Looking for Summer

Okay, I know that the official beginning of summer doesn't come until the middle of June, but for those of us working in academia—for me in particular—summer begins around 15 May. Life isn't as sweet in this administrative position as it was when I was regular faculty; I'm on a 12-month contract, so I have to be here all the time. Still, the summer—running from mid May to mid August—holds some promise for me. My hope is that I can find some creative space to return to some of the things that, I think, make me me.

I want to write. I wrote for years—songs, stories and other things. In my own eyes, my writing defined me. Maybe that's healthy, maybe not. Whichever the case might be regarding health, when I'm not able to write—which is 99% of the time these days—I'm not myself. It might be in this circumstance that the darkness of my last post originated. Anyway, I'm at least thinking about writing. I might write a song or two. I have a couple of short stories I'm working on. And a couple of longer stories.

I want to make some music. Writing is tough, with lots of sweat and angst involved. And I don't smoke anymore, which seems to make it doubly tough. I remember sitting in an upstairs apartment on Music Row in Nashville, my guitar in my arms, the apartment dark except for the single light bulb over my notebook and the glow at the end of my cigarette. I certainly don't want to go back to smoking, but I'd love to recapture some of that old writing feeling. But back to making music. I'm never more "gone" or "in the zone" than when I'm playing music, either alone or with a group. Right or wrong, it's the most elevating, spiritual experience I have. Tonight, I'll be playing solo on the patio at a golf course in Greeneville, Tennessee. Nobody will be listening except for my wife, but if I can keep that from bothering me, I can have a blast playing song after song after song—and getting paid for it! Then there's most every Sunday with the band at church. It's a fine band, and I like most all the songs we do. Together this makes one of the brightest spots in my week. On May 16, the White Water Band will get together again to rock that little back road over in Mitchell County. We're working toward a set of my songs to play later in the summer and fall in Spruce Pine and Marshall and down around Chattanooga. That's gonna be a blast.

And I want to travel a little bit. Although I've been able to do a good bit of traveling these last months (Washington, DC; San Antonio, TX; Charleston, SC; Bermuda), I still have more that I need to do. I'll go to DC again in a couple of weeks. But mainly, I need to go to Nashville. Too much time has passed since I saw my friends there, and I'm feeling the hole in my life. (If you're one of these friends reading this, look for me sometime between June 14 and June 19.)

Okay, maybe I'm not thinking so much about travel as I am about friends. I spend too much time confined to this office. If I'm going to be writing a lot this summer, I'm going to have to break away often to avoid madness. So I'll be in Nashville. I'll be in Spruce Pine. I'll be at El Torito. I'll be down the street at the Acoustic Coffeehouse with the 4 O'clock Club and with my English folk. I'll be at Cherokee United Methodist Church. I'll be over the mountain in Walnut, NC. I'll be down in Blythewood, SC. I'll be home in the living room.