Gone But Never Forgotten

Hey folks, its been a while but here I am again. Life has really taken a sharp turn for me lately, but not all of it has been bad. Despite losing my favorite uncle in the whole world things have been okay. I've been depressed over it but it was expected for a while. He had cancer and it was pretty aggressive, although I forget the type (there's so many). Day by day its getting easier, but I'll always miss him till my last day here.  My band played another gig last night and it was one of our better performances if not the best yet. Despite not having a bass player I thought we sounded pretty good, and that was no fluke. We worked on it. We did it the old fashioned way, just paying attention to details and making sure everything is hooked up correctly when its time to start flipping power switches. Then we did our sound check. First up came the drums. One by one (microphones) we fine tuned them on the mixer, and then it was our singer's turn. After that we dialed in the guitars and tried out a song and made a couple of fine adjustments and walla!! We were ready to rock n roll. We shut it all down and went home to get ready for later that night. It was a Halloween party and I'd say everything went pretty well as far as the gig & party goes. We were all on top of our game at the same time and everything just clicked along like a well oiled machine. And our singer won best costume for his Joe Dirt look.

I played my uncle Bob's old Gibson ES-330 for the first time ever at a gig. That old guitar and me go a long way back. I think I'd have to do a full blog post on that history to do it justice. My uncle Bob passed away a few weeks ago from cancer and I was pretty close to him my whole life. Even while he was in the Navy we wrote letters back and forth (we didn't have email back in those days) and when he got out and moved to Arkansas, with me in Illinois, we still wrote letters and talked on the phone occasionally until I finally moved to Arkansas myself after a stint in the Army. We were co-workers on two different occasions and one of those lasted several years. So we were pretty tight as you can probably tell. After the funeral my cousin Bobbi presented me with that guitar to hold on to for a while once again. Words cannot express how that felt to me. Of course I assured her it would receive the same good care I used with it back in my younger days and told her I was going to put that guitar back on the stage in his honor. Uncle Bob played in bands a lot in his younger days but this guitar had not been touched for a long time.

I invited my cousin, Bobbi and uncle Bob's wife, aunt Vada to the party to see uncle Bob's guitar back in action. When I picked up that guitar and strapped it on for Jamie Johnson's, In Color, there were a few hearts that skipped a beat or two (including mine). It made my cousin cry, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't the bad kind of crying. She said it was the perfect song to honor uncle Bob with, and I agree. It was actually suggested by my buddy, Steve, our lead guitar player. As soon as he said it I knew that was THE song. After a couple more songs I'd had about all I could handle for the time being. I didn't want to start bawling on the stage lol. Uncle Bob was right there with me all night in spirit. Something (strange?) happened at the gig before this one. It was on the same day uncle Bob passed away. I didn't find out until after we were finished playing and saw my missed calls and text messages. While we were playing, and while my uncle was passing away, my amplifier volume turned up a little. I'll just say it kinda blows my mind thinking about it and leave it at that...... Until we meet on the other side and get together for some pickin'. Rest In Peace Uncle Bob ... I love you forever man.