It has a sweet satin black finish, Floyd Rose licensed tremelo, rosewood fingerboard with black pearl “flying bat” inlays, EMG pups,and grover 18:1 tuners.

1. Start saving for a car. My poor little Civic is in it’s “golden years” @ 298,000 mi. and isn’t going to last forever.
2. Get a washer. I’m tired of going to the laundromat.
3. Practice my more advanced guitar techniques (sweep picking,tapping, etc..)
4. Get junk out of my shed and my yard. Basically, get rid of all my junk. (and other people’s that have been abandoned at my house.)
5. Write more songs for new release.
6. Finish “Wish Song” video.

Well, there they are. Wish me luck for 2012. Comment on this post and let me know what you resolve to do in 2012.

4EVER ENDEAVOR

So many times I’ve stumbled on the crooked road

Every step curse the burdens that I have towed

So hard to just get to my feet and move along

I don’t know where I found the guts,to be so headstrong.

When my body is breaking down, (and by God I ain’t that old)

I know I got to forever endeavor to save my soul

I admit some of my heartache I brought on myself.

And caged in from  my redemption is my personal hell.

The world moves right across me as I lay and I bleed.

They say, “You can’t always get what you want.”

I can’t even get what I need.

And I try, and I try, and I try

When my body is breaking down. (and by God I ain’t that old.)

I know I got to forever endeavor. . . to save my soul.

I fooled my heart so often that love was found.

Just to learn that on this “island” I’m ever bound.

Someday I’ll stand before the doors to paradise.

Damn sure I’m gonna ask the man, “Was it worth the price?

Well, was it man?” . . .Tell me!

When my body is in the ground; in that six foot deep hole.

Know that I forever endeavored to save. . . to save my soul.

RISE

By, Jay McAllister

1^st Verse

Been tangled in a thorny patch for many an uncounted day

Trying to beat a path back to you.

I only see a wall of misery that’s in my way.

I am shaking with so much to prove.

Then the raven overhead catches my eye.

I raise my arms above me to the sky.

Chorus

I wish I could rise above this murky plain.

I want to soar over the turbulence the lightning and the rain.

I wish I could climb from this hole I’ve dug myself.

The horizon far below me, and the world laid at my feet.

If I could rise.

2^nd Verse

My tests and trials fell and shattered into broken glass.

No “do-over” or second chance for me.

And to those who hindered me while I was weak can kiss my ass.

But the anger here I need it lets me see.

My enraged and bitter eyes turn to the stars.

Then I relax when I think of where you are.

(Repeat chorus)

3^rd Verse

Six billion souls infest this dark and sinking cursed earth,

Six billion isolated points of view.

A single voice calls out for you for all it’s worth.

A drowned out scream buried in the gloom.

Accepting lonely days as normality,

And merely prison walls are all he sees.

(Repeat chorus)

© Jay McAllister 2010

Giant Steps pt.1: Overture

This song has no lyrics, so I’ve included it here as the title page for the links to all the other lyric pages as a jumping off point to get to the lyrics for my songs. Control the little player above to listen to my introduction piece for “GIANT STEPS”

It’s called “Overture” and it consists of many elements taken from the later parts of the opus and put together for a short introduction.

The opus “Giant Steps” Is a story of an elderly man who basically squandered his life and missed many opportunities to be more than what he was. Then, one day in a depressing “funk” he fell asleep and “dreamed” a new life for himself.

Giant Steps pt.2: Looking Back

(1st verse)
He spent his whole life starting over.
Falling down, going back to square one.
Another job, different home, a hopeful lover.
A brand new song on the stand and left undone.

(chorus)
Life’s pace continued.
In the race, he was distracted.
In the distance of the past,
What he could be if he’d reacted.

(bridge)
Ever since his first words spoken,
He felt flawed, wrong, and somehow broken.
Marred and scarred in some way.
Dimmed was his light of day.

(2nd verse)
As a young man with no plans
Day to day, tomorrow will fall in place.
Lofty goals slipped from his hands.
Having fun sent his dreams too far to chase.

(2nd chorus)
Looking back through the years,
This way his life moved along.
Lately it’s all come crashing.
In his old age it now seems so wrong.

Giant Steps pt.3: Tears for the

Wasted Days

With bowed head in his hands. . .

Aware of his plight, the truth demands.

At the start he had no doubts or fears

of the net result of squandered years.

Now turning back to face his futile past of waste

the dam behind his brow breaks loose the tears.

(2nd Verse)

Wasted, drained, and spent from grief.

Reddened eyes , heavy lids close for relief.

Lies to one side, back toward the light

to face the shadows and purge all sight.

He sinks into dark thoughts of his history wished untrue.

And finds a way to sleep and greet the night.

Giant Steps pt.4: Entranced (Finale)

(1^st verse)

“As a dream comes to me, (but it’s not

‘cause it’s got a strange reality.)

A light grows. Off I go to the past

Where I last stood at my first crossroad.

Decisions to make, which way do I turn?

A giant step upward from what I have learned.

This moment to choose all over again

From the future I see with both eyes open.

Triumphant, I move on.

(2^nd verse)

I can see what can be. With hindsight

I just might alter my history.

Blind before, now know more in my head

Than I did; I now see what’s in store.

I’m informed now with every choice.

Before I was silent. I now have my voice.

Consequences are now bright and clear.

Haunting mistakes I no longer fear.

Correcting, I move on.

(chorus)

In this dream I seem to feel that it’s real.

Manipulating all of the strife that’s shaped my poor life.

Past life’s memories swirl out of view. Now renewed.

Eliminating all of the strife of a downtrodden life.

(3^rd verse)

Back through time in my mind I can change

Rearrange my entire lifeline.

Just one night to set right all my goals

As my soul walks with an Inner Light

The derelict I once was now is dead.

Just a nightmare that was all in my head.

One by one I’m rid of my woes.

It’s hard to believe the way this dream goes.

Waking, I move on!”

THE ANGEL AND THE FOOL

In early summer an angel flew into his door

And stayed, he had her company for a while.

She brought hope, faith, and love and so much more.

Into the night she left, but free and with a smile.

Oh, but when she was gone he cried.

A fool, wanting her to stay by his side.

Will his angel forever be out of reach?

A dog after a butterfly.

Clouds overhead,  she’s  sunlight through a breach.

Then she’s back again, as if  from the sky.

He waits to see her again every day.

To look into her eyes,  hear her laugh.

His heart sinks knowing she has gone away,

Just memories of her kiss and a lone photograph.

“Oh, she’s gone again.” He cried.

He only wanted to be by her side.

(repeat chorus)

Autumn’s here and winter’s coming soon.

“Bide your time,” she told him, “until the spring”.

But she’s gone, free in the light of the moon

Said someday she may show him everything.

As she left, he laid back and cried

Wond’ring if she’ll ever come back and be by his side.

(last chorus)

But his angel is forever out of reach.

The dog has lost his butterfly.

Clouds overhead, no more sunlight through a breach.

The fool stares up to cry, and shouts to the sky,

“Fly my angel! Fly free my angel!”

“KILLER” THE DOG

By: Jay McAllister

I wake up from my restless sleep

And take a quick look around.

Run to the door, slip through the crack

You never know where I’ll be found.

They whistle and call but I run to the hills

To howl at the rising moon

Lift my ear and cock my head

Don’t worry I’ll be home soon.

I’m a cur, I’m a beast, always looking for a feast,

But most of all… I’m a dog.

I’ll never know the answer to life,

 But I know I’m having fun

Scrapping with cats sniffing this and that.

That’s my life under the sun.

The whole world’s going straight to hell.

I don’t care because I’m free.

Run a mole into a hole, a squirrel around the world

Or a possum up a tree.

I’m a cur, I’m a beast, always looking for a feast,

But most of all… I’m a dog.

The next day……Jimi Hendrix died.

WISH SONG

BY, 

Jay McAllister

INTRODUCTION

(INTERVIEW #1)

J.B.: “My earliest memory? That’s a hard one. Let’s see…I remember I lived in the country in Virginia, in a small cabin. I don’t know if we owned it but there was a horse in the field in our back yard. I used to see it out of my window, just walking around, grazing. I was maybe three years old. I was fascinated by that horse.”

            “One day, I had a bright idea;  ‘I’ll go pet the horsy’.  My pappy was in the garden, busy with his pumpkins, beans, squash, or whatever.  I totted on out into the field, walked right up and pet the horse. The look in that horse’s eye was so peaceful. When I turned to walk back to the house, I must’ve walked around to the rear of the horse. I remember a sharp pain in my back, and seeing the ground below me moving, and a sensation of flying. That horse kicked the shit out of me!”

“I woke up in my bed, and my pappy and a neighbor, Doc Wilson, talking in the kitchen.  When Doc left, Pappy walked to my bed and I could see he had been crying. I had an awful pain in my back, and I couldn’t feel my legs. I guess I was hurt pretty bad.”

“Now, Pappy was an old blues guitar picker from somewhere around Mississippi, or Louisiana, or someplace down that way. He used to talk all the time about his old buddies from his childhood on the Mississippi River. He was an orphan, raised by an old black, homeless man that earned his money playing the harmonica in various towns along the river. They were no doubt a strange pair in those times. He always said that the man gave him something that enriched his life like nothing else ever would. Later in my life, I came to realize what that ‘something’ was. I’ll just never be able to explain it.”

“As he sat by my bed, he seemed torn over something. I recall how he kept saying, ‘I don’t need it no more, I’m too old.’ and, ‘There’s no sense me keeping it.’ Then he walked over to his old handmade, beat up guitar…picked it up, sat in a chair by my bed, and started playing.”

“What he played that day, to me, just didn’t sound right; not his typical delta blues anyway. I don’t know what it was. I just remember it sounded and somehow, “felt” different to me. It made me sleep….and dream. I dreamed of distant stars and the light from them washing over my body. I dreamed I was being cleansed by their light somehow. Suddenly, the dream changed and I was looking into a horse’s eye. Then the pupil of the horse’s eye became the sun.”

“When I woke up, my back felt fine, and I could feel my legs again. My pappy was on the floor, unconscious, and laying on his guitar. He must’ve fallen on it because it was in pieces. When he woke up, he started to cry from happiness, I think, because I was okay. I don’t remember how he was before that day because I was so young, but somehow, I don’t think he was ever the same after that.”

He had lost track of time. “How long have I been here, staring at his grave?” he wondered to himself. Everyone else had left a long time ago. He faintly recollected someone asking if he would be all right by himself, and his answering, “Yeah…Go ahead. I’ll be O.K.” The moment everyone was out of ear shot he let loose the tears. He just couldn’t bring himself to cry in front of them. The reality set in and he couldn’t believe the old man was gone. Now he was done and ready to go home and sleep and shut down all his beleaguering grief for a while.

The burial service was over, he knew, at four o’clock. He also knew at this time of year, September, the sun sets around seven-thirty, so for about three and a half hours he just sat, recalling memories of his grandfather, and grieving for the loss of him as a best friend and the only family he had ever known. And now, looking into the face of the sunset, he came to the realization that he isn’t dead, not as long as atoms exist, the sun still shines, and there is at least one person in this world who will always remember his essence. He has merely gone back to where we all come from to rejoin the universe. He hastily stood, his legs nearly buckling under the sudden weight of his body, and turned his back on a cheap tombstone that read:

ELVIN JAMES “PAPPY” FRANKLIN

BORN- September, 17 1902 DIED-September, 17 2002

May the stars shine upon his soul

until God’s final judgment.

He started walking. It was a half-mile to the road, and by then, it would be prudent to be on it. It was always hard to see this path at night. The few neighbors that “volunteered” to carry Pappy to this plot bitched and grumbled not only for the distance into the deep woods here, but just as much for the rocky, uphill terrain of the narrow path. They tripped numerous times and even dropped his casket once. It was an embarrassing and undignified fiasco for which the boy forgave them. It was difficult for him to find anyone to be Pappy’s pallbearer at all so he overlooked the faux pas. He had no flashlight but as long as he reached the road before twilight failed completely, he could prevent a sprained ankle or a few stubbed toes.

He walked on while wiping the last of his tears on his shirtsleeve and he wondered what he was going to do, “What will become of me now? I guess somebody from the government will snatch me up and put me in a home somewhere.”

Johnny Goad was raised and home schooled by his grandfather in his country cabin in a remote, pristine valley in southwest Virginia. While Pappy was on his deathbed, their nearest neighbor, Doc Wilson, inquired what was to be done with his twelve year-old grandson? There was no other family around so it was a relevant question. Elvin insisted, rather boisterously for a 100 year-old man on the threshold of the pearly gates, “Nothin’! I done made arrangements with them that matters.” J.B. could hear the words from the kitchen table in the other room where he was sitting. He was curious, “What did he mean by that? What arrangements?”

As he shuffled through the last fifty yards of mountain laurel that seemed to swallow the neglected trail to the road, J.B. remembered who it was who last checked on him at the grave. It was the good Doctor himself. He also knew that he would be waiting for him at home. “I’m surprised somebody hasn’t sent a search party.” J.B. mused.

He reached the road, and after another half mile, he came to the gravel driveway that led to the cabin. He looked up and saw the Doctor’s red Jeep parked by the front porch light. He immediately also noticed an unfamiliar vehicle parked in the shadow beside the cabin. 

He drew near and he could see Doc Wilson on the front porch sitting on the first step, his hand shielding his eyes from the light of the porch, peering into the darkness. J.B. must have seemed like a wandering ghost slowly appearing into the illumined area.

“It’s about time you were showing up. We were worried.” Doc said dropping his hand and standing.

Doctor Ted Wilson was old, but not nearly as old as Pappy. J.B. wasn’t sure, but guessed he was around 65 or 70. He was your typical country doctor. Ted used to run a clinic on the main highway into town. He was now semi-retired. Folks would call him at his home when he was needed and he would drop everything to meet them at the clinic. If there was an emergency, he never shied away from making a house call. He had short, grey hair, and a big, bushy mustache so thick the only feature one could make out beneath it was all chin and no mouth. He always reminded J.B. of a combed and neat Albert Einstein. He was normally built, usually wearing coveralls but this evening he was sporting his black suit and tie. He had immediately loosened his tie when he returned from the cemetery.

“You all right, son?” he asked with an empathetic tone. He put his arm around the boy’s shoulder and walked him up the four, short steps onto the porch.

“Yeah. I’m just going to really miss him Doc.”

“I am too, son…I am too.”

Pappy and Doc Wilson were best friends. When Elvin “Pappy” Franklin came drifting into town over fifty years ago, people didn’t know what to make of him. Just a sack of clothes and a beat up old guitar was all he carried. No one tried to get to know him very well, and no one ever understood how the old man, seemingly undereducated, accomplished the home schooling and raising of his young grandson.

In the small community of Summer Hills, Virginia, people were more inclined to mind their own affairs, though none were completely immune from the afflictions of rumor and gossip. It was generally not known exactly where, when, or how J.B. entered the picture, which for a while, was a short-lived incubator for the “virus of hearsay”.

Some speculated that he was abandoned at the old man’s doorstep by a long lost, crack addicted daughter. Others said he was found in the woods. Schoolchildren joked that J.B. was farmed out of the ground in Pappy’s garden. No one however curious or inquisitive minded, had enough nerve to check into any legalities of the guardianship of the boy. Everyone held the good Dr. Wilson in such high regard that the respect of his word and seal of approval was sufficient to accept the odd pair as a communal offshoot of their fold. “Live and let live”, as they say. Besides, J.B. appeared to be well fed, smarter than average, well taken care of, and most importantly, happy.  Anyone could see and sense that the two had a powerful bond of love for each other. They were family, and they were best of friends, and Ted was an ideal buffer between them and the world at large.  He was their perfect advocate and defender of their way of life.

“Doc, whose car is that?” J.B. asked, nodding toward the grey rusted 1980 Mercury.

“You’re about to find that out right now.” explained Ted as he opened the front door and allowed J.B. to enter first. He held his hand out, palm up, in an ushering gesture.

J.B. entered the cabin and spotted a woman sitting on the couch with a book in her lap that was opened upside down, taking a break from reading. She was in her late fifties; thin, with black, grey streaked hair.

“J., Meet your Aunt Lisa. She’s your Pappy’s oldest daughter,” Said Ted. “Your mother’s sister.”

“Who . . . ? Pappy had another . . . ? Why didn’t he . . . ?”

“It’s alright baby.” Her voice was soft and angelic. “I know you have a lot on you right now.” She said. She laid a bookmark in her book and set it on the coffee table.  The pitch of her voice was consoling and tuneful in his ears. She had beautiful brown eyes, and in her younger days must’ve been very pretty. Even now, at her age she appeared to be younger, say, in her early forties.

“Your ‘Pappy’ knew me as a young child, but I was taken from him. He just recently found me, or should I say, I found him.”

J.B.’s head was swirling with a range of emotions. He was naturally distrustful of strangers as it was, and this woman was no one he had ever met before. She was sitting here, claiming to be his aunt, yet he never even knew his own mother. Surely Pappy would’ve said something.

She motioned to the love seat that sat at a right angle to the couch, “Please, if you’re not busy at the moment, have a seat and I’ll try to explain some of what you care to know…as well as I can, mind you.”

J.B. sat on the love seat, and while not breaking eye contact, nearly missed the cushion farthest from her.

“I would feel at ease in my heart if you would accept my condolences of the loss of your grandfather.” She began. “I am told you and he were very close.”

Immediately, J.B. could tell this woman was educated, articulate, and by the sound of her accent, from the north.

She continued, “I regret my arriving too late for the funeral. Though I talked with him on the telephone a couple of times, I wish I could have seen him at least once before he passed on. I was delayed, unfortunately.”

“You never met Pappy?”

“He raised me until I was six.”

“Then what?”

“Then, I was taken from him.”

“Why? Were you kidnapped?”

“No…well…I was, in a manner of speaking. It was ‘legal’.”

As she said the word “legal”, J.B. sensed animosity in her voice.

“He was good to me, but certain authorities couldn’t see past their own narrow-minded ideas of what was ‘good’.”

Again, J.B. heard the sting of sarcasm in the word “authorities”. All he could muster to say was, “Oh.”

“I had been trying to find him for the past ten years when my friend gave me a lead that let me know where to find him. I finally learned that he was living here, in Summer Hills. My friend had better resources than I. One person I could never find was my sister, your mother. Needless to say I was quite surprised when I found out I even had a sister, and equally saddened to learn at the same time that she too, had passed away, and that I never got the chance to know her. Now, at least I am able to meet you Johnny, my nephew. Now, you are the only true family I have, and I, yours.” 

As she spoke these last words, she smiled, and J.B. saw in her face what he could only describe as, “Eyes that laugh”. It was a look that seemed to light up the room. Suddenly, some of the distrust went away, and he felt a fondness for her. But the next words she spoke set him back a notch.

“That brings me to why I’m here, J.” she called him by his first initial, the way he preferred.

“Doc must’ve told her I like to be called ‘J’.” he thought.

“I’m here to take you home with me, to New York.”

“What?!”

“I know. It’s sudden. But think. You have no one now to care for you and who better than family would be suitable for that honor? I say ‘honor’ J., because this way, neither of us needs to be alone. It could actually be the best arrangement for both of us if you think about it.”

Ted sat on the arm of the love seat next to J., “I’ll look out after the property here son, until you come of age to claim it. And your Aunt Lisa is willing to make arrangements for you to visit here in the summer. It’s really for your own good J.”

J’s head was spinning. This was just too much at once. First, Pappy up and dies on him, then he learns he has an aunt, and in his first encounter with her, finds he is being uprooted from the only home he has ever known.

“Your Pappy wanted it this way, honey. He made me promise. I guess he felt it was important that you grow up with a family member.”

Ted added, “I tend to agree.”

They all fell into an ominous silence, apparently to wait for J’s reply. He thought about his options. He could run away, but where? He dismissed the thought the second it entered his mind. He didn’t want to wander around in the wild, homeless. He most assuredly didn’t want to live in an orphanage or a foster home. He felt sure the latter was obviously the only alternative. This lady seemed nice, and she was family. Also, somehow, he felt comfortable in her presence. Maybe it was some intuitive kinship there after all.

Before he could speak, she told him, “Just sleep on it tonight sweetie. We’ll have plenty of time to talk tomorrow.”

“Thank you, ma’am. It’s just that I don’t know what to say.”

“No. There’ll be none of this ‘ma’am’ business. You can call me ‘Aunt Lisa’. And Doctor Wilson here has already informed me you prefer to be addressed as ‘J’.”

Then softly, she spoke, “You know. This is all new and sudden for me too, but I’m truly excited to have you come home with me.”

He looked at her and saw she was smiling. Yes, she had “laughing eyes”, and he could tell that she meant what she said.

“Can I bring my guitar?”

She gave him a pondering frown, “Are you any good?”

Then she laughed, “I’m teasing you J., I would love it if you brought your guitar. The doctor here tells me you’re very talented.”

“Oh, he’s definitely got something special.” Said Ted

“Well, when you are in better spirits, I would really enjoy listening to you. I’m a real music lover. It must run in the family.”

With that, Ted excused himself, wished them goodnight, and assured J. he would return tomorrow. Then, with a nod to J.B., he left. Aunt Lisa soon excused herself politely, “I’m going to lie down now, but while you are thinking about it, I want you to keep in mind that I am committed to doing what I can to take care of you and keeping you safe and happy. I think, right now, we kind of need each other. I’m hoping you come to agree. Goodnight.”

J. sat, wondering how he would sleep. He was used to the lullaby of Pappy’s snoring to drift him into slumber. After a while, he got up, drank a glass of milk, and then went to bed as well. In his room, as he lay in his bed, it seemed like the darkness and silence of the night amplified every insignificant noise. He listened to the river. Though it was flowing by a hundred yards away outside, in the cold stillness of the country it seemed to trickle along right outside his bedroom window. He could hear a cricket chirping. His thoughts went to Pappy teaching him how to calculate the air temperature by the sound of a cricket, but he couldn’t concentrate on counting the chirps. The wind gusted and blew the few lingering raindrops that were caught in the leaves of the big maple tree onto the tin roof of the cabin. For a moment, J. thought it was starting to rain again. He yawned.

He was suddenly aware of a familiar sound as his eyes closed, and his mind was lulled into unconscious slumber by the snoring in the next bedroom.

The music now included more instruments, all in tune and harmonizing with the guitar, yet the guitar was the primary sound above all. He could hear violins, flutes, and clarinets, and when the tune reached its louder levels, trumpets, trombones, and various horns.

The song was loud now, the guitar more distorted and suddenly, everything punched in with a deafening kick. The guitar played a solo that seemed to flow with a flurry of notes that reminded J of “The Flight of the Bumblebee”, by Rimsky-Korsakov but without the repeating phrases. He looked down at his hands and saw they were flying up and down along a guitar fret board, realizing that he was the one making these sounds. It was as if his body was taken over by an unseen force, and he had no control of his fingers.

He looked up, and saw lights. They were flickering and flashing. Colors washed over him and one blinding beam appeared to shine from a distance onto him. He was sweating and breathing hard and deep. A shiver ran through his entire body and immediately, from then on, he had no control at all of his arms. His hands were all over the guitar neck. His fingertips burned with the heat of the friction on the strings.

He looked up in front of him and saw a sea of people. Every face was looking back up at him and they were all dancing and swaying to the music, which now peaked to a completely higher plane than before. He could sense something emanating from him into the guitar, and then out through the sound of the music. He felt that what was flowing from him did not originate from within himself, rather, that it was fed into him, as he played, from a place he did not quite understand.

He perceived also, that the music was having an unusual effect on this expanse of human souls before him. Each and every person, as far as his eyes could see, was being affected somehow. He could comprehend in his mind and feel in his heart the pain, the fears and phobias, the heartache, and the angst of each person out there.

Then, the music seemed to come in for a landing from the lofty airs from where it had been carried, and it slowed and softened. He looked up above and saw a star, shining bright in the black sky. It felt as if a connection, like a spider web string, was stretching and bit by bit, thinning and disappearing between him and that star, and with a sudden “snap!” the tie was gone, the music was over, and darkness enveloped him.

He opened his eyes again to see only the plaster and log beams of his bedroom ceiling. He was awake now. The sun was shining through the window, illuminating a wide ray of tiny dust particles. J had soaked his bed sheets with sweat. He didn’t sit up right away, but lay there, staring at the sunbeam in his room. He imagined each minute dust particle, floating in the light, as a small star in space- his own personal, little universe, floating right there in his room.

“I’ve got to snap out of it.” He thought, “It was only a weird dream.”

Then, as if he were just then coming awake, the memories of the events the day before flooded back into his consciousness, and like a computer rebooting, he remembered his situation.

“I guess yesterday wasn’t a dream, a ‘nightmare’ maybe.”

He caught the aroma of his favorite morning breakfast food…bacon permeating the whole cabin. Pappy had been sick for a long time and J imagined that it had been ages since he was able to actually cook real food for him. He had been starting his day with cold cereal and oatmeal for three months now.

When he walked into the kitchen, Aunt Lisa had prepared pancakes with bacon and was setting his plate on the table. “I’ll leave you to your breakfast. I have to go into town to run some of Daddy’s . . . er, your pappy’s leftover errands. You eat and bide your time as well as you can until I return.”

“Sure,” J said, “I’d like to go to the river and play my guitar a while.”

Aunt Lisa smiled, “That sounds nice. Well, have a good time.”

She stopped before going through the front door and turned to look at J, who had just started to eat, “Are you okay sweetie?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“We’ll hang out when I get back and get to know each other. There is so much I want to know about you.” The way she said it made J laugh, accidentally spitting some of his pancake. He could tell she was trying to talk on his pre-teen level at an attempt to make him feel more content, but coming from her, it was mildly amusing to him. He appreciated her for it and, in a way; she actually achieved the intended effect.

“Okay.” J said. He was busy digging into his pancakes and couldn’t talk very well. He had just crammed an entire pancake into his mouth and was barely able to even chew it. Aunt Lisa laughed and went out the door. When J finished eating, he got dressed, grabbed his guitar and carried it to the river. He found a sandy path that wound its way along the riverbank to a place he frequented when he needed time to himself to think about things. There was a nice, huge fallen tree. Its trunk lay parallel with the riverbank. In the space between it and the shore was a small fire pit where J would make a campfire from time to time. This was his favorite spot in the world. He had not been here since Pappy died—he hadn’t had the time. Somehow, he thought that this is where he should be right now. He didn’t want to think though. He just wanted to play a little music on his guitar. He always liked the way the sound of the river gurgling made a peaceful background to his music.

As he started to strum the first chords, he became aware of nothing in his surroundings except for the sounds of nature. He may as well have had his eyes closed. He remembered what Doc told Aunt Lisa last night about his having “something special” when she asked him if he was a good guitarist. He never knew of a time that Doc actually listened to him intently enough to notice if he was any good. 

When he stopped thinking about Doc, and his Aunt Lisa, and got back to paying attention to his playing, it suddenly dawned on him that he was playing without even concentrating on his hands. “Wow!” he thought, “That’s a first.” He had always had to think about his playing while he played. This was the first time he had other thoughts on his mind and played at the same time. It reminded him of the dream he had the night before, and how in it he looked down to realize he was the one playing the music, but didn’t realize it until he saw his hands.

What happened next was (unknown to him) was the first in a series of strange events; a precursor of amazement yet to come. As he was picking out a particularly defeating pattern, he broke a string. It had happened in the past many times and would have no consequence now, but for the frustration he felt at that moment seemed to manifest itself at a peculiar level. At the same moment, a large tree limb snapped, fell, and crashed a few feet to his right. The noise from the initial “snap!” hit J’s ears at the exact second the “twang” from the breaking guitar string. When the limb crashed to the ground, it did so with a loud thud that sent a slight tremor through the entire area around where J was sitting. Suddenly a shiver ran through his core and he didn’t know if it was due to the spookiness and fright of the incident, or from a deep down suspicion. He could swear that in some way, the string breaking, and the limb crashing had an uncanny connection . . . as if one caused the other. Something in the pit of his stomach told him that somehow, he caused the tree to give up its dead limb.

J jumped up with his guitar and ran back toward the cabin. “What was that?” he thought. When he got to the edge of the tree line by the river to the field behind the cabin, he stopped and turned around. He looked back towards the river and thought to himself, “I’m losing it. There is no way that just happened.”

J. walked into the back door to the kitchen and sat at the table. He wondered when he would ever see this place again. He had never been away from Summer Hills except for the occasional fishing trip with Pappy and Doc. He felt that perhaps going away wouldn’t be so bad now that Pappy was gone. He liked the idea of a new adventure. He actually felt excited about going to New York City. Maybe there he wouldn’t feel like such a hermit. Being home-schooled as he was, J didn’t have as many friends as other kids since he didn’t go to a public school. He wondered what the kids were like in New York.

While he was sitting there with his thoughts of  “the incident at the river”, Aunt Lisa came back. They sat and talked a while until the time came to get motivated to get ready for the move. Ted came by to help J with some of his packing, which did not amount to much; just a few clothes, some music, and his acoustic guitar that Pappy had an old friend build for him. Then it was time. Lisa wanted to get on the road early and stop for the night on the way so they could arrive early in the city before the traffic jams that are so common in New York.

There was really no one to say goodbye to other than Doc Wilson. By now, he was standing by his Jeep, wearing his overalls that had always been his trademark attire

“Well son, I guess this is it. Now you take care of your Aunt Lisa. Something tells me she kind of needs you.”

“Okay Doc.”

Doc Wilson could see a tinge of apprehension in J’s eyes . . . maybe even a tear welling up.

“Don’t you worry boy, you’ll be alright. You know? I grew up around these parts. Lived here all my life except once. That was when I went to Chicago to go to medical school. Scariest thing I ever did, moving away to a big city like that. But I adjusted, and I don’t think I was as smart as you. Actually, now that it comes to it, I’d like to get away from here and see a big city again. Maybe I’ll come up to see you real soon.”

“Will you, Doc, really?”

“Sure kid. Maybe sooner than you think.”

“That’d be great.”

J meant it too. He had a feeling a familiar face would be quite welcome in the near future until he, too, could adjust. There would be absolutely no one in New York other than Aunt Lisa for him to talk to—at least until he could meet some friends. There was handshake, and then an awkward hug, and then Ted went over to Lisa.

“You’re a good woman Miss Franklin, coming down here to get the boy like you did. If anything happens, don’t hesitate to give me a call and I’ll do what I can to help.”

She was dismissive, “Aw, t’weren’t nuthin’.” Then she giggled, “Is that how you say that? Thank you Ted for all you’ve done and we’ll be looking forward to your visit when you decide to come.”

With that, J and Aunt Lisa were in her car and riding away. Doc Wilson stayed at the cabin to cover the furniture, shut off the well, and essentially secure the old cabin for a long vacancy. He was going to miss Johnny and all the good times with him and Pappy. Ted was left in charge of the property . . . its cabin, land and Pappy’s secrets.

“I guess I’ll tell her about her sister if the time comes when she needs to know. There’s no need for that can of worms to be opened yet. Not after all the changes in that poor family’s life here lately. I made a promise too but I don’t know if I can live up to it to my grave. They’re going to have to know some day.”