Was Tom or Henry a closet Dead fan or was it just more trying to get the Americana sound more in the band? Hell- he didn’t know if he could sing those songs. If we’re going Americana didn’t Dylan really influence that sound? Would be easier to put a little Dylan into the song mix than the Dead. At least he knows Dylan. Maybe that isn’t a bad idea. Whoa – old man! Slow down a little. What the hell kind of sound is this country band going to produce this summer? Are we really going to become an Americana band? Damn, Dwayne loves the Western sounds. He doesn’t want to let go of that. Maybe an Americana/Western mix?

He needs to start thinking about his voice. Realistically, what is his range and what can he sing? He thinks about the names the boys had thrown out. Willie sings just fine. Dylan? Well, he could sing a little better than Dylan. Of course, if his own songs were as good as Dylan’s no one would care how he sounded. He suddenly thinks of the song he would have to sing every night: “The First Time.” There is no denying he had once written a masterpiece. The thought of singing it every damn night makes him a little sick to his stomach. He does not have any father’s pride towards his one masterpiece. Damn song ruined his life. How can he possibly sing it every damn night?

He pours himself a second Irish whiskey on the rocks and remembers the days when he would easily finish a bottle. He knows by the time he finishes a third drink, he will be opening up the drawer on his great grandmothers’ little night stand he had owned his whole life; looking through the few pictures he kept there. His great grandfather had made this nightstand by hand. Both great grandparents dead before he was born, it had been put in his room, “the baby’s room”, and then in his and his wife’s bedroom awaiting their first child, and then just carried with him to every transitory home since. He opens the drawer and take out the pictures; thinking that he should send the night stand to his older brother’s youngest son who might someday have a baby’s room to put it in.

On top of the pictures are his own head shots for publicity. Some are current, but most are from his Nashville years. There are a few snapshots of him younger with some big name stars. Hell, to think he had once jammed with The Hag. There are pictures of him and the country legend who had sang his one hit song.

Then there are the pictures of Carolyn. She had been his Nashville companion for five years. She was a beauty. Look at that beautiful amber hair! She was such a short little feisty thing. It was hard to believe a woman that short and of slight built could have such great natural tits. Man, those tits! He had never been with a woman since he hadn’t compared her tits to theirs. It was part of the reason he had become such a leg man in LA. LA is the land of fake tits. He thinks of how Carolyn’s under boob would smell like lavender sometimes when he lifted them up to kiss them or sometimes mixed with that musky smell of sweat. Carolyn was his last real relationship. He had been gone a lot touring. It was his job to be gone for weeks or months at a time. When he was at home, he was drunk and stoned, still playing, jamming, in the studio every chance he got. Plus he had been hired to write songs. He always was in a walking dream state when writing. It was his process. He started to see that look of loneliness and abandonment in her eyes. He came home one night and found Carolyn with another man. She begged forgiveness. She was lonely. He was often cold and aloof. He hated hearing the same refrain as he had heard from his wife and seeing that same look in her eyes. Of course, he forgave her. It was his fault, really. What could he expect from such a feisty, sexual woman if he left her alone and feeling insecure? He tried for a while to change his ways. He even brought her with him on shorter trips and wrote a song for her that the legend recorded, but it never became a hit. He was on the road for an extended trip the next time the rumors of another man came to him. Damn, he had to do his job, didn’t he? He never asked her to work. He paid the bills. She begged his forgiveness again. One night in a drunken rage he raised his hand to her. He dropped it without hitting her. After months of seeing the disappointment in her eyes get worse and worse, the look in her eyes when he raised his hand to her surprised him. Her eyes looked triumphant as if she had finally got him to show her the real man he was. Hell, maybe it was triumph because he was really paying attention to her. Is that what it took for him to pay that beautiful woman the attention she deserved – and like that? He left for California a week later. The look in the mirror at who he was becoming made him decide it was time to walk away from the life, the career, the girlfriend.

He doesn’t spend a lot of time thinking about Carolyn. She is not the one who he thinks of when he sings “The First Time.” At the bottom of the pictures is his favorite picture of Danielle. She had only let him call her Dani. He holds the picture taken on the day he proposed. Her blue eyes matches her dress; the sweetest blue dress. Seeing her in that dress always made him a little hard and he feels himself rising now. In the picture she is standing outside. The sky matches her eyes and her dress. He can appreciate the aesthetics of the scene captured by the old picture. The eyes, the dress, the sky all the same shade of blue, it seems to him, which makes the lips seem so red. He never had a prayer, he realizes, of resisting this girl. He had not thought ahead about proposing, but in that moment kissing that girl he thought he would never be happier and found himself going down on his knees. He realizes he had been right. He had never again been and probably never would be that happy as on that day with the sky of blue, her blue eyes, that blue dress and her sweet red lips.

They married the summer they turned eighteen; a week before he entered college. They were married in a small Baptist Church. The only honeymoon they could afford was one night at a bed and breakfast in a nearby town. They arrived in the early evening. Soon as they got to the room, she went to the restroom. It was summer and he took the pretty blue blanket off the bed, folded it neatly, put it away. It gave him something to do. It was not his first time, but he knew it was hers. It seemed like it was taking her a while. He got undressed, under the sheets, and waited. She walked out with an old towel she must have brought from home. Her mother had warned her she might bleed the first time and she didn’t want blood on the sheets. She didn’t want the owners of the bed and breakfast to be able to tell they had been sexual in the bed. She placed the towel carefully and laid in place on top of the towel. Every other woman he had ever been with had been older, experienced. Now, he was the experienced one with this sweet woman on top of her towel. Jesus, he loved her. She would bleed? He hadn’t realized. He cursed his length. Locker room jokes had always made him aware he was longer than the other boys. Well, he was taller. It was proportional. Besides he could tell by the laughter of the other boys that being long was good. Now, he wasn’t sure. He was so afraid he would hurt her. He tried to be gentle and tender. He still remembered how good he felt inside of her. He wanted to go deep, but he tried not to go in too far. He had to make himself go slow. He didn’t want to go too fast, too hard, too deep, but she felt so amazing. This woman is mine, he thought at one point. When she moaned, he stopped and looked at her. So beautiful with her eyes closed. He realized she was not moaning in pain. He went in a little deeper. He had never paid attention to how a woman looked when she came before. He had always been more concerned about what he was feeling. This first time with his wife he studied her face and her sounds as he sped up or slowed down. When she came, he came almost immediately afterwards. She was so beautiful. Hell, had he ever done anything more important in his life than given his wife an orgasm on their wedding night?

They were happy, but struggling those first few years. She waitressed at a little diner to support him their entire marriage as he went through college and then graduate school. They agreed to put off children until he graduated. She bought him that old blue guitar on their first anniversary. She told him to write her a song and he did in fifteen minutes. He didn’t remember much of it now except “Dani, I love your fanny”. He remembered her shaking it at him. By then she wanted it a little harder and liked it when he grabbed her ass. She always wanted to be underneath, though. He enjoys remembering those happy years.

It was when he was working on his dissertation that his interest in song writing became so strong. He had fallen in love with the hillbilly tunes and the sound of a dulcimer. Dani and him talked and worked out a plan. It was a fair plan. He would teach college full-time and he would spend summers writing songs. They would start a family. It was a good plan; fair to both of them.

The spring before he graduated, he found himself with his dissertation mostly written and time to write songs. He found he had a process for writing songs. The only way to really write a good song was first to escape for hours into an awake, but dreamy state. He would need to prepare to write by relaxing his mind and letting his brain explore other realities. Once he was writing, he wanted to write for hours because it was hard to prepare to write again. It took a while to get into that dreamy state. Once there he didn’t want to leave. Writing songs was different than writing academically. He didn’t know if it was the way other song writers wrote, but it was the only way that seemed to work for him. He wasn’t truthful with Dani. She wouldn’t have understood. He told her his dissertation needed rewriting and then he escaped away from her to write his songs. He had to distance himself from the real world so he could concentrate on the fantasy world where he found his inspiration. He often found himself simply staring and smiling at the stories he was telling himself.

He remembers the day Dani accused him of cheating on her. He hated the look in her eyes of loneliness and abandonment. Never, he told her, and it was true. What kind of man did she take him for?! He would never cheat on her. He was insulted she would think of that.

Then, he went back to his fantasy world. Was it wrong if he fantasized of another first time? He didn’t fantasize about being with a virgin. The first time with Dani was so special for so many different reasons. He would never imagine another first time quite like that. Wouldn’t want to think or imagine a first time like that with another woman. Still, it was sad to think that, at not yet thirty, he would never again have a first time with another woman. What would it be like to have a first time with a woman about his same age now, experienced, and in love with him? How would it be different than it was with Dani? He imagined a woman, experienced, who loved him and who was his intellectual equal. He started thinking about the romance that would lead to the first time. In his mind, she was someone with whom he would walk in the woods and easy laughter would flow from her. She was as attracted to him by his intelligence as by his looks as he was to her. They had great conversations about history and literature. He didn’t have to be careful about his choice of words in fear she wouldn’t understand. He didn’t have to change his vocabulary to be with her. He thought about the conversations, walks and stolen looks for hours before he imagined the first sexual act; even the first kiss. The thought came to him that he would like to believe in a soulmate. What if there was one true soul he was meant to be with?

He knew he was being unfair to Dani with these thoughts. She had given her youth to put him through school. All of her friends had already started having kids. She didn’t have any hobbies. She didn’t care about a career. Her entire world was him. He hated the look in her eyes when he would return from long hours wandering the woods and tell her he had been in the library. He would pick up his guitar and escape into his music while she prepared dinner and got ready for bed. Sometimes he wouldn’t go to bed with her. He would stay in the living room picking on the guitar. Sometimes he would sleep on the couch so he didn’t wake her. He hated the look in her eyes.

Still, it seemed unfair. If he was never going to leave her and he had no intention of leaving her; if he was never going to cheat on her and he knew deep within himself he could never cheat on her; was this imaginary first time with a soulmate so bad? If it was all just imaginary with an imaginary woman and the hours he spent in fantasy about the romance was just so he could imagine what it felt like to have a first time with a soulmate and it all ended in a few good songs, why was it so wrong? It was just his writing process. It was, after all, a process that worked. He wrote “The First Time.” He realized how good it was. It was actually a shock to have written something that good. Without telling Dani, he made a demo and sent it off to Nashville.

Once the demo was sent off, he returned to everyday reality and preparing for graduation. Dani was still always so angry. He tried to joke with her. He told her lots of couples go through this during dissertation time. He introduced her to a spouse of a friend who was going to law school; so she would see it was just the end of graduate school they were going through. He told her not to worry so much. He would graduate and everything would change. She said he was so cold, so aloof, never wanted to talk to her anymore. He received a teaching offer from a university and they celebrated. She seemed a little happier.

Two weeks before graduation a representative from the country legend called. The country legend actually came to his home –all that way to meet him. The man was going to record his song, but wanted him to be in his band and the contract would include additional payments for additional songs he would write. Damn, this was the dream. Didn’t she understand that? He wanted her to come with him. He wasn’t leaving her. They would start a family in a year or two once they were settled in Nashville. She was still young. They would have children. He had never seen her so angry. Damn, he wasn’t leaving her. He could support her now. She wouldn’t have to work. It was just a change of plans.

She said he had already left in his mind. She said again that he was cold and distant. She didn’t want to be so far from family. She couldn’t keep waiting to have kids. What if they waited so long and she couldn’t get pregnant? She begged with him to take the job at the university and forget about Nashville. When he said he was going to Nashville soon as he graduated, she packed her bag and left. She didn’t even come to the graduation ceremony after all that time putting him through school.

Dwayne realizes he has dropped the snapshot. He picks it up and puts it back carefully at the bottom of the pictures. He looks at the clock. He had been lost in his past for a couple of hours. He wishes he could go back now and make another decision. He thinks of the irony of it all. He now teaches college, but not in a four year university. If he had kept with the plan, he would have had tenure by now. The children he never had would be grown. This nightstand would have gone to a baby’s room in his house. In the end, he had prioritized fame over the woman who had prioritized him over her youth. Then, he ended up walking away from the life and the fame which was destroying him. Now he is living a lesser version of the life he would have had if he stayed with her. Teaching community college, writing in the summer, but without his sweet Dani- no children, no love in his life. Why had he really made the choice? Was he hoping to meet a soulmate? Did he really make the choice that made her leave because he wanted another first time?

Carolyn hadn’t been his soulmate. He tries to remember their first time. He remembers her tits, but not the first time. How could he not remember their first time? He did believe he had tried with Carolyn. He had wanted it to work. Cold and distant, she had called him. Maybe that is just who he was. Maybe that is just who he is.

There has been a lot of first times and only times with a lot of women since then. If that’s what he wanted, he got it and then some. None of them had equaled the first time with Dani. None of them meant a damn thing. None had been a soulmate. None had been the woman he had dreamed of when he wrote the song.

Dwayne goes to his closet and reaches towards the back for the one guitar case he keeps there. He had never gotten rid of the old blue guitar. How the hell will he ever sing the lyrics to that damn song every night? He thinks, if I hadn’t written that song. Every time he sings it he sees the look in Dani’s eyes; her look of abandonment and loneliness. He had written a great song for an imaginary woman which had made him famous and had broken his wive’s heart. He tunes the guitar.

The country legend sung this song with a melodic deep voice. It is such a romantic classic. Dwayne always imagined it a little twangy, a little more nasal, not quite so bass, a little faster tempo in the second half. He can sing it the way he wrote it, but not the way it was arranged for the legend. Really it is a song about a man who finds it hard to say I love you. It is a song about a man who wants his woman to know how he feels without telling her. It is a song about a man who finds it hard to express his emotions. In that way it is a song about him as much as about any woman. As he starts to sing the song he realizes how deeply a man who wrote this song for a real woman would have cared for her. It is a beautiful, if fanciful, love song. For the first time in decades he tries to return in his brain to the woman he had imagined. Can you imagine meeting a woman you believe you had loved in a past life? What would it be like to have a first time with a woman you believed you were destined to love? He plays and sings and thinks to himself that he can do this, but, if he is going to sing this every night, he will need to believe this type of thing is possible. He isn’t sure if he believes anymore. It seems rather like a myth to him, but it is a beautiful myth – this thought of a soulmate. He wants to believe that such a thing is possible. At least he knows he couldn’t hurt his ex by singing this song now. He knows that she remarried and she has a child who would be grown by now. Her child attended school with his youngest nephew. She is ok, he thinks, probably better off all these years without him. It is him that screwed up and he is the one alone. He is a song writer and this is his legendary song. He needs to find some way to let go of the regret and be able to sing this song every night. He won’t hurt anybody now if he goes in his brain to imagine the woman he had imagined when he wrote it. He can’t quite remember what she looked like. He thinks about the woman he has been dreaming about in his dreams surrounded by the world of blue. That will do. He thinks that he could just think about her each night when he sings this song. Maybe he can think of this woman and pretend that she is his soulmate. Maybe, if he can begin to believe in this myth of a soulmate again, this song can be about hope instead of regret. At least, maybe he will be able to sing it without hating himself.

Chapter 7: The Country Musician

The time between the end of classes and the beginning of the tour is normally a happy time for Dwayne. He typically spends this time turning in his students’ grades, saying good-bye to his guitar students, making arrangements for his mail, finalizing plans for the tour, and practicing a few times with the band. This is a period of unwinding; daydreaming which is part of his songwriting process. That is a typical summer, but it is not how this summer starts off. The first two rehearsal days turn into marathon sessions. At one point Dwayne actually thinks about just calling off the eight weeks and disbanding The Lonely Players. First, they have to agree on what songs in their current repertoire they are keeping. There are some songs Johnny sang which are simply not going to be in Dwayne’s vocal range. There are some songs that Alex felt they needed to let go of to make room for a different sound. More than once, while rehearsing a song which Dwayne knows well as a guitar player, he misses coming back in for the vocals. He is still the lead guitar player. The rehearsals help him to learn how to balance the two duties. It turns out once he made up his mind to sing “The First Time” it is not so hard to get up to speed on that song. The band likes his new arrangement and he enjoys hearing it the way he had imagined it when he first wrote it. If the audience can get used to a different version, then that song is easily ready to go. If only the rest will go so easily!

By the end of the first weekend, they agree on some basic song rotations. Hank’s “Honky Tonkin” will be a staple every night and, at Dwayne’s insistence, so will the classic “Sitting on Top of the World.” It had been one of Dani’s favorite songs. Dwayne wrote a paper on it as a graduate student. It always put a smile on his face when he could find his way to recall his happy, younger days with Dani. At the end of the second day, Dwayne is happy with what is actually a much more Western sound to the band. The band sounds like a real cowboy band. Dwayne knows the worse is still to come. During the week ahead Alex and he will decide on the songs to add; the songs which will increase the Americana sound of the band. Then, they will practice the new songs with the full band the following week-end.

Alex comes to Dwayne’s apartment each day that week. Dwayne’s neighbor, Eugene, comes in on Monday after their morning jog. He listens to Alex and Dwayne discuss the new material. Eugene suggests they add some Wilco to the mix and Dwayne threatens to kick him out of the apartment. The compromise between Dwayne and Alex on the new song choices are a little tense at times on Monday, but on Tuesday, the two old friends have the toughest day since they’ve known each other. Dwayne has never seen his friend so stubborn. They agree on the Dead’s “Tennessee Jed.” Dwayne gets why that song would fit in an Americana/ Western band. He refuses to play any Skynard, any Band, or Eagles. His band is not a Southern Rock band. If he is going to change the sound, it still needs to have some rhyme and reason. It still needs to represent him at some fundamental level. It is, Dwayne reminds Alex, his band. The struggle of wills results in a screaming match over adding a tune from a band called O’Death. Punk grass is how Alex describes their sound. Alex bargains hard on the fact that they are a modern band from the Appalachian region. Dwayne’s argument is that he doesn’t think that he can move his fingers quickly enough on the banjo piece. He just isn’t that proficient on this instrument. Besides Alex and him would so exhausted afterwards they might not be able to do anything else. He makes a joke that if they are going to play the Dead and O’Death maybe they should just rename themselves the Soon to be Dead Players. Alex doesn’t laugh. Dwayne finally agrees to put in an instrumental version of a song on a few nights-if the mood is right-maybe as an encore. Without missing a beat, Alex is on to the next crazy request. He starts talking about the Avett Brothers. Dwayne agrees to one song off their first album which Dwayne thinks is more purely Americana, but enough is enough. Why reinvent so much? There are plenty of classics they have never played. Why not add a little more of those songs to the performance? Alex agrees.

Alex feels like he is dancing a difficult dance, but he takes pride in the result. Hell, Alex never thought Dwayne would go for a Punk grass band cover. Ridiculous, really, but he had. Alex suggested that choice thinking it would make the Eagles “Take it Easy” more likely. They are doing a gig in Winslow. This would have been the song Alex would have gone for. Dwayne could be stubborn. Alex is surprised by what Dwayne agrees to and what he rejects. Interesting as Hell, but again, the song selection is less important than getting Dwayne’s mind thinking and his blood on fire. Sometimes a little strange in your life reawakens you! Alex delights in the screaming match over the O’Death tune. Dwayne thinks of himself as an Appalachian music scholar, such an intellectual about that regional music, but he has gotten lazy. He hasn’t kept up with how the newer sounds are evolving. Alex calls him a lazy old man pretending to be an expert on the music from that region. He knows how to push Dwayne’s buttons. Really, you never heard of this band? You think you are smart and this was once your area of expertise? How vain Dwayne is about that damn doctorate! It is playing the damn song that is going to be impossible. Alex is secretly happy when Dwayne agrees to play it on rare occasions only. Alex doesn’t want to work that hard every night. The reward comes when they practice the song. Dwayne isn’t skilled at the banjo and there are some hard fingering to figure out. Alex struggles even with the fiddle piece. They get it wrong more times than they get it right. Dwayne is not going to let any song beat him! Alex knows he is on the right path towards helping Dwayne improve his musical performance.

Dwayne isn’t so sure. Tuesday night, he keeps picking at that banjo long after Alex leaves. The guitar is second nature to Dwayne. Sometimes it feels odd not to be holding a guitar, but he isn’t so used to a banjo. This is shaping up to be an odd summer. Three ways this summer could be a failure- audience doesn’t like his singing, audience doesn’t like the new sound mixture, or he doesn’t end up writing at least three songs. Dwayne drinks a little more whiskey than he should or is used to. He finds it hard to jog on Wednesday morning, but he is a disciplined man. One of the few things Dwayne misses in the summer are his morning jogs with his neighbor and he is going to get everyone in he can.

Alex waits at Dwayne’s door on Wednesday morning. He has to admit to himself that he is feeling pretty energized about learning new songs. What are the stages of grief? The thought of death briefly passes through Alex’s mind. He remembers Dwayne joking about a name change to Soon to be Dead Players. Alex feels more alive- more awake somehow-than he ever has before.

He immediately starts to give Dwayne shit as soon as Dwayne and Eugene walks up. Think after all this time he would at least give him a spare key. Dwayne lets him in and silently hands him a spare key. Alex looks at the empty whiskey bottle on the counter and Dwayne’s paler than usual face. He suggests that today they come up with the older classics they are going to add. He realizes that, maybe, he has pushed a little hard for change.

By the time the two old timers finish their third run through of “Sunday Morning Coming Down” (Kristofferson’s classic) any tension between them is gone. The song seems like an old friend itself and there is a gentleness between them as they play it. Alex thinks strange may make you feel alive, but it is love that makes you want to stay alive. The thought hits him hard. He is suddenly overwhelmed with love for Dwayne, love for music, love for the life he is leaving behind. He fakes a coughing fit to have an excuse for the tears in his eyes. Dwayne gets both of them a glass of water. He says he’s had a thought about an unusual encore. They spend the rest of the day on “Wabash Cannon Ball.” What could be more Americana than a train song?

At the end of the day, Alex makes a suggestion in a hesitant voice. He knows this is going to be the hardest sell yet. Alex tells Dwayne that he, Alex, needs to take over as lead guitarist on a couple of key songs. Dwayne’s face relays the strong message he intends it to. As much as he prides himself as a song-writer, he takes as much pride as a guitarist. He worked hard during his Nashville days to obtain his skill level as a lead guitarist. When the hit songs hadn’t come rolling along as quickly as the legend would have wanted, Dwayne earned his place in the band by being a genuine great musician. He could play with the best of them.

Alex: It’s too much for you to sing and play an instrument on every song.

Dwayne: You can play anything and I envy that, but you don’t play guitar as well as I do.

Alex: Agreed and that is why you will still be our main guitarist, but not on every song. I’m thinking I can play on songs like “Honky Tonkin” and maybe a couple of others.

Dwayne: Why? Just give me one good reason is all I’m asking.

Alex: Because there are certain songs where playing guitar might distract you from other things you need to concentrate on.

Dwayne: It’s called multi-tasking and there is no reason why I can’t sing and play the guitar. I struggled with it last week-end, but I will get used to it.

Alex: But you are forgetting about the third component. You, also, need to shake your ass.

Dwayne: Oh, my god, this again.

Alex: Part of the job description of front man is showmanship. You are the show.

Dwayne: It should be about the music.

Alex: It will be. Some songs will be more about the music and some songs about your ass. Some songs such as “The First Time” the showmanship will be your handsome puppy dog eyes. I’ve been talking with your interns about some lighting options.

Dwayne: Damn, Alex, I have never been a front man before. Don’t you think I’m too old for all of this?

Alex: I think it’s about time. You’re a great songwriter, but, except for one song, you have never found a voice for your songs. It’s because the voice is yours. Trust me-being a front man will fuel your songwriting. Writing great songs will make you a better front man. Trust me.

Dwayne: But you want to light up my face so people can see my eyes. Have me dance around.

Alex: Put on a show, yes. Of course, you want to play great music, but it is a show. You have never fully used your attributes.

Dwayne: My ass?

Alex: You have a great ass-et, there, my friend. You have that great curse of always being the handsomest man in the room. You’ll forgive me if I don’t feel sorry for you. You’ll use it to get laid. Why not use it to improve the show? You think your brain, or your guitar, or your sense of musical ethics means women are still not staring at your eyes, your arms, your crotch, your ass.

Dwayne: Stop, please, stop.

Alex: Isn’t it about getting people to enjoy the music? Do you think Elvis wasn’t great? Yeah, we liked when his hips moved, but we listened when he slowed it down as well. Come on, Dwayne, baby, be The Lonely Player’s Elvis.

Alex stands up and does the Elvis gyration until Dwayne finally starts to laugh.

Dwayne: Now you are going to give me lessons on how to move my ass?

Alex: I will trust that you can figure out how to move your ass on your own. We should add “Hound Dog” to the set list.

After Alex leaves, Dwayne takes a long shower and then spends some time naked in front of a mirror. Sing the damn song you hate to sing, learn to play the Banjo better, learn to play Punk grass music, and learn to shake your old damn ass. Dwayne thinks again it is going to be a hard, hard eight weeks and he might be a laughingstock at the end of it. Fine, he thinks, you thought about what songs you could realistically sing with your vocal range. You figured out how to play your hit song. You thought about how to change the sound of the band-what you can give up; what you are willing to add. Front man! That is part of your job! Give yourself the once over objectively. He stares at himself from toes to hair and turns around. Honestly, he is in pretty good shape for a man his age. As he rubs a three days beard’s growth, he thinks it is a good addition. He might want to let his hair grow on the tour. His eyes are handsome. He has heard that his whole life. Fine- light his face on slower ballads. He turns around and looks at his ass, bobs it up and down, shakes it side to side. He looks back at the mirror and realizes he is smiling from ear to ear.

On Thursday when Dwayne and Eugene comes in from their jog, Alex is already in the apartment. He is standing in front of the table as if hiding something.

Dwayne: Just couldn’t wait to use the key, could you? Just don’t go surprising me some evening by coming in and climbing into my bed. I know you’ve been staring at my ass.

Alex: I am glad you are in a good mood this morning, Handsome. I brought you a gift.

Alex moves away from the table to display the gift. Dwayne’s eyes looks at the gift and stays on it. It is unexpected. Dwayne picks up the dulcimer reverently. It is a tear shaped specimen, four strings, not made of one wood as they traditionally were, but, being a newer model, has Cedar wood for the sound board and Rosewood for the back and sides. It has been a while since Dwayne has held one. On closer inspection he notices his initials and Alex’s initials are carved in with a small 2 between. Dwayne raises his eyebrows at Alex.

Alex: Don’t go thinking I’m soft for you, Handsome. The engraving was free so what the hell, you know.

Dwayne: You’re not going to keep calling me Handsome are you?

Alex: Maybe just on special occasions.

Eugene: Don’t mean to break the moment, but what the hell is that?

Alex: It is an instrument that should have died a natural death decades ago, but these intellectual types decided it represented real folk music.

Dwayne: It’s a dulcimer. It’s an instrument of the hearth, of families gathering before they had radio and television to keep music and musical storytelling traditions alive.

Alex: (interrupting him). Be prepared for the professor to give you a day long lecture and a test afterwards.

Dwayne: I once saw one in an older man’s home that was hand made in the 1890′s. It really is fascinating the different theories of its origins.

Eugene: (interrupting him) I guess that’s my cue to go.

Alex: Tomorrow’s class is the evolution of the American washboard as an instrument.

Eugene: (laughing and patting Dwayne on the shoulder). See you tomorrow, Handsome.

Alex watches his friend hold the instrument as if it is a Stradivarius. He has spent years teasing Dwayne about his love of this instrument. Alex believes this instrument would have died long ago if it wasn’t for intellectual folk revivalists in the fifties. Dwayne sometimes agrees with that and says that it’s a good thing intellectuals like him are around. Sometimes he disagrees and says there would always be in dulcimers in Appalachian homes. What Alex might not have fully realized until this moment is how much Dwayne truly loves this instrument.

Alex: Why in the hell didn’t you ever just buy one- or had one made- and learn to play it?

Dwayne: Have you ever heard one played really well? I knew I couldn’t play it like that. I wrote about the instrument. My degrees are in music history; not music performance.

Alex: Insecure, much? How many mountain people you think went to college to learn to play this?

Dwayne: But it was their family’s instrument, their heritage, they grew up with this instrument the way some families grow up with a piano in their homes. I didn’t grow up with music. I came to it intellectually.

Alex: But you took up guitar. You write country songs. Tell me a story, Professor, of hearing this instrument.

The first time Dwayne heard this instrument was as an undergraduate through a guest lecturer and music series. The interesting thing was the history of the instrument itself. It was somewhat of a mystery with differing theories, but the known facts were related to how well it had endured in the Appalachian region and the economic and environmental realities which contributed to its popularity. The fact is that the very culture of the Appalachian people – their Irish and Scottish heritage- was tied up into their musical storytelling. Alex interrupts and thanks the Professor. Now he wants the songwriter to tell him about the instrument.

Dwayne retrieves a memory from what seems like a hundred years ago. “In another lifetime ago and in a land very different than LA,” he begins and laughs. He worked with an oral history professor on his dissertation committee to develop a research document. The survey tool was used to discuss generational memories. The goal was to find out on what occasions the dulcimer was played and if that might have changed over time. He was interviewing an eighty year old woman and her sixty year old daughter and when it was over he started to leave. “Stop,” they said, “didn’t you come to hear us play? How can you learn about us without hearing our songs?” They each pulled out their instruments, played, and harmonized their singing. It had just been the three of them during the interview, but, as they played, grandkids and great grandkids seemed to come from everywhere outside in the yard back into the house to hear. He was unfamiliar with the song. The older woman thought her grandfather might have written it. A seven year old boy came over and the eighty year old woman asked him if he could sing the song. Dwayne heard the 7 year old boy sing this song his great, great grandfather had written while the eighty year old woman played. He realized then that he was writing the wrong paper. He was still interested and would finish the paper, but the real story was that songs could communicate and pass along culture. He learned never to do an oral history without asking the person to play and every time the family members gathered together from wherever they had been. That’s when he not only started to write songs, but to write country songs. He imagined someday his children would play his songs to his grandchildren. Hell, that wasn’t going to happen now, but at least people knew and played one of his songs. Music created family and community. He had never seen that more so than with the people he met who played this instrument.

Dwayne told Alex about a wake he had been invited to once. The family was not well off, but he has always remembered the number of people who came to this wake which lasted for days. Everybody brought food, an instrument of some type and stories of the deceased. To see the generations gather and to honor this man with music! Alex hasn’t thought about his funeral. He hadn’t thought beyond his plans for this summer with Dwayne. He is moved by Dwayne’s memories-sentimental fool! He thinks of the Cajun old timers who had taught him to play when he was young.

Alex: It’s a musical story telling instrument that communicates culture across generations?

Dwayne: Yes. That is what I witnessed. What song will you play?

Alex: It’s your instrument. I will teach you to play. I will play the harmonica and the other guys will take a break. It will just be us.

Dwayne: It feels right as we move into introducing this Americana sound as part of our band that we include this instrument. (Quietly and as an aside). Thank you.

Alex: Do you want to play an Appalachian song?

Dwayne: It will have to be a great song, if it is just the two of us on these old instruments. We need to think about reaching the younger kids-we will need to try and bridge some generational stuff. I’ve been thinking about Dylan (Dwayne had not been able to forget the thought since he had it the previous week) Remember the Dylan/Cash version of North Country Girl?

Alex nods: That would be the perfect song for these two instruments.

Section 4: Bliss (song)

I’m a man without a woman

A soul without a home

Wandering eternal across the desert sand

Seeking temporary comfort in any random lips

The nightly, desperate seeking

The close to, but not quite, bliss.

My tale is not uncommon

Its writ in many a poem

Sung in every bar by every country band

A lonely man escapes into the bottle he sips

If you hear the old bed creaking

It’s close to, but not quite, bliss.

I’ve never had a soul mate

I’ve looked far and wide

Wandering eternal across the craggy moors

Seeking my salvation in a hundred pairs of arms

Searching for answers in their eyes

Oh, close to, but not quite, bliss.

I’ve had some amazing dates

Even took a bride

Walked through love’s revolving doors

Done some hearts some harm

Told my share of lies

So close to, but not quite, bliss.

I’m a man growing old

Yet my journey onward goes

Wandering eternal on winter’s frozen ground

Seeking a soft bed just to lie and rest

Would like a few nights to recall

The close to, but not quite, bliss.

It is true what I’ve been told-

A man reaps what he sows

No farm, I’ve lived on what I found

Searching for the myth I can’t resist

Going through the motions of it all

For the close to, but not quite bliss.

Chapter 8: The Dulcimer

Sandy wipes tears from her eyes. She has been emotional for the last two days. She remembers Juanita talking about how women her age go through menopause. Maybe hormones are affecting her, but she thinks it is the loneliness. So sad to be aging and realizing you never had real love. It isn’t so bad for her, she thinks, because she has never believed in romantic love. She has never bought into that crap. Her parents hadn’t really been in love and seemed to think of marriage more as a business partnership. She hadn’t been raised to believe in the myth of the one true love. She is sad for the man who believes, who tries to find love, who seeks for it still even though he is growing old. To believe and want it so badly is the real tragedy. If you never believe, you never have to miss what you don’t have.

Sandy has written a new song. She was having trouble getting her voice as low as it should go. If she was a bass or a baritone, but she was not. Initially she hadn’t reacted to the words in the song or hurried to write them down. She is no longer shocked when she wakes up with a poem or song in her head. She enjoys the half asleep and half-awake feeling as she reads the words on the blue screen. She knows when she is fully awake she will be well rested and will remember the words. This time as she reads the words, she imagines a man from behind wrapping his arms around her. She does not see him but knows that he is good looking. He is tall. His arms are strong. She leans back and puts her weight fully against his body. He lifts her hair and rubs his scruffy beard against the back of her neck. Sandy had never been intimate with a man who had a beard. She had always thought she wouldn’t like it, but it does not irritate. It…she cannot come up with the words. It doesn’t matter. She won’t be describing it to anyone. Just live in the moment. Her thoughts return to the words on the screen and her voice in her head gets louder.

She cannot get the sound of her voice in her head as deep as it needed to be for this song. This song is definitely from a man’s perspective. He is a man about her age. He is a handsome, strong, rugged man; a man who believes in love. He is a man who wants love more than anything else. He is such a pleasant man in her brain that she thinks to herself that he cannot be real. She must have made him up as she slept. This must be her version of the fairy tale Prince. As he holds her it is sensual, but not really sexual. It feels, maybe, as if it is after sex. She thinks of the word in the song: bliss. It is bliss. It is more bliss than she has ever known, but how could she have made him up to seem so real. She wants him to hold onto her a little while longer. She feels him loosening his arms. He keeps one arm around her. She sees out of her peripheral vision his other arm bringing up a cowboy hat and feels it brush her hair as he puts it on his head. She notes the brown hair on the arm and imagines running her hand over his forearm and feeling the hair. The arm still around her lets go and he is gone. She wants to turn around to look after him, but cannot. She reads the screen one more time before the dream is over. Upon awakening, she sits up and writes down the words and the notes to the song.

Bliss, she thinks, bliss. She looks at the words she has written down. What an odd word. She has never felt bliss except for this fleeting moment in her dream. She has never searched for bliss. She has had orgasms, excitement, happiness, but never bliss. She remembers a friend of hers used to compare pizza and sex. Both, when they are good, are really good and both, when they are bad, are still good. Why search for bliss when any moron would tell you it either didn’t exist or was really fleeting?

The problem is that for the last two days, whenever she thinks of the song, her heart hurts for this man she made up. He tried, she knows, to find bliss within his wife’s arms, but she was not his soulmate. Now he is old and still wandering and still wants to believe in this myth. In his own way, he has never stopped looking. Then, she would start to cry, because she is so sad for him. Damn.

She tried using the app on her tablet to record the song, but she isn’t feeling satisfied. She needs an instrument. She knows she can’t afford a piano, but didn’t they have cheaper keyboards now? This is why she is sitting in her 2007 Chevrolet Impala in front of an instrument store having a good, long cry. If she can stop crying, she can go in and look for some type of cheap instrument, so she can play this damn, sad song.

It takes thirty minutes for Sandy to gain her composure, apply fresh make-up and go inside the store. A tall man with long grey hair in a ponytail walks over to her. He is wearing jeans, a buttoned Western style shirt and a leather vest. Sandy isn’t sure she even knows enough yet to talk to a salesclerk. She tells him she simply wants to browse. He takes off his wire rimmed glasses and looks at her kindly. He isn’t concerned about trying to sell her anything. He has been watching her cry in the car. Damn, Sandy thinks. She sees now that from the cash register he had a full view of her in the car. She tells him she is fine. He continues to look at her kindly. Sandy tells him again that she is fine. She just wrote this really sad song. From the impression on his face, Sandy thinks that he doesn’t believe her. He assures her he believes she is a songwriter and wrote a sad song. He puts his glasses back on and shrugs. Why not? They have a lot of would be songwriters come into the store. He doesn’t believe that it is not her that is sad. Why would she have written a sad song unless she was sad? Then, it must be a really sad song to make her sit in the car and cry. When he says that the song must be really sad, Sandy feels her eyes fill up with tears again. The sales clerk introduces himself as Adam and asks her if she wants some water. He tells her he is a really good listener. Sandy shakes her head. Is it a breakup or divorce? She tells him no. He hands her a tissue to dry her eyes. Sandy tells Adam that the man in her song has never found a soulmate. Adam looks confused. Sandy quickly composes herself and tells him that she is just looking for a keyboard. She is just needing a cheap keyboard.

Adam quickly turns into a professional sales person. Sandy reminds him she needs a cheap keyboard, but Adam now thinks she is a serious songwriter. He tells her she doesn’t want to go too cheap because she will just be back in a month looking for something better. Might as well spend the money now on something that will meet her needs. Sandy thinks this man has never been a single mother. Money is never plentiful. Sandy is trying to calculate what she thinks she can reasonably pull out of the vehicle repair emergency fund given her car’s age. She has just paid for Isadora’s flamenco dance lessons and there would be other costs associated with these lessons such as costumes. Isadora’s needs are always the priority. Sandy lives frugally and there is still never enough money. She is already feeling guilty about splurging on herself. Really, buying an instrument because she is suddenly a songwriter (having written a total of two songs) seems like a luxury she shouldn’t really splurge on.

Adam is showing her a $300 instrument and stressing how versatile it is for the price. He assures her it is the smartest buy. Sandy doesn’t see a keyboard for what she can actually afford. She blurts out, “What would you have for under sixty bucks? Really, tell me the instruments in your store for under $60 bucks.” Adam is a little taken aback and goes to the cash register. He looks at a list of instruments on a stock inventory list. He reads off to her: a recorder, a harmonica, a triangle, a bongo, a ukulele or a dulcimer. “A what?” she asks. Adam pulls a cheap looking, tear-drop shaped instrument from a cupboard. He explains a guy who lives in the more isolated East side of the Sandia Mountains had brought this instrument in and sold it. He made it himself. He sold it because he had children who were hungry. Adam said the store owner had felt sorry for him and gave him $35. He could sell it to her for $50. It is within her price range. Sandy has never heard of the instrument before. “How would I learn to play it?” she asks. Adam suggests starting by seeing if there are online videos and then maybe a mail order book. They didn’t carry any books or music for the dulcimer. They simply didn’t have much traffic for dulcimer song books.

Sandy doesn’t want a ukulele. It reminded her too much of Tiny Tim. With a recorder or harmonica she couldn’t sing. A bongo and a triangle are ridiculous. Guess she is going to learn to play a dulcimer. Adam says he feels protective towards her and reminds her that the sale would be final. Why not think about it at least overnight? No one else is going to buy it, he assures her.

Sandy picks up the instrument. There is something about its tear shape that seems appropriate given the tears her song has inspired. She thinks of the story of the man who made it having to sell it to feed his children. This seems like a good omen given her own lack of finances. As she holds it longer, she thinks there is something romantic about this instrument. It is the type of instrument a person looking for bliss might play. The man she has made up (the tall, strong, rugged, handsome man with the beard) would play this instrument. She will take it.

She pays and Adam hands her the receipt. He asks her if she is sure she is ok? He will feel bad if she left still upset about whatever is bothering her. Now that he is through “selling”, he is once again looking at her kindly. She tells him she is fine. He walks from around the cash register to stand next to her. He leans his head towards her and smiles. He tells her she is a beautiful woman. Could he have her phone number? Sandy is accustomed to simply brushing off this type of attention. She thinks about what Juanita said to her. She thinks about not wanting to perish in an arrogant self-reliance. She looks at him a little more critically. He is probably a couple of years older than she is. Possibly he might be fifty or close to it. He likes music. He is sensitive and kind. All of those are good traits. He is not particularly handsome, but in a life mate would she need that? Even though he is dressed Western style, she doesn’t think he is a cowboy. Definitely more of the Hippie type; also so prominent in Albuquerque. She thinks why not and gives him her number.

Chapter 9: The Country Star

In what is a five year tradition, the band begins their tour in Lakeside, California. They are the opening band in the city’s free Thursday Summer Music in the Park series. They have opened five years straight. It is a low-key and, generally, stress free event. There is something nice about playing for an audience that did not pay for their own admission. Five years ago when The Lonely Players first started touring, Dwayne had reached out to an attorney friend he knew from graduate school who was now living in Lakeside. Anthony (Tony) Whitman and his younger wife, Abby, were influential both in city politics and the art community. Tony arranged for The Lonely Players to play that first year and they have been invited back every year since. Dwayne thinks of it as easing into the summer tour. It is an eight hour drive, a two hour concert with familiar faces in the audience, and, afterwards, the band spends the night with the Whitman’s. Tony and his first wife were friends with Dwayne and Dani after Tony and Dwayne met at a university sponsored musical seminar. Tony and his second wife have a large, sprawling home, an excellent wine cellar and a generous nature when it comes to their love of musicians.

This year Dwayne is a little anxious about the new sound, but the crowd’s applause is a little louder than typical and Dwayne’s friends are appreciative that night. They love the way Dwayne is performing his hit. Tony had knew him when he wrote it. He is glad to hear it closer to the way Dwayne had originally wrote it. He teases Dwayne about him shaking his ass. Abby Whitman, an elementary school teacher, loves the part in the middle of the show when it is just Dwayne and Alex on dulcimer and harmonica. Tony Whitman says it is the best he has ever heard the band sound. He asks Dwayne if he has written anything new. Dwayne has not. He has been busy with the overhaul of the show. He is sure the creative juices will flow now that they are on the road. At least, Dwayne thinks to himself, he hopes so. Abby asks him, as she does every year, if he has found a girl yet. Is he going to settle down soon? No, he says, probably will never settle down.

After everyone else is in bed, Alex and Tony stay up and sit out on a bench in the Whitman’s garden. They have learned over the years that they share a special interest in tawny ports. It is an acquired taste that the two men have bonded over. They are the last ones awake with a very special port. Sitting outside with the sweet and selective wine, a cool early summer breeze and stars visible in a way that they are not in the light polluted city of Los Angeles, Alex feels his mind relaxing. He had been concerned about having pushed Dwayne. This first concert was a test. Dwayne passed. Alex feels his soul mellowing with the warmth of the wine and the knowledge that it is the beginning of the tour he so craved. He becomes aware for the first time that this is also the beginning of many last times. This is the last night beginning a tour, the last time in Lakeside, the last time sharing a port with a fellow aficionado of the wine. Alex shares with Tony the story of giving Dwayne the dulcimer. He encourages Tony to tell him stories of the younger Dwayne. Tony kept in touch with Dwayne during his Nashville years. Tony wishes he had been a better friend during those years, but he was going through his own divorce and Dwayne wasn’t a man who communicated easily about troubles. Tony was not a fan of Danielle. She seemed, he said, almost two dimensional, no depth, so dependent on Dwayne for her sense of identity. He cannot imagine that Dwayne would have been happy with her over time, but he knows Dwayne would never have left her. Danielle did Dwayne a favor, but Dwayne has never recognized that.

Graduation night, Tony tells Alex, Dwayne kept expecting Danielle to show. He was heart broken when she hadn’t. He had convinced him to play with some other guys in a local bar; just a pick up jam session. Dwayne was so self-absorbed- maybe a little drunk. He hadn’t even realized that all the other guys had stopped playing just to concentrate on Dwayne. You felt, Tony says, chills thinking someday he will be considered one of the greats. When Dwayne went to LA, it just seemed like he had given up on being truly great. But tonight, Tony begins. He stops. He looks at Alex and asked “what’s changed?” Alex doesn’t know Tony well, but he knows he loves the music. He knows he loves Dwayne. Also, Alex just needs to tell someone. Damn-he needs to tell someone. Tony pours the last of the port into their glasses as Alex finishes telling Tony about his prognosis and his attempts to help Dwayne achieve greatness.

Tony asks what he can do. Would money help? Alex shakes his head. Alex doesn’t need help for himself. He needs a conspirator with Tony’s skills set. He can work on Dwayne and the sound, but the tour will be over before word of mouth will build their audience. Tom knows a little about social media and he has encouraged him, but- they need real media coverage and someone with the influence and connections to get that coverage. Tony nods. He has some influence. Alex tells him-without Dwayne knowing, you understand? Tony nods. He will start with connections he has in the Tahoe area. The make Dwayne a star conspiracy has begun in full force.

As Abby Whitman is preparing brunch the next morning, the phone starts ringing. Several couples from Lakeside are making arrangements to go to Nevada City to spend Friday night. Seems like it is a nice week-end road trip. Why not see the Lonely Players perform at the same time? Abby and Tony quickly agrees and by the time the band gets on the road, there are six couples planning on driving up for the show. Dwayne assures them it will be a slightly different show since they rotate some songs. He is happy to have some familiar faces in the audience again tonight. He is still nervous about the new sound; still afraid of failure.

In Nevada City the band plays at a large brewery with an outdoor stage that seats about 100. The area is full, standing only, and probably has more people than the Fire Marshall would allow. It is a wild night. There is something in the air teasing adventure. Dwayne notices women holding their shoes and dancing barefoot. The bartenders stay busy. There is a continuous line to the restrooms. Dwayne notices four kids standing outside the venue area listening; three guys and a girl looking to be about 19 or 20. This is why they are outside the adult only venue. He recognizes them from the concert the night before. Maybe they came up with their parents? They cheer loudly after “The First Time.”

Saturday is another short drive to Tahoe. Dwayne had been excited when he booked this gig, but now is a little nervous. They are playing at a casino with a 250 seating capacity on a Saturday night. It is like hitting the big time for their little touring band. When Dwayne booked it, Johnny was the lead singer and front man. Now Dwayne just hopes he can put on a show for that many people. The Whitman’s call to say they met a couple the night before who are going to Tahoe from Nevada City and invited them along. Three nights in a row? Weren’t they sick of him yet? Dwayne teases about Abby becoming his number one groupie. Tony says the band has never sounded better. He is excited to hear them for a third night. He later calls Alex and updates him on the media plan. When the band arrives at the casino, the event planner meets them. He is a short, slight man wearing a suit and talking very excitedly. The event has sold out. There was a sudden surge of tickets at the last minute being purchased by out of towners and the casino hotel is full as well. Also, the local television station wants to interview Dwayne.

It isn’t Dwayne’s first time on television. He was interviewed on a national morning show when the country legend he had played with died. “It’s the First Time” had been one of the legends later but most beloved songs. Dwayne had also been interviewed a few time for LA newscasts as a background expert for musical news events. He was, after all, a local professor with a doctorate in music history and a minor celebrity. Dwayne imagines that this interview will be similar to interviews he has had in the past. In fact, this interview is nothing like his other interviews.

He is surprised by many things about this interview. He is surprised by the length of the interview, but the journalist says it will be edited for a shorter piece. He is surprised by how in depth the piece seems to be. The journalist attended the concert last night in Nevada City in preparation. He is surprised the idea for the piece came from someone in Lakeside who knows her boss. Finally, he is surprised by the interviewer herself. Jackie is in her mid-twenties. She has prepared by seeing the concert last night, by interviewing a folk historian who specializes in the Western mystique and from gathering old footage of Dwayne from twenty years ago. She is a red-head with short hair, green eyes, about 5 ft. 5 inches and, Dwayne assesses, a c-cup; probably natural as is her hair. Dwayne realizes that he is attracted to her and might be distracted, so he compensates by providing full and complete, sometimes complex, answers.

Jackie’s initial questions are related to “The First Time.” She shows Dwayne a clip from twenty years ago with the legend. Why the change in the way the song is performed? Dwayne says he is performing it the way he had originally imagined it when he wrote it. It was an honor to have it recorded by such an icon. He would always be grateful, but he thought it would be good to revisit the song, try to find its roots, in some ways it is like trying to bridge the gap between who he had been when he wrote it and who he is now. The next questions are related to the evolution of country music. Could he compare Country Music today to where it had been when he played in Nashville? It is a good question and he answers as honestly and fairly as he could, but tells her he has been mostly teaching college for the last few years. She asks about the dulcimer and harmonica duet and he tells her that in some ways it goes back to this concept of bridging musical generations. Dylan’s song was inspired by the traditional song “Scarborough Faire”. Dylan took the traditional song, wrote contemporary lyrics, but kept the traditional refrain. As many times as it had been rerecorded, who plays it today? Yet, the folk tradition encourages reinvention of songs to make them timely for new generations. The way they are playing it today with two really basic instruments with important historic ties to American culture and music is a way to reintroduce it to anyone who comes to the show. He explains how the harmonica had arrived in the United States through German immigrants and was popular during the civil war. It was an instrument one could take into battle. He then talks about the dulcimer and its significance. He realizes the journalist is smiling at him and that he has talked at length. He tells her he wrote his doctorate thesis on the instrument and didn’t mean to lecture. The point being, he says, is that these Americans in the nineteenth century who had immigration or generational memories of strong traditions in musical storytelling found a way to keep those traditions alive even in battlefields and even in isolated landscapes. Today in the 21st century, there is the Internet and smart phones. No one is isolated, we can all share music, but we are listening more and more with our headphones; not communally. How often do generations listen to the same music together? At least in a concert there is a community listening to the music together in a shared experience. Also, did the songs today still tell relevant and meaningful stories? He just isn’t sure that they do in the same way. He hopes people who hear him play the dulcimer and Alex play the harmonica would understand the beauty in just two old guys playing a simple song. If the story in the song means something, then in today’s technological world, the simplicity of the instruments might be the best way for people to hear the story.

He again apologizes for getting long winded and boring. He says he has a couple of friends who have started calling him Professor. The journalist laughs and tells him he did great. She will film concert footage tonight, splice it all together, have it on the Sunday’s news/entertainment program the next morning. She says she is going to try and market the piece to other affiliates: especially in the towns he is going to play over the next few weeks. Her boss feels strongly, or his friend in Lakeside does, about helping to push it in other markets. For her, she is hoping this piece would help move her to the Sacramento market. It could be a big break for her. Dwayne thinks about the moving up and down and running to stay in the same place. She is looking to move up; as someone in her twenties in her industry should be. He tells her he is looking forward to seeing it the next morning. She asks if they couldn’t watch it together. It comes on really early, he says. He meant he would just turn it on and watch it while he is in bed. The young journalist smiles at him with great confidence. She is accustomed to getting exactly what she wants out of life. She tells him she is hoping they will be waking up together. Oh, he says, then he better give her his room number.

That night the venue is indeed sold out. He notices the four kids from the last two concerts right up front. When he introduces his hit with, “I think you know this but it might sound a little different,” there is loud applause before he even begins. After the dulcimer and harmonica duet, the crowd gives the two old friends a standing ovation. Dwayne thinks Alex is about as happy as he has ever seen the old man. When it comes time for an encore, Dwayne asks Alex if he is ready to play a little Punk grass. He notices the kids have their phones aimed at them to record video. He thinks about how they are indeed crossing the generational lines!

The next morning he wishes he could remember the sweetheart in his arms name, but thinks, when they turn on the television, her name would be announced as part of the piece. She came to his room about 2 a.m. He was already in bed. She had convinced one of the hotel clerks to give her a key. She said she had just finished integrating some of the concert footage into the piece for tomorrow. She is young, beautiful, with the energy of having just finished a deadline and he lets himself become lost in her. He is lying here this morning, holding her in his arms, trying to remember her name and thinking that this is about as good as it gets with someone you do not love. Funny how he was thinking about this just a couple of nights ago. Almost, but not quite, bliss, he thinks. She rolls over, looks at the time, turns on the television, jumps out of bed to make coffee and calls room service. She is all energy and bounce and youthfulness and he is an old man feeling the aches and pains of three nights dancing on stage.

She sits on a chair close to the television with a notebook in her hand. She is going to take notes on her performance in the piece that is coming on. Dwayne likes that she is a perfectionist. He pulls himself out of bed to wash his face, brushes his teeth and then lounges back on the bed. He is enjoying watching her watch the television.

“Today, I have the story of an uncommonly handsome, college professor and music historian, who twenty years ago wrote the hit song “The First Time.” This summer he is on a mission to bridge the generational gap of country music by recreating his own song and jumping effortlessly from a folk ballad on an antiquated instrument to a modern high energized bluegrass song that pumps up the audience. The lesson Professor Dwayne Hucks is teaching this summer is that music doesn’t need to divide the generations. It can bring young and old together and build an inter-generational community”.

The piece is impressive even if it does have a bit of hyperbole. There is footage of him with his back to the audience jumping across the stage to a musical interlude in “Hound Dog.” He doesn’t remember doing that move, but there is no doubt it shows off his ass as much as it possibly could. Alex will be happy. He is embarrassed. He gets out of bed to make himself another cup of coffee as the piece concludes with a scroll of tour dates.

The journalist is pleased. She runs at him and kisses him on the side of his mouth. He looks in her eyes. He does like that look in a woman’s eyes. He is her Prince who can do no wrong. He is a hero of song and stage and bed. He could swim in those eyes and kiss these lips for a day or two if he had the opportunity. He thanks her for the comment on being uncommonly handsome. She shrugs and says something about how for a country singer, his age, touring the West, his looks are exactly what is needed to make it big. He explores the comment a little more and she says that good looks are all in the moment, all dependent on culture and the norms for the moment. There really is not such a thing as universal good looks -just what plays in the moment- it is her job to keep her finger on the pulse of such things. His looks are definitely right for the right now in her audience market. She also thinks it plays well that he is reaching for a simpler sound and is a music historian. That kind of smart is sexy for today, she says, that is why she played up his intelligence. She tells him he is kind of like Gregory Peck in “To Kill a Mockingbird.” That blend of educated and down to earth could really appeal to women right now, but a year ago she would never have done the story – a year ago dumb was handsome and now smart is. She kisses him again. Dwayne feels just a little bit dissected and analyzed. He also feels a little old fashion to go along with the old – Atticus Finch, indeed. Could she at least pick a movie in color? He decides to bury those feelings in her kisses, but she can’t stay. She has to go see where she could get the story picked up. He should expect to see cuts and versions wherever he is playing.

Sunday is an off day: a travel day. Dwayne likes to schedule it so they wouldn’t play on long travel days. Eight hours to Henderson and they would perform on Monday. Tuesday not even an hour away to Laughlin. Then four hours to Winslow for Wednesday night. A couple of hours to Phoenix on Thursday and they will have been on the road for one week. It had already been a very full three days.

Dwayne tries to write in the bus. Three great nights of concerts, that beautiful young thing in his arms this morning, long stretch of desert ahead of him. It is exactly the right conditions for a day of song writing. He has been looking forward to this! As the bus bounces along he goes back and forth between paper and guitar and damn, nothing seems to come. He thinks about the woman this morning telling him what was sexy and hot is all dependent on timing and location, culture and norms. Ridiculous! She would have found him sexy any time, any place, any culture. She invited herself to his room after all. Maybe she is trying to convince herself. He has seen that look in women’s eyes before. He likes it when women give him the set you high above all others look. The best thing about never being with a woman more than once or twice is that you get to leave them with that look in their eyes. Long term that look never stays. He thinks of the look in both Dani’s and Carolyn’s eyes at the end. He could live forever without seeing that look of disappointment and pain in another woman’s eyes. The thought crosses his mind that this probably means never falling in love again. If a woman got close to him, he would almost certainly disappoint her eventually. All these great thoughts rolling around his brain. Why can’t he seem to get any of them to form the words of a song? Hell, at this point he would even be ok with a poem. He tries to form the words. Damn, the words didn’t come. He wonders if he took a nap if he would dream about his woman in the blue world. Not long ago the him in his dreams had walked up behind the woman and held her in his arms. He might be getting closer to seeing her face. It is a mid-afternoon, hot Sunday day driving through the desert. He lies down and dreams his blue dreams of the unknown woman.

Section 5: Uncommonly Handsome Common Man

We have an intellectual discussion about my physical appearance.

I am the world’s most attractive man or the world’s most repulsive;

Dependent, you say, on culture, norms and values.

I say, but I know my value in the culture we both inhabit.

Intellectual flirtation-your way of saying yes while denying an attraction;

Although your eyes say, “Kiss me, handsome.”

Well, babe, you are only human.

You will take me tonight as I am.

Judgement- your name is woman!

At first your eyes will tell me

That you set me high above all others;

Consider me a most uncommon man.

I bring you nightly pleasure.

Your smile extends well into daylight.

You consider me your knight,

Your protector, your defender.

We walk the beach at sunset hand in hand.

I like this image of me and

In the image reflected back at me,

I believe this is who I am.

I dread the day I see disgust in your eyes;

The pain, disdain, repulsion soon to come.

In time in the image reflected back at me,

I will see another image of your man,

The lowlife who offended you

Through some neglect, misspoken word,

Perhaps an action you don’t understand.

I will avoid your eyes, your glance and gaze

Until we are strangers-angry

You have seen me for whom I truly am.

If I apologize today for any tomorrow,

Can you try to see me fairly?

I stand before you as simply-MAN!

I am well-intentioned, strong and caring,

Weak, insecure and deeply flawed-

Not high above or stomach crawling;

Just a common man.

My love, I stand vulnerable and exposed

My body, heart and soul as freely given

To a woman as I can.

Handsome and repulsive-BOTH?

Babe, I am only human.

Can you accept and love me as I am?

Chapter 10: A World without a Prince

Close to 90 this Sunday in June in Albuquerque, but cooling off a bit now. It is not too hot yet for the botanical gardens; especially if you apply sunblock, look for shady places to rest, and drink plenty of water. Carmen and Isadora have taken charge of Carmen’s younger siblings. The five children are on a horse pulled wagon ride around the functional farming portion of the garden. Juanita and Sandy take a few minutes to relax in the rockers that are made to look old on the porch of the “farmhouse”. Sandy tells Juanita about her latest adventures in dating and Juanita’s shrieks of laughter can be heard through-out the quiet farming portion of the gardens.

Sandy: I don’t get it. I suggested we go out to coffee and he said everybody started out texting now so the first date isn’t so uncomfortable. I get that, but we never really said anything of meaning and suddenly it was Babe this and Honey that and then a picture of his junk. I mean, I guess, there’s a benefit to knowing what his junk looks like before you go out on the first date, but it seems to be getting the cart before the donkey, if you know what I mean.

Juanita wipes away the tears of laughter: The important thing is that you are trying.

Sandy: A guy came up to me at the bar the other night and introduced himself to me as John Travolta. I asked if that was really his name and he said he was hoping I was Olivia Newton John. Then, this other guy was talking to me and he seemed nice, a friend came up and interrupted him and he said “’can’t you see I’m starting a relationship with my next ex-girlfriend.”

Juanita: You make me glad I am married.

Sandy: I just think I am too old and I don’t understand the whole electronic, social media dating thing. I mean this hippie guy seemed like he was nice when I met him. How long do you date by texting? Should I have sent him a nude picture back?

Juanita: No! You have Mike for sex -if that’s what a guy wants. You need a real guy.

They sit for a few minutes in quiet. The temperature continues to gradually decline. Clouds are forming off in the distance for an afternoon thunderstorm. The horses pulling the wagon with the kids round the final corner on its way back to the farmhouse.

Sandy: This is a pleasant moment.

Juanita (pleased). It is a pleasant moment. I wish we had more of them.

Sandy: Do you believe in bliss?

Juanita: Believe in it? Of course.

Sandy: Have you experienced it?

Juanita: Of course.

Sandy: Is it blissful to have someone to grow old with? Or is that just a myth?

Juanita: It’s not a myth. It has a way of lingering in the background when you’re in love. How could my life be blissful with four kids? It’s chaotic and crazy and hard, but the day Bernie held his son, for the first time – just watching them was bliss. Or when the kids are finally all down for the night and Bernie’s fallen asleep on my side of the bed and I touch him and he makes room for me and wraps me in his arms without waking up. Something in the way he moves over to make room for me is bliss.

Sandy hasn’t told Juanita about the second song she wrote or the dulcimer she bought. Juanita is her best friend, but Sandy thinks it is probably best to keep the songs and poems secret for now. The more the songs and poems come to her, the more precious they seem to her. She thinks of them as something fragile – like a flower that could die when plucked or a peaceful afternoon broken by the sound of thunder. Those thoughts make Sandy laugh. She is becoming more poetic in her daily thoughts.

Father’s Day came and went. Isadora and Sandy bicycled to a yoga class and then stopped at a farmer’s market on their way home. There were no questions or comments from Isadora related to her father. Neither of them brought up fathers at all. Sandy again thinks about how grateful she is for Juanita; her children are almost like Isadora’s cousins. Isadora has a more meaningful family in some ways than Sandy had growing up. School is out for the summer and Carmen and Isadora wants to spend more time together. Isadora asks if she can spend the night tonight with Carmen and Sandy is happy to say yes. She is happy to know Isadora will be spending the night with a bunch of loud kids and seeing an adult couple in love and making marriage work.

She is, also, happy for some free Sunday time. It is a great opportunity for her to call Mike – get a little satisfaction, she thinks, but also thinks it might not be all that satisfying. She has been practicing the song “Bliss.” So instead of calling Mike, she goes home and plays the dulcimer. She is getting better. There are excellent online instructional videos and it is an instrument she took to better than she had the piano. The only two songs she is interested in playing are “Blue” and “Bliss.” How interesting, she thinks, those two B words are the absolute opposite of each other! She takes a lot of pride in her songs. Thoughts of the man she has dreamt of lingers with her. She thinks of how nice it felt to lean back in his arms. She suddenly thinks how decadent a long, full Sunday afternoon nap would be and stretches out on the couch.

Sandy wakes a full two hours later with a poem she considers far more complex and layered than her other poems or songs. It is different than the other poem and songs, but is still written by the rugged, handsome man. He does not take Sandy in his arms and she does not feel him rubbing his beard on her neck. Instead as she sees the words against the blue screen she is aware of his thoughts, his fears and his heart as if it has sat side by side with her thoughts, fears and heart in her body, mind and soul. She realizes his heart, soul, and mind had always been there in her dreams, but she was so good at pushing her own emotions away that she had done that, to some degree, with him as well. This poem has to be written by a man. In a strange way, it seems to be written by a man who is talking directly to her. She realizes she is breathing with difficulty and makes it a point to think: in and out, in and out. She grabs a pen and writes the words down quickly.

After she writes down the words of the poem, she leaves her writing on the table. She pours herself a glass of ice tea and takes it out to her balcony. The breeze has kicked up, the air has cooled down, and the smell of rain is in the air. The minutes before the storm begins suits her mood. Sandy focuses on the moment at hand. It is early for the monsoon season. Perhaps it will be a long season. Giant slow drops begin to fall- a couple on her, but mostly around her. At this stage of a monsoon storm, if you knew the right place to stand, you could avoid getting wet all together and could just watch the giant drops fall in slow motion and bounce off the ground. As with all moments, though, this moment of the storm is quickly gone. The breeze is a wind, the fall of the rain is quick, the drops are smaller, and there are more of them in closer proximity to each other. A moment later and the thunder begins, the torrential monsoon with the pounding, hard, hurtful slivers of water is at its full force. Sandy goes back inside. She leaves the balcony door open and turns off the swamp cooler. She returns and stands beside the open balcony door and stares mindlessly at the raindrops. She is no longer focused on the moment at hand. Her mind is quickly running through all the moments of her dreams on the blue screen; the poems and songs. Twenty minutes and the storm ends abruptly. If it was not for the lingering smell of rain in the air, you could delude yourself into thinking the storm had never happened. Sandy is grateful to smell the air. It centers her somehow. She is in the moment again. She watches a bird in a tree shake the rain off its wings. It is another peaceful Sunday in Albuquerque and there is nothing unusual in the day. Sandy tells herself this a few times as if it is a mantra. Finally she sits down cross legged and begins the breathing exercises she usually starts out with in the morning. Inhale/exhale; concentrate on the breathing. This is a great way to calm herself. After twenty minutes, she considers herself calm enough to look at reality more clearly.

Sandy realizes that she always knew in a part of her brain that she could not suddenly be waking up with poems and country songs written in her sleep. Really? She is writing songs from a man’s perspective and with a history and background she knows nothing about and she is writing them while she sleeps! She doesn’t even listen to country music. She doesn’t even read poetry. It is absurd! Sandy realizes she had decided to believe the absurd because all the alternatives were crazy. If the most believable scenario is absurd, then what? She forces her brain to consider the crazier alternatives. Remembering the Browning poem related to reincarnation, she thinks, this could be a voice from a past life. Sandy had grown up Episcopalian, but hasn’t been to church in a while. It is not in her nature to spend time pondering spiritualism. Reincarnation and another voice from the past speaking through her is not possible. Is it? She thinks she could be experiencing multiple personalities, right? This could be another identity in which case she is truly crazy and will likely be hospitalized soon. For some reason, this seems the more plausible; albeit the most unpleasant scenario. Could it really be a man, a real man, is coming to her in her sleep and using her to write poems and songs? Why? Is he in a coma? Is he unable to speak or write himself? Is it someone with whom she somehow has a bond? She thinks of Isadora’s father and her heart leaps, but she knows his life’s story. These poems and songs are not his or Mike’s. The simplest answer, she thinks, is still that I am actually the one writing them and for some reason I have made up this guy in my dreams.

She feels she is now ready to read the poem she has “written” this afternoon. The poem is titled “Uncommonly Handsome Common Man.” She likes that he is handsome; whoever he is. The first paragraph is about flirtation. She reasons that she has experienced some of that recently. She had been talking about it to Juanita this very afternoon. Ok- this is where that came from. She laughs at his arrogance, his self-assurance. What an attractive trait in a man! She could see herself writing this first stanza and making up this handsome, flirtatious, and arrogant man.

The rest of the poem portrays a man who is wounded, damaged, scarred. He doesn’t believe in himself except for his good looks. He blames himself for breaking women’s hearts. He doesn’t trust himself not to break another woman’s heart. He doesn’t think he could stand being responsible for breaking the heart of someone else he loves. He wants to believe that he could confess in advance, admit all his faults, make sure she knows how difficult it is for him to be the knight every woman wants and, maybe then, only then, could he risk falling in love again. Sandy has never broken anyone’s heart. She is sure of it. There is no way she could have written this poem. The thoughts and the concepts are too foreign to her to have imagined. They are not foreign now, she realizes. She knows this man so well. Her heart bleeds for him as much as it had when she wrote the “Bliss” song. Somehow, these foreign emotions and thoughts are now part of her understanding, fears and dreams, but they are not from her. She understands them as if someone had spent great care in explaining them to her, but she couldn’t own them as her own.

She reads the poem again with a more critical eye. It reminds her of the poems of Browning. This poem cannot be hers. It is too good for her to have written it. She picks up her phone to start googling. There has to be a psychic specializing in these types of things in Albuquerque.