As Ferris Bueller so famously said, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”
Amen, Ferris. It seems like the last 30 years are a blur at times and I’m trying to remember when I last stopped and looked around.
There was a lot of looking when I lived in Nashville. But a lot of what I enjoyed and looked at has either closed or morphed into something else so only memories survive.
There was one night at a Writer’s Night that my roommate, Frazier Riddell hosted weekly, where Tony Arata got up and sang. He often did. The performer in me could only judge the performance and not leave that behind and hear the song.
I wasn’t impressed. But you know who was? Garth Brooks. Yeah, he took Tony’s songs and made millions. I don’t even know if Garth was in the audience back in 1987.
But one night, the late great John Prine got up and sang a few songs.
Now, I knew who he was and had actually paid good money to go see him at Mud Island a few years before my Nashville days.
When you’re a few feet from greatness, you stop and look around. Thanks, Frazier.
I attended a church where most of the contemporary Christian singers hung out.
It was actually started for them as a late afternoon service because so many of them performed on Saturday nights and it gave them a chance to get some sleep and get in some worship.
There were plenty of ‘80s Christian hitmakers there but my favorite was Scott Wesley Brown who morphed into a worship leader later in his career. I was walking through the sanctuary one Wednesday night and Brown had a few folks practicing a musical of sorts based on his “Please Don’t Send Me to Africa” song about being a missionary.
They were missing whoever was playing the pastor and someone asked if I’d fill in. Yep. I looked at the script and saw it was a southern preacher so I just jumped in and poured it on thick. They liked me and I Wally Pipped somebody accidentally. Still have the t-shirt of the song and one of Brown’s Hawaiian shirts he sold at the church rummage sale. I stopped and looked and smelled and still do from time to time.
Oh, and thanks to my late friend Bob Finical, who was working as a booking agent, and had tickets to the Nashville symphony when Michael Martin Murphy (of She Ran Calling Wildfire fame) was the main event. He and his black Stetson hat met me thanks to Bob. We hung out and just had some fun talking and such but I have no memory of what we talked about. He was fun to be around and the performance was epic. I wasn’t drinking but I was bold enough to ask him for his hat.
He said no. But it was nice to stop and look that night. And it was a really nice hat.
I’m no Forrest Gump or Ferris Bueller or even a Johnny Weathersby but I get by.
There are plenty of folks we need to stop and look and enjoy before the world whisks us and them away into other places. Teachers, coaches, friends and acquaintances all need to be enjoyed and remembered. I often reminisce in this space about those who have influenced me on many levels.
These days its Athletic Director Jason Conner at MDCC, Brady Smith at Sunflower Lumber, and others who give me the time of day to chat about business and life and our differences.
Life is always moving fast. Be sure and stop, look and take it all in. Or you might miss a cool encounter.
