Roots
The roots of performing arts in my family go much deeper than just me. In the summers when I would visit my grandma, we would look through the catacombs of picture albums that my she had amassed over the years, and one black and white photo in particular caught my attention. It was a photo of some guitars, two gentlemen, and a lovely lady in the foreground all positioned around an old ribbon mic with radio station call letters in the background.
These have to be famous people that my grandma had met, or long lost cousins somewhere. As I sat on the Davenport perusing the intricacies of this fine Kodak moment, my curiosity began to well. I just had to know more about the young people in the photograph. But before I started a conversation with grandma I needed to wait a minute or two longer because her coo coo clock was about to go off, and I had waited what seemed half a lifetime to watch it coo coo, and I would have to wait a whole nother hour if I missed it.
My grandmother on my dad’s side was a singer, and her two brothers were musicians. They sang in church, and performed regularly and different dance halls and fine establishments around their region of the state. On several visits to my grandma’s house when I was very young we would go down the street to Uncle Guy’s place and there would be plenty a pickin’ and a singing. I recall being fascinated with the sound coming from the jumbo acoustic guitar being held in uncle guys strong working man hands, the bright brass colored stings resonating with each pluck or strum.
The deep, rich, mother of pearl inlays adorning the headstock and the outside binding of the curvaceous, alluring body. It all beckoned me. It had my full attention. My grandma would try to get me to join the singing or listen to her sing and all I could do was soak up what that guitar was putting out. It was filling a space in my head and my soul that I didn’t know existed. There were a few chords that were strummed, that called out to my inner soul. I wanted to hear them again… and again. It was like my spirit thirsted for those chords. The low end resonance and the high end chime filled the unfinished room of Uncle Guy’s newly erected home. The sound swirling in a rolling upward motion directly towards the heavens carrying me with it.
Then it stopped as abruptly as it had started. These were hard working folk who knew the value of musical release but also knew there was always more work to be done. So while the older men and strapping lads went back to working on the house, off we went on our next adventure; sailing in my grandma’s Chevy Nova. Yard Sale-ing that is. As we tooled the unfamiliar roads and byways looking for the deal of the week, I couldn’t help but think about that guitar. More so, how it completed me. How it reached my innermost being and started a fire, not just a flickering flame but a roaring wildfire.
As we slowly meandered the country roads back to my grandma’s house, the sun shown through the side window onto the dashboard of the maroon colored Chevrolet causing the black, liquid filled compass to glisten as it gracefully rotated on it’s axis pointing the way home. Simultaneously the sounds of the guitar were rotating on the axis of my spirit, also pointing the way home.
