"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild 

and precious life?"

--Mary Oliver, "The Summer Day"

On Stanley Avenue, just south of town, sits Andalusia Cemetery.  I haven't counted, but I suspect there are upwards of 2000 graves in the place.  My grandparents and my father are buried there.  Ben Bates is 50 feet away.  My aunt and uncle Hilry and Abbie Ryland are just across the way. There are, no doubt, a hundred or so other people there that I know.  But that leaves almost 2000 people that I never knew.  And there are people buried there that no one alive knows or remembers.  That makes me pause.

Recently, my brother-in-law, Frank Shaffer, and I were engaged in deep conversation, and as conversations always do when the participants are middle-aged fathers who are struck right between having grown children and aging parents, the convo turned philosophical.  Frank said something along the lines of "isn't is just crazy to think that we are here for a little while, and then not many years after we die, there will likely be NO ONE alive who even remembers us?!? While this might seem sad and depressing to think about (go for a walk--it'll boost serotonin), it's actually a very empowering thought, if you view it in the right perspective.

If we truly and strongly grasp on to this truth--that we will be gone one day--then we begin to live differently.  We begin to live with a different sense of purpose that we perhaps lived with before we crossed over into this knowledge. Or, as Richard Rohr put it, while we're still building our vessel.  Once we are in Rohr's second stage of life, and we begin to FILL OUR VESSEL, we see everything differently.  And this ultimately leads us to wonder what our legacy will be.  

Legacy.  (I actually want to buy a Subaru Legacy, but that's a different story.)

How are going to be remembered?  What difference are we making with this "one wild and precious life?"  It reminds me of Lin-Manuel Miranda's "who tells our story?"  

Early this morning, my mother's cousin, Dwight Ryland, died.  He was 81.  He had two daughters, Anna and Stephanie, neither of whom I've seen in many years.  The significance of this death is that there are now only THREE male Rylands left in my family:  Dwight's older brother, Wayne, Wayne's son, Justin, and Justin's son, Caleb.  Unless Caleb has a son, the name ends there.  But does it really???  

I've been thinking about Andy Andrews' "Butterfly Effect."  As I am one who believes literally everything has significance, I loved that book.  I suggest you read it if you feel like you aren't making a difference in the world.  My great-grandparents Lon Ryland and Ida Martin Ryland had four kids:  my grandfather, Alton, two daughters, and another son, Hilry.  From that farm in rural Geneva County came so many amazing things. From them came my amazing mom, and her sister, my Aunt Laura.  From them came Thomas and Jeremie.  From them came my niece Lorren who sings like an angel and her brother Riley who loves music almost as much as me.  From them came my kids.  And from them came all the rest of my Ryland family.  From them came everything that all of us have ever done.  And will do in the future.  All because two people got married and had four children.  From them came Dwight's many drives from Thomasville, Georgia to Andalusia just so could feast on home-made biscuits.  My mom's really are the best on earth.  Just ask me--I'll tell you.  From Lon and Ida came more things than I can type today.  The point is that they do live on--after death--in the lives of those who came from them.  They are not forgotten.  And neither will I be forgotten.  And neither will you.  

It is not what you achieve that will make you be remembered--it is what you contribute to the world.  As Kevin Kline's character in The Emperor's Club said "conquest without contribution is without significance."  What a powerful thought.  Some of you will contribute art.  Or you might contribute compassionate children.  You might contribute a life of faith that affects those around you.  You might contribute to those who are alone.  You might be the cause of 6.02 x 10^23 smiles. You might contribute by making someone believe in him or herself.  You might contribute by easing the paths of those around you.  You might carry a burden that isn't really yours to bear.  And the real, capital-T truth is that you will likely not even know that you contributed to the world in the way you did.  

Your birthday has already been put on your headstone.  If you are reading this, your death date hasn't.  You're working on that little hyphen that goes between them.  "So, tell me, what is you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"

Today's the 1st day of the rest of your life.  What's on tap??

 "Time, time, time--see what's become of me."

--Simon and Garfunkel

When I was in high school, Chick Earle helped coach the Andalusia High School baseball team.  One of my best friends, Zane Johnson, played on the team.  I remember he would say that Chick was known to yell "Time him, time him!"  It became a running joke with Zane and me.  It's been about 32 years, 7 months and 7 days since we graduated--but who's counting, ya know??--but I guarantee you if I saw Zane today, and I yelled "Time him, time him" he would laugh.  Baseball is so much about timing.  Chick probably knew that better than anyone I ever knew.

If you put a quarter note triplet in front of the average high school drumline, I would bet you a lot of money that they would play it like dotted eighth/sixteenth tied to eighth/eighth.  It's close but it's wrong.  The timing is wrong.  God forbid they have to play half-note triplets.  Right, 2019 Southwind hornline?? Helloooooooo! But I digress.  In music timing is absolutely crucial.  I have a book of orchestral excerpts for auditions, and in the preface notes, the compiler of the book actually said that very thing:  that rhythmic inaccuracy is the number one contributing factor in being passed over in an audition.  Timing matters!!!

I used to have a book called How We Decide.  The first chapter was about Tom Brady and his rise to football fame, beginning with his career at Michigan.  It was fascinating to read about just how fast he could make the decision to throw the ball to this or that receiver or to run it, or to do whatever else he might have done with the football.  (I guess that could include deflating the ball also.). When you look at the size of a regulation football field, and take into consideration just how fast professional athletes are, on both sides of the ball, it is obvious that timing matters.  

Time and timing seem to dictate so much of human existence.  We are obsessed with time.  Back to the Future, and its two sequels point this out in cinematic beauty, complete with amazing music that had to be timed perfectly for it to make sense.  At exactly the time the flux capacitor (part 121G at O'Reilly Auto Parts, by the way) kicked off at 88mph, that music climaxed and BOOM! Back to 1985 we go!  But what if the music and the film aren't in time?  Well...then the effect is lost.  You might not know that when you watch the opening credits for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the trumpet solo you hear Malcolm McNab play is actually take 17.  He played it 17 times perfectly, but the composer wasn't as a good a conductor as he was a composer, and on the first 16 tries he couldn't get the music to line up with the video on screen.  If you're Malcom McNab, it tends not matter, because he has never flubbed a note, ever.  

We've heard of being in the right place but the wrong time.  And we've also, unfortunately, known of instances of being in the wrong place and the wrong time. But what about when the timing of everything  is exactly right??  Well, that can produce some amazing results.  The thing about timing, though, is that you can't force it, and you can't always know that the right time is right.....now.  No, now!! Wait...now!!!! Dang it, I missed it!  NOW!!!  Now??  Uhh, ok...ok.....NOW!  Nah....that does't really work.  There are just some things you simply cannot know, until after the fact.  And perfect timing is one of them.  

My Favorite Things.

Remember that song in The Sound of Music?  The one where Maria lists off her favorite things in a cheesy bed-time display of ridiculous vocal and acting talent??  Yeah, that one...

I don't think this could be turned into a song, but I thought I'd write my own list.

These are a few of my favorite things....

1.  The sound of my children when they say "hey, dad."

2.  Salted caramel lattes made with heavy cream.

3.  Posting final grades at the end of the semester.

4.  Firewood that is cured perfectly.

5.  Honda motorcycles.

6.  The first day of fall semester.

7.  How the Chicago Symphony brass section sounded when Bud was still alive.

8.  Building things with my hands and my tools.

9.  Flagg Mountain.

10.  Homemade vanilla ice cream.

11.  Boat parades. Even if it's foggy.

12.  Jeep Wranglers.

13.  Watching The Ensemble shred.

14.  Being tacet on a piece of music so I can listen to my friends play amazing music.

15.  Spontaneous trips.

16.  Maverick and Ellie and Josie and Zeus and Beau and Dodger and Tucker and Oakley and all the dogs.

17.  Smartwool sock.

18.  LaSportiva shoes.

19.  Yamaha trumpets.

20.  My mom's homemade biscuits.

21.  Voces8.

22.  How my yard looks after I mow it.

23.  Robert Frost poetry.

24.  The look on a student's face when they finally get it.

25.  #BrassStaff

26.  Liriodendron tulipfera.

27.  Sunsets

28.  Liturgical music.

29.  November.

30.  Tritone suspensions.

31.  Having my kids all under one roof.

32.  Comfortable chairs.

33.  Hennessy hammocks.

34.  Barq's root beer

35.  Sunshine on a brisk fall day.

36.  Hiking.

37.  Road trips.

39.  St. George Island

40.  Duran Duran

There are a million other things.  I don't even know how I listed 40 things because I love so many things.  There is so much in the world to love if you see it properly.  

I was recently encouraged to resumer blogging, and so here I am.  And I love that, too.  

Have a great day!  

I used to….

"Things aren't what they used to be, and probably never were."

    --Will Rogers

Past tense verbs are dangerous.  (How's that for random??)

You know the kind I’m talking about…

I had.....

I went.....

I used to....

Quantum physics seems to suggest that we can go backwards and forwards in time, and that we can even be at multiple points in space-time simultaneously.  But I don't need quantum physics for that, as I am quite good at living in the already-happened past, or in the future that I have planned out in my wild, sleep-deprived imagination.  It's easy to get lost in thinking about the past--to go down the rabbit hole--and while it isn't necessarily bad to think about the past, I have to be careful.  It's not so much the thinking about the past that is problematic, as is HOW we think about it.  What we think about it.  The significance we give it.  

For most of my adult life, or at least the portion of my adult life in which I was conscious of such things, I have believed that people think about the past so much because we know it's the only thing we really "have."  It's the only "proof" that any of this life that we've created actually happened in the first place.  In the present moment, which alway seems to fly by at the speed of light right before our eyes, we are so pulled for attention that the "present" isn't even a real thing.  Your daughter is trying to show you what she made at school while your son is chasing the dog through the house while you are attempting to cook spaghetti before rushing off to Wednesday night Bible study, and you're already mentally exhausted from a long day at work.  It's like you're standing on the banks of a river watching the water flow by, non-stop, all day long for eternity.  All a parent wants to do in these situations is press pause on life and just stop time from passing.  Ask any parent whose last kid(s) is/are seniors in high school--they'll tell you this true.  

As for the future...well, the flux capacitor is still just a movie gimmick...a joke that is "currently out of stock" on the O'Reilly Auto Parts website.  (Part #121G, if you wanna check that out.) We can't go to the future yet.  Not sure I'd want to....I mean, have you seen Back tot he Future, Part 2????  No thanks.  We can dream about the future.  We even think we can plan for it, but even this is false because the future never really arrives because once it does, it immediately passes into the past.  

I taught my kids, and my students also, that you can't plan for the future--you can only plan a past to look back on. Make it a good past, because you are going to look back on it for years, and years, and years, and years.  No action taken taken is without consequence, and it just might be that the only consequence is you having to look back and wonder what would have happened if you'd decided differently, but there is always a consequence.

So, about this past of mine/yours....

We romanticize the crap out of it don't we??? 

"When I was in school..."

"Back when I was in the military..."

"Back when I was a priest..."

"Back when I was a teacher..."

We are absolutely convinced that the best days of our lives are BEHIND US.  And it is this mentality that scares the absolute living daylights out of me.  I mean, am I to believe that I've already done all the good that I'm ever going to do?? God forbid. Sadly, I must admit I'm the world champion of this kind of thinking, and I must change it.  I hate that I ever wasted time and energy being upset [read: "completely wrecked"] that this or that thing or time or place ended and is no more.  I hate that I ever got to a place in life where I'd been "taken out" by the enemy with such a sly, simple tactic--making me think the best days of my life are behind me.  

Remember in that movie A Night at the Museum, right before Robin Williams/Teddy Roosevelt turned back into a statue, and he was talking to Ben Stiller's character?  Ben said "I have no idea what I'm gonna do tomorrow." And Robin Williams said "how exciting!"  Do you feel truly excited about knowing that you have absolutely no idea what is going to happen tomorrow?  I bet if you're honest, that notion scares you. It does me.  But I'm learning to enjoy the not knowing.  And with that comes less emphasis on the importance of what I've already done.  At least I hope so.  Into the light!  

Have a good day.  

 "How old are you, buddy?"  

 

A life....in magnets....

Seems to me that most folks like to collect things.  Stamps. Baseball cards.  Fine chinaware.  I always said I would like to collect watches.  I have a few, maybe 4 or 5--yeah, I know, not much of a collection, but it's a start.  One is from my dad and is a Bulova Computron.  Another is a Wyler Dynawind Incaflex.  

This photos above are of my mother's refrigerator.  She loves to collect magnets, specifically magnets from places to which my brother and sister and I have travelled.  When we go somewhere, mom always tells us "bring me a magnet!" And she means it.  Like, we best not even cross the borders back into Covington County without a magnet.  It's serious business.  I was late to Christmas parade once because I was trying to find  her magnet, and didn't have the stones to face her without it!  LOL. 

A little bit about my mom....

She's an amazing warrior of a woman who raised her kids to be able to go and do whatever our hearts and minds led us to do.  With hardly the funding to do so, she took us places: the bayous of southern Lousiana, the beach, New York City, Disney World just to name a few.  She wanted us to see the world, and she wanted us to know that we could spread our wings and fly!  In many of our travels, mom has been able to go with us, which has been a blessing for me.  Nowadays, she chooses to stay home.  But she's always with us in spirit wherever we go, and she asks that we honor her in a simple way--to just bring a magnet for her refrigerator.  

To me, her refrigerator is far more than just that.   It's a work of art that tells a story of a family of three generations all influenced by one woman.  And what a story it is!!!

I think the oldest one is from the Cayman Islands.  1999.  A whole life ago.  I both am and am not that person anymore.  I remember Cayman being really expensive and that the cruise ship couldn't stay there more than 5 hours due to port charges.  The Firm had been partially filmed there and I scuba dived in the same place where the diving scene was in that movie.  

There's one from the Colosseum in Rome.  I have no idea how that got there as I have never been to Italy.  Thomas? Jeremie?? Mom, do you have another child???? 

There's one from Sequoyah Caverns.  I understand those caverns were recently closed permanently.  I need to verify if that's true.  If you've ever been to Sequoyah before you know it's incredibly beautiful, and full of Indian and Alabama history.  That part of Alabama has always been a favorite location of mine.  Mentone, the Little River Canyon, DeSoto State Park...all great places to be in the fall or spring.  Or any time.

Near that one is one from Cheaha State Park.  I used to spend a good bit of time at Cheaha with the Alabama Hiking Trail Society.  Rick Guhse', Eric Douglass, Joe Cujah, Mike Kennedy, Marie Arnott and I were the driving force of AHTS for a good portion of the early 2000s.  I am very proud of our connecting the Pinhoti to the Appalachian Trail in 2008, and I often camp near the monument when I go backpacking there.  

There's one from the Tuskegee Institute.  When Grant was in the fourth grade, he had to do a project on Booker T. Washington, so one Sunday, we drove up to the campus of Tuskegee University and learned more about BTW and George Washington Carver than I had ever learned in school.  Both of those men were brilliant, and Tuskegee stands as a monument to them and their vision.

And right near that one is one from the US Marine Corps Memorial, better known as the Iwo Jima Monument.  Having a son who is a Marine makes this doubly special.  If you have never scene Iwo in person, I encourage you to go.  If possible, see it at night!  Wow. 

There's one from Busch Gardens.  There is no telling how many times we have been to Orlando/Tampa with the AHS Band.  I know I have been three times myself.  Jeremie has probably been 11 or 26 times. We grew up in the band, and our kids grew up in the band.  There ya go.

There's one from Quebec.  Ahhh, the Quetico park.  Canoe fishing for days.  Grant and I paddled for 6 days catching more fish than we could count with 5 other canoes of father/son pairs.  It was really cool to do that trip with Mark Craig, whom I've know since I was 5.  

Right near that one is one from Alaska.  Amazing and gigantic Alaska.  One day I hope to ride the Dalton Highway on a motorcycle.  Now THAT will be a great magnet.

I see one from Highlands, NC.  This was a trip that mom actually went on.  My brother may or may not have gotten a speeding ticket trying to keep up with me.....I plead the 5th.  

Grand Lake, Colorado!  Wow!! Now that is one of my top five favorite places in the entire world.  A summer night sitting on the dock of Grand Lake at sunset is almost impossible to beat.  Can you say ZERO humidity and 65 degrees?????

There's one from Wisconsin.  Wisconsin.....I was in the airport in Milwaukee when I learned that Ashlyn was going to require reconstructive surgery.  I had just purchased the magnet and was holding the bag when I got the call. (Yes I remember that--it rather makes a mark on you when you learn your baby girl is going to have that kind of surgery.)  

And of course, there are several from the Camino.  Two trips there, in 2018 and 2019, and it still calls me every day.  I'll go back one day.  

There are so many other magnets on that refrigerator.  Each one, a memory, and each one a place my mom went, at least in spirit.  My mom leaves a legacy in her three children and her 5 grandchildren.  She sent us out into the great big world with fierceness and assuredness.  She sent us out as explorers.....and all she ever wanted for it was a magnet.  I love you, mom.  

"We must find the time to stop and thank the people who have 

made a difference in our lives."

--John F. Kennedy

It's Thanksgiving week.  

This is a week that I always look forward to for a variety of reasons.  As a middle school band director, I would have the entire week off from work, which was great.  For the past 18 years, working at the college, I have worked a few day during the week, but classes don't meet, so it's always a nice break from instruction and rehearsal.  Plus, I like to take some time and look back over the semester and look at what I've accomplished, what the Ensemble has accomplished, what my kids have accomplished. It's a time of reflection.  

This week is also a time of family.  The kids are out of school and are at home.  This year is somewhat unusual as Grant is at Camp Geiger completing infantry school and Jack has lived in Pensacola since August, but he's home as of this writing, and it's really nice to have him at home for a few days. 

Of course, there is also the Thanksgiving meal.  I mean, who doesn't love turkey and dressing?? Well, Frank Shaffer doesn't like dressing, so Jeremie makes stuffing for him.  But other than him!! LOL.  Oh, and cranberry sauce.  And dumplings.  And sweet potatoes.  And everything else!  It's just grand!

But above all this, Thanksgiving always makes me think of my Aunt Doris and Uncle Lloyd Langham.   

Always! 

My mom had four aunts: Mary, Doris, Abbie, and Ruby.  There were actually five, but the oldest (after my granny) died when she was 12.  Mom was closest to Doris, and so every year, when the invitation came to drive down to Bay Minette, we always went.  I still remember counting train cars as the trains would pass by between Atmore and Bay Minette.  One time we counted over 150 cars in one train. 

I can still remember the house where they lived.  It was a grayish-blue, on the right side of the road as we approached it, and it had a carport on the back.  You always entered the house from the carport and immediately in front of you when you walked in was a white freezer, over which were a couple of Lloyd's guns--a rifle and a shotgun, I seem to recall.  Two steps up from that level, and you were at the dining room/kitchen.  To your left was a small den which also was a step up.  

In that den, there were two recliners, on either side of the door, as well as a couch and a television, and on that television, on Thanksgiving day, was the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.  Uncle Lloyd was usually in the chair on the left, if my memory serves me correctly, and he was always smiling.  Always.  

Doris and Lloyd had one son, John.  John and his wife Jamie, and their daughters Janet and Kathryn, and later on Susan and Mary would be there also.  I remember Janet was enough older than me that we didn't really play together, and Kathryn was way too fast for any of us to catch her playing hide and seek. John was a math teacher and like most of the men descended from Oscar Brown (my great-grandfather), he was very tall.  Mom always admired how smart he and Jamie both were.  She also taught math.  They would later go on to work for Faulkner Community College, now Coastal Alabama, part of the system I work for now.  Small world, huh?  

Lloyd had been a butcher and always had an awesome garden and he'd send things back with us.  He had a genuine heart and was a giver. Aunt Doris had owned a salon and I remember her reminding me of my mom's sister Laura: full of sass.  I guess Laura got it from her.  LOL.  I also remember my mom sitting at the table talking with Doris and laughing for what seemed like forever.  I think mom saw her as a mother figure.  

The food was always delicious and it seems like we'd stay til shortly after lunch, and then we'd drive 31/29 back to Andalusia.  Back to the house where the four of us lived.  Back to my small, little world on Perry Street.  Back to reality.  

Several years later, in 2019 to be specific, I was driving my motorcycle home from Gulf Shores.  For whatever reason, I decided to try to find that house where I spent so many Thanksgivings.  I messaged Kathryn and she gave me the address, and a few minutes later, there it was.  It's no longer in the family, but it's still there.  I parked my bike in the street and just looked at it.  And remembered.  I remembered faces.  I remembered memories.  And I was thankful.  

I was thankful that someone included us.  Standing there, 47 years old, having lived through enough stuff to understand what life is really about, I was mature enough to appreciate family.  I was old enough to appreciate inclusivity.  I was mature enough to see what REALLY happened each time they invited us down for lunch.  Lloyd and Doris were showing compassion.  They were sharing what they had with us.  They were being FAMILY.  It is only now that I'm a parent myself, that I can truly appreciate someone looking out for a single mom and three small children they way they did.   I never got to thank them for their kindness, but I do thank them.  I appreciate it more than I can say.  

When we share what he have with others, we are sharing more than things.  We are sharing more than food.  We are sharing more than clothes.  We are sharing ourselves.  We are making a connection.  We are drawing closer.  We form community by sharing, and if there is anything this world needs more of, it is community.  

I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving.  Share something with someone if you get a chance.  Invite someone into your home, even if Covid restrictions suggest you shouldn't.  You never know when someone will be blogging about you 40 years later, thanking you for having done so.  

God Bless.