OldTroubador's blog post - Sunday, 17 Feb 2019

Before I begin the real reason I'm here, two quick funnies.
For those not aware, moonshine can now be made and sold legally in liquor stores. It kind of removes the cachet of drinking 'shine, at least for me. And yes, the stories of shine are true - you feel fine as long as you stay on your barstool, but as soon as you try to walk, your face meets the floor. Anyway, I saw a billboard in South Carolina advertising 'Sugar Tit Moonshine'. If I was still a drinking man...…
Last Sunday, I was driving around Rome, GA and went past an adult boutique called 'The Frisky Biscuit'. Can you imagine the orders placed there? "Excuse me, I'd like two bacon, egg, and cheese biscuits please, a side of grits, and, ummmm, how about one of those 'Clone-a-Willy' kits? To go."

In case you haven't noticed, I haven't blogged in a while. I haven't even been in status, although I have stopped in to check messages and to leave a few. The last year and a half have been rough on me - health issues, broken trucks, and, oh yeah, buried Mom and Dad. Needless to say, losing my folks hit me hard. Whenever I see baseball highlights on YouTube, especially the Yankees (Dad was a life-long Yankees fan), I want to call him and ask if he saw what happened. Or I will be driving along and see something that he would find interesting or amusing and I catch myself reaching for the phone. I didn't talk to Mom on the phone that much - it was tough for her to understand the conversation due to being profoundly deaf. But I could hear her in the background and she almost always took Dad's phone just to say Hi and Be careful. And on my birthday, two weeks after we laid Dad to rest, I waited all day for them to call and sing Happy Birthday to me.
Since Mom died, and then Dad, I don't have the old fire to push as hard as I used to. I will drive hard when I need to, but not really because I want to. I'm still making miles and getting the goods delivered, but it feels more like a job now, a chore. It is not a happy pastime where I happen to earn money for doing what I enjoy. And as such, I have nothing to write about. A few times in the last couple of weeks, I have had awesome days, where the coffee was hot, the tunes were loud, the windows down, and the tires were smoking down the highway. I could feel that old spark trying to fire deep inside me. But when it came time to put pen to paper, the pilot light went out and the fire was cold. SInce October of 2017, between visiting Mom for the last time, all the funerals, caring for Dad before he left, and my health problems, I've lost between five and six months of driving. So, I don't have as many experiences to draw from as I normally would. As an aside, I was going to buy a truck this year and lease it to USA Truck, but I lost so much time that it is inadvisable for me to spend that kind of money, not knowing how much driving I can do in a given year.
There is one more reason I am not writing. My sister wrote and delivered Mom's eulogy, and I took care of Dad's. If I do say so myself, it was a helluva piece of work, the best I've ever done. It feels like a culmination to all the writing I have done before. There is a tradition that, when a special toast is given, the glasses used are broken so not to be used again for a lesser purpose. To me, Dad's eulogy was that special glass.
Will I write again? Probably. At some point I will start writing again. And the dam will probably break open and everyone will get tired of me. But for now, the pen will stay in my pocket and the Muses shall go unanswered.

To end on a brighter note, I saw magnolia trees in full bloom in Alabama this past weekend and heard tree frogs singing to each other outside Atlanta. So take heart, spring is coming, slow but sure.

From out where the horizon meets the highway, this is the Old Troubador, wishing you all well.