Unconditional Mom

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My parents have both passed away and I think about them often.  It’s interesting to think back about how the relationships change.  I think in some ways this mirrors how we grow as individuals over time.   In the case of my Mom, there was significant change for both of us.  Towards the end I think Mom and I had a harder time relating to one another since we were practically polar opposites on the political spectrum.  I remember returning home to Oregon from Arizona a few times thinking to myself “who is this person?”  It didn’t diminish how I felt about her at all.  And here’s the reason why.  Perhaps you too can relate.

When I was a kid, I’d have my usual bad days like everyone.  Could have been that I did poorly in a class, was having trouble with a friend, or perhaps a family member was not happy with something I had done.  Doesn’t matter what it was, the point is, you’re a kid and you think the situation is hopeless.  You feel totally defeated because nothing is going your way.  Your hopes and dreams seem completely shot.  What do I have?  Who is on my side?  Who loves me?  There are those moments.  I think we all had them.

The thing I remember most about Mom is that when I was down at my lowest point, she was the one there with a hug and words of encouragement every single time.  Everyone else could be all negative or indifferent about what I was going through, but she was not.  She was my last, and sometimes it felt like my only, line of support that affirmed I had some self-worth and whatever it was would be over soon. No matter what I did, she didn’t seem to care in that moment.  She was wise in the sense that knowing a heart-felt connection of love was not condoning whatever mess I was in.  It was simply, unconditional love and let me tell you, that’s a very powerful thing.  If you have children, they need that sometimes.  I don’t know how my life would have turned out differently had I not had that.  All I know is that I’m glad I did and I hope every kid gets the same benefit.  And that no matter how different Mom and I were in the end, it doesn’t matter.  This is how I choose to remember my Mom.

Piano for Pleasure

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This may sound obvious, but perhaps not to all musicians. I discovered years ago that in terms of playing pleasure, I am able to get more satisfaction playing the piano than guitar. I’ve decided the reason is due to simple math. On the piano, I can play rich chords with 10 fingers whereas on the guitar, I’m limited to 5.

If you’ve ever played either instrument, you can probably relate to the notion of rich sounding alt-chords like Em7b5, or G13. There’s just something about playing along to a tune that calls out a G7 and knowing a few substitution chords that will give the song a more rich sound. This is really what the ‘Real’ Books are all about. Jazz standards are chock full of chord substitutions and they are a true joy to play. For the guitar player, it helps separate you from the pack a bit and that’s satisfying in its own right.

What I learned later however, is with the piano, you not only play the rich sounding alt-chords, you have options on the base line as well. It’s really just simple math. Having 10 fingers at your disposal, you have the chance to give the chord so much more on the low end plus the high end.

I had headphones on one night while I was playing a Jazz Standard. I forget which one, but it was probably either Misty or My Funny Valentine. The headphones allowed me to crank up the sound and get lost in what I was doing. I still remember, every time I hit one of those alt-chords on the piano, so absolutely amazing in its sound, I got a pleasurable feeling and had to do it again. I couldn’t stop and I knew deep down that while I was a guitar player at heart, the piano actually gave me more pleasure to play. If only I could read music better!

The Tea Party

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You know, back in the 60’s, two neighbors could live next door to each other and happen across the subject of politics. One might have supported more conservative policies and voted for Nixon, and another more liberal and voted for Humphrey. Some conversation could have ensued about that, followed by an invitation to golf or the next family bbq.

Today, the same scenario does not seem possible. Extremism and hatred are common. As soon as one neighbor mention that he voted for Obama, the other one, especially if they have a Tea Party affiliation, would immediately conclude that their neighbor is a scumbag socialist Nazi apologist who deserves to die.

Such is the state of discourse in America today. It’s even worse on-line because there’s a layer of anonymity involved. You can make outrageous statements without ever really having to be accountable for them. Some seem to think that he with the most words with ALL CAPS wins the debate. Go figure.

The main reason I address this issue at this particular time has to do with an online sparring partner who just happens to be a mis-guided Tea Party proponent, looking for some answers. Maybe I can either shed some light or else hold a mirror up. Whatever works is fine by me, but I have every expectation that my efforts will be in vain.

Just like I’ve learned at work, it’s always better to have a face to face conversation with someone vs. trying to resolve an issue over e-mail or a blog. There are so many opportunities for misunderstanding. The same is true with other forums like FaceBook. Really bad assumptions can happen. Leaping to conclusions. I’ve run into false accusations… a whole slew of things that, if we were having a beer together instead, would not have happened. Nevertheless, they did happen, so here we are.

But this guy hates Obama. Hates him. Wants to impeach him and put him in jail. In his defense, there are some very legitimate things to be angry about, but taking it to the hate level, I just can’t relate. I was embarrassed by George W. Bush but I didn’t hate him.

I voted for Obama twice. Using guilt by association, apparently I’ve condoned every action by this President since he took office and should consequently, be burned at the stake. This was all news to me, especially as a registered Independent. The very reason to be an Independent, is to leave open the possibility of holding the ones you tend to agree with accountable at times, which we all need.

I can actually find some agreement, even with Tea Partiers on the subjects of accountability ( or lack there-of ), and broken promises that Obama has to live with, and dealing with crooks and liars within your own team. But given the toxic nature of the public discourse, I actually feel kind of sorry for him. No President has ever had to try to get things done in a more partisan, and hostile environment. And I doubt it’ll get much better the next election cycle no matter who gets elected. It’s a little naive to think that one person representing one branch of the Government can have so much influence over our daily lives.

The Tea Party complains about the mainstream media giving Obama a pass. I personally believe there could be some truth to this. But this is likely because the Tea Party has done a poor job of disguising their witch hunt. Every error. Every flub. Every bad thing that happened in the world is somehow Obama’s fault. I believe the mainstream media is tuned into the witch hunt nature of Fox’s programs, especially Hannity and The O’Reilly Factor, and figures that well, that’s enough on the negative side. Fox has that covered pretty good, let’s not get ridiculous and over-do it. Let’s get on with the news.

    Standing For Something

At least with Libertarians, they have a well-defined platform that they speak to. They are in effect, very clearly, small (minimal) government advocates with minimal interference into our lives, strong freedom advocates, and responsibility of self. Okay, that’s clear. I get where you’re coming from. I can either be for or against it because it’s fairly clear.

The Tea Party on the other hand, suffers from the lack of issues they are for. If you were to engage one in a conversation, you would soon get the sense of what they are against…. pretty much everything. The logic seems to be : If it’s the way it is now, then I don’t like it. If it has anything to do with Obama, then I don’t like it. End of discussion. Would you care to elaborate? “We have 17 trillion debt!” and a host of other talking points that sound suspiciously like a read of Rush Limbaugh’s last show.

Talk to any Tea Partier and they’ll tell you that the movement is about ‘Taking our country back!” Okay, that sounds good. Power to the People. How? This is where it gets a little vague and dangerously mis-guided.

The reference to the Tea Party itself is recognition that some things were perceived by a group of people to not be fair, and they finally said “enough!” and did something about it.

There is indeed in this country, no shortage of issues where one could say “enough!”. I don’t think I’d get too much push back on that. The deficit is too high. The middle class seems to be disappearing, but how to fix that is up for debate. Gun violence is out of control but nobody can agree on the smallest measures to make any progress at all. Even if it’s just keeping guns out of the hands of the mentally ill. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. We seem to lack the ability to face the tough issues of our time like immigration. We can’t get anything done. Is it a surprise to me that a Tea Party evolved out of this framework? Absolutely not. What is a surprise is the head-in-the-sand lunacy that passes for reasonable fixes to complex problems by the ignorant leaders of this faux ‘movement’.

    The Tea Party is Mad

The Tea Party would be wise to incorporate some sort of a theme around wine since they are clearly the party of sour grapes. They are mad that Obama won in ’08, and even madder that he carried the day in ’12. They are tired of the country’s rising debt ( though they haven’t mustered up enough courage make any cuts in military spending, in fact, they advocate for more aggression ), they are mad about The Affordable Health Care Act, they are mad about having to pay taxes, and they are mad about Benghazi. They are mad about Lois Lerner, the IRS, Unions, the Veteran’s Administration, any sort of discussion about keeping guns out of the hands of crazy people, and they are mad that Mitch McConnell caved and made a deal with Democrats to keep the country from defaulting on its debt obligations. They are mad about any discussion about immigration reform, not because there aren’t pragmatic ideas on the table from both sides of the aisle. They are mad because any movement on this issue could be perceived as an accomplishment for this administration and they are of one mind to not let that happen. I’m convinced they spend the better part of their day just being pissed. It must be exhausting to carry around that much anger all the time.

The Tea Party expresses its anger in the form of being obstructionists. No compromise allowed. If they don’t get their way exactly, then no positive steps forward shall be considered. Let Rome burn. This hurts the country as well as its own credibility. The problem they face is, the founders based everything on compromise and reasonable people. It only works if you have sensible people at the bargaining table though. Let enough nut-jobs in and the plan falls apart.

    The Tea Party and Credibility

The lack of credibility in this writer’s opinion, will be its ultimate undoing. In order to have credibility, you have to be on the right side of history once in a while. You can’t just be a Monday Morning Quarterback and second guess the decision makers with no skin in the game. Yet this is exactly what the Tea Party does.

Of course the truest test of one’s resolve to stand behind their political convictions is if they are willing to pay for them. There just isn’t any doubt in my mind that if the Iraq and Afghanistan wars had been pay-as-you-go, that the support would have dropped off the charts. Everyone’s taxes would have had to go up substantially or else no deal. Since it was sold as free entertainment, it was just too easy to get behind the flag waving effort. Ironic that the same people who were such strong advocates of expanding the wars are the same people now complaining about the debt.

And we can’t address credibility without mentioning just how wrong the Tea Party has been on Climate Change. Take a look at the Climate Change Deniers list, it’s a veritable who’s who of the Tea Party. Even in the face of overwhelming scientific evidence, they choose to put their heads in the sand and let the free markets drive us off the cliff.

    The Tea Party and Hypocrisy

Of course you can’t get your message across and convince the other side of anything unless you walk the talk. This is where I struggle the most with the Tea Party’s approach. The behaviors have to back up the rhetoric or else it doesn’t work.

Take for example the fact that the Tea Party believes in its heart that it is the party of God. I’ve blogged about this in the past, in terms of the type of roll up your sleeves Christians that I admire. As someone who, at the insistence of my parents, endured 5 years of Catholic school, I can attest to some of the more lasting teachings. One of them was more about ‘show me’ vs. talk about it. Do something nice for someone else and don’t tell anyone or expect credit for it. Practice consideration always. It wasn’t all bad, there was a lot of good in there. Most of it I’ve recovered from after about 12 years of counseling.

But most of all, don’t be a hypocrite. They didn’t like hypocrites at all at my school. You’d get called out every time. Which brings me back around to the Tea Party. First of all, how come when I debate these righteous individuals who, about 1/4 of their posts have to do with getting right with Jesus …., how come they are the ones calling me a Fucking Nazi Socialist, just to provide one example ( out of several? ). How come it is they who are quick to resort to personal attacks?
When it comes to selling me on going to your church, let me tell ‘ya, you just lost me. If it means I get to behave like you, no thanks.

One of the toughest things I had to wrestle with as a young adult was to reconcile my personal beliefs with my religious ones. This is a very difficult exercise yet one I think everyone should do. After all, if your votes don’t reflect your belief system, then how come? What went wrong?

Having been educated for a time in Catholic Schools, I can tell you that whether you believe Jesus was the son of Man or not, when it came to poor people, his response was never going to be “tough shit”

The Tea Party has the conflicting problem that they are the self proclaimed party of God — yet poor people need to get off their asses and it’s their own damn fault that they are poor. Quit moochin’ off me! This just doesn’t square with my understanding of the history of Jesus, the man, and smacks of hypocrisy, which makes the Tea Party something I’ll never choose to be a part of.

Thanks to the 1st Amendment, the Tea Party and its Duck Dynasty followers get to blather on all they want about righteousness. They get to talk about JFK as a great leader who reduced taxes — never mind the actual numbers ( he reduced the top bracket from 91% to 77%. Would the Tea Party be excited about 77%? Go JFK! ).
Reagan was a great guy who told the Russians to go pound sand. Never mind his trick-down theory was wrong by a country mile and is responsible for the mountain of debt we have now ( the top bracket has had a pass on taxes since Reagan. A pass on what it used to pay anyway ).

My father, an extremely smart man once said “You know, sometimes the best response to a ridiculous statement is a deafening silence”.
It’s apparent to me, the public discourse has been degraded into Fox News sound-bites, most of which are not worth the effort to reply to.
Can you hear the quiet?

On Being a Father

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Few things compare to fatherhood. There’s the idea that knowing your own bloodline is taking on a life of its own. There’s the feeling of responsibility to make sure they ‘turn out right’ lest I have some adult dependents later in life. There’s the excitement of watching them do well in their fields of interest, and the pain of watching them try and fail at things they thought they wanted to do. And there’s the feeling of relief when the project is all finished and you know you did your best and that it’s been pretty damn good, thank you very much.

My daughter Kelli was born when I was 20. Dan at 22. For quite a while we figured that a family size of 4 with a boy and a girl was perfect. Why mess with it? Then about 6 years later Rob came along and we couldn’t imagine life without him in the mix too. Three little personalities to observe and enjoy, each one with its own set of joys and challenges as far as fatherhood is concerned.

In most family structures, the father gets the dubious duty of being the bad cop. It’s not a fun role, really, let me just say. The tricky part is resisting the temptation to project .. to let ‘typical kid behavior’ cause us to project worse behaviors in adulthood. I struggled with this some, I have to admit. My tendency was to err on the side of keeping things in line, but it probably would have been more wise to roll my eyes at some things and hope they pass. Hard to say now. Hindsight.

I do believe that being diligent over behavioral issues in the early years pays huge dividends. You probably get to have your biggest impact before about age 12. After that, their friends are having more influence on their decisions than anything I say. If I haven’t taught them what they needed to know by now, it might actually be too late.

One of the most enjoyable aspects of being a father is watching your kids excel at something. My daughter Kelli was pretty good at most things she tried. Learned piano quickly and gave some incredibly memorable performances. Could be a tenacious soccer player, especially on defense. I coached her team a couple of years and she made some outstanding defensive plays that saved the game. Seemed to go on auto-pilot at school. Just always seemed to bring home the grades with little or no involvement on my part. Now she’s a teacher with 10 years experience and I have 2 grandkids. Wow. Someone pinch me.

Dan was pretty athletic from the get-go. Baseball was his thing from about age 7-14 or so. I remember my eyes lighting up when he was 9 and threw me about 10 strikes in a row with pretty good velocity. Could I possibly have a pitcher on my hands? Yep. He got some good opportunities to shine in Little League and JBA as a teen and was a joy to watch. He had this uncanny ability that, in any situation on the mound, it seemed like when he needed a strike, he could deliver one. I don’t know who was more excited about that fact, him or me. It was fun to write the article for the Tualatin Times that said “Toner faced 12 batters and struck out 11”. He was no slouch in soccer, basketball, or cross-country either.

Rob excelled in chess early on, and he was always kind of a natural at soccer. I think he finished 2nd in State in a chess tournament as a 5th grader. I tried playing him in about the 3rd grade and consistently lost. You wouldn’t think chess was a particularly exciting event to watch unless you’re the parent of someone competing. Let me tell you, it was pretty exciting! In soccer he’d make guys twice his size go flying in one-on-one confrontations with the ball. It was hilarious to watch. He could get it done with good moves and had great passing ability. But the event I remember the most was when he was 9 in ‘AA’ baseball. You know the team picture with the smallest kid in the front row with his knees crossed? That was Rob. That’s why as his coach, twice that year when I was coaching 3rd I was ecstatic that I got to wave him around 3rd for an inside the park home run. My arm was moving! He had pounded the ball in-between right and center, making the outfielders chase. That’s what’s truly awesome about being a dad.

I hope all my kids get to experience parenthood. Kelli and her husband Kyle seem to have to formula down pat and best of all, they are on the same page. My sons are both working on it and that’s fine. Take your time and do it right. The rewards are in the final result when you get to watch these self-sufficient individuals pursue their own careers and families.

Like their parents, they aren’t perfect. But it’s what I call ‘close enough’ to say no regrets what-so-ever. For Father’s Day, next weekend we are all going to run a 5K together in Tigard. What’s significant about it is that in the past 7 months I’ve had 2 strokes. One in Dec. and another one in Jan. This is my ‘comeback’ run. To me it’s kind of a big deal. I wasn’t healthy and now I’m striving to be. I’ve been training since April using the C25K program and it hasn’t been easy. I’ve had to work pretty hard to get ready, but I’m a week away and looking forward to running with my kids. They can all blow by Dad on the course and make me look silly now that I’m 54 and had some health issues. But little do they know, that’s what I wanted! Why? Because I enjoy watching them all do well, perhaps more than they know.

On this Father’s day, I figured I’d just reflect on these things a bit and enjoy the moment.

The Reynolds High School Shooting

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I’m going to be weak on data to back up my points on this post, but I don’t care. It’s a general common sense thought anyway.

How arrogant are we as a country to think that we know it all when it comes to public safety. Other countries have wrestled with gun violence and acted. The UK is one example as pointed out by Piers Morgan. Good for Piers for standing on principle.

We are stuck in gridlock because of monied interests. Same story, different issue.

The damage George W. Bush has done to the economy will be felt for decades. It’s not just the cost of the wars, it’s the Supreme Court appointments that I think get overlooked. The existing court stands conservative by a 5-4 vote on most issues, but the most damaging one is Citizens United because it basically supports the idea that money can win the day. He with the most dollars deserves the most influence.

Consequently, the NRA lobbyists, in the name of free speech, indirectly control what legislation gets put to the floor. Even though 80% of Americans support the idea of more thorough background checks on guy purchases, especially for mental health issues. The NRA won’t hear of it and cries tyranny at the very thought.
As a result, we get to witness school shootings as common-place events. Over 70 school shootings since Sandy Hook. Ho hum.

What we need is for the silent majority to stop being silent. Nothing will happen until the NRA backers take them to task for this position. Speak out.
It might save a child ( or 20 ) from a horrific death some day.

Walking your dog in 2014

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It’s so nice to see my neighbor taking his dog for a walk on a nice sunny day until…. you realize this idiot appears to be talking to himself, spouting off into his phone. I can hear every word from a block away. Dude, I do not want to hear your conversation. Okay???

Facebook rants

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Ugh. I’m a troller. I guess that’s the first step of recovery, right? Admit what ails you and move on. I’ve gotten better over the past year at not wasting so much time engaging in debates with people who either don’t listen or don’t fight fair, but I’ve got a ways to go. This past week, I came across an image that sums it up pretty well. BouonGKCIAAjl5V.jpg-large

I have to admit, I do get some enjoyment of debating the far right, exposing some of the lunacy that I see and watching the opposition back-pedal. I’ve engaged some rather famous people on Twitter ( Grover Norquist and Greg Guttfeld are two that come to mind ), and gotten direct responses in the form of text messages. I pushed the conservative button and they didn’t like it. Mission accomplished.

So exposing hypocrisy is a favorite past-time of mine. To a point. I’ve recently decided that it’s the responsibility of the Facebook page moderator to referee a fair fight, and to keep debates from digressing into personal attacks. I had to do this myself recently. A good friend I have on Facebook, Duane, whom I disagree with strongly on most issues, was misunderstood on a post that intended sarcasm, and he was exposed to a personal attack by another Facebook friend, a raging alcoholic, who attacked Duane when he didn’t know what he was talking about. I ‘unfriended’ him immediately and apologized to Duane for the behavior of this other guy. I didn’t think twice about it. Good riddance, Tom. It was embarrassing and there’s no place for it.

I had this one Facebook friend, Mark, who is perhaps the most passionate debater I’ve ever run across. Mark and I go back to high school and even though we didn’t hang out much together during those years, I think we both got some enjoyment out of sparring online. Mark’s a Tea Partier, thus limited in his weaponry of material to make a logical argument that can’t be refuted by pointing out the irony and hypocrisy of his assertions. He was an easy fish to fry as they say. He probably felt the same way about me as well. He probably thought he was roasting a liberal every time we sparred online.

But last week Mark failed miserably at moderating his page and I checked out. Some of his other friends are also raging Tea Party loons who engage in personal attacks. I’m not a big fan of that. In the past I’ve just ignored their comments, but this time I was baited into joining the debate, and then attacked by some raging idiot who doesn’t know up from down, and Mark did nothing. I’m out.

So it’s not that I don’t care for Mark, I do. He’s a good guy at heart. Terribly misguided by the partisan ‘News’ channels he watches, but none-the-less, if you needed someone to step in and do what’s right in a confrontation, Mark would be your guy. A sports fanatic with a pretty decent resume as a player himself, he’s a veritable encyclopedia of information about college football and sports in general.

It’s with some sadness that I had to disengage from the online sparring with Mark. It wasn’t as much about him as it was his inability to referee a fair, above the belt fight. I’m sure not everyone agrees with me on this, but just the same, this is my new policy. Control your ‘friends’ or else I’m out.

But such is the nature of the state of politics in the USA today. It’s horribly partisan and not very constructive. The Tea Party in particular seems like they don’t stand for anything in particular other than, “We want whatever is the opposite of what Obama wants.” I doubt that is going to sell very well in the mid-terms or the next election cycle. I’m thankful that it appears the Tea Party has been exposed for the extreme organization of hypocritical loons that it is and has no chance in the next election cycle. Republicans, moderates, may still win the day, but the party won’t be dominated by the Ted Cruz / Sarah Palin / Duck Dynasty crowd anymore, because enough time has passed that the general population doesn’t want any part of it. Thank God for that.

And speaking of God, isn’t it ironic that the flag waving fundamentalists are the ones calling you “Fucking commies, fucking socialists, fucking Nazis” on one post, and then posting about their personal relationship with God a few minutes later. I find that amusing more than anything.

In the mean time, I’ll continue to follow the words of Krugman and Reich. Sure they may have a liberal bias, but they also have PhD’s. Which is more than I can say for the Get right with God Duck Dynasty / Climate change deniers / NRA fanatic crowd. Does being right count for anything?

Have a good weekend.

Colwood National

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It seems fitting that the last day of play at Colwood National Golf Course would be on the anniversary of my father’s passing, six years ago to the day. Colwood was an easy course, nestled in the heart of Portland’s industrial area, catering mostly to casual players who wanted to get a round of golf in and not spend a fortune. It became the course of choice for Jim Toner and I, whenever I’d visit from Seattle. I always enjoyed my visits to Portland, especially the trip over to Colwood for a round with Dad. It wasn’t fancy. It wasn’t impressive. The holes were fairly short, but not to the point of being a joke. It had its challenging holes as well. Since Dad and I didn’t talk too often on a very deep level, Colwood always represented to me a chance to hang out with Dad. For that reason alone, I loved Colwood.

In the 1980’s I had joined a golf league through my employer in the Seattle area, Boeing. I probably played 6 or 7 years and improved steadily. In High School I played on the golf team at Centennial and played JV my freshman and sophomore years, Varsity Junior and Senior years. I wasn’t great by any stretch, but I could occasionally break 80 at Glendoveer, which I’m sure made Dad extremely proud. He broke 80 a few times there, but it wasn’t that often, so he had a lot of respect for guys who could do that.

In the midst of my golf league years at Boeing, I started to take it a little more seriously and tried hard to get my handicap down. If I recall correctly, I got down to a handicap of 9 at my lowest point. And I was competitive in the league for a few years. I ended up winning the men’s first flight 2 of the years, playing against some pretty decent golfers. To make sure that isn’t over-stated, everyone gets to use their handicap, so I may have been playing for the club championship with my 9 handicap against a guy with a scratch handicap, but he had to give me 9 strokes. Anyway, golf was my thing for while there and it was fun.

On a trip to Portland, in the midst of playing a lot of golf, Dad and I took our usual jaunt over to Colwood for a round of 9 holes. I always liked playing well with Dad and then not saying much about it because that seemed to work the best. If you don’t brag about it, then he does, and it just feels that much better. On this particular day I got the putter going. Colwood is fairly short which means I could reach the greens in regulation ( I struggle to reach on par 4’s in the 400 yd range ). So I was getting on in 2 and on 2 of the first 6 holes I drained a long putt and was sitting at 2 under. I walked up the 7th fairway like “I do this all the time” and tried to contain my excitement. But Dad couldn’t contain his. I know he was trying not to jinx me, but at the same time he knew, my son is 2 under par with 3 holes to go and he knew a pretty good story was unfolding.

Then I parred 7 and 8. Was I capable of shooting a 34? Oh man, that would be a family record of some sort. The 9th hole was a short 419 yd. par 5, slightly up hill at the end. I hit a decent drive up the right side and had about 220 yds to go. My second shot I didn’t quite hit on the screws as they say, but it was straight, and about 50 yards short of the green. Up and down for a 33? That was on my mind for sure. Dad would have done cart-wheels.

I pulled out the wedge and hit a high shot a little longer than I wanted and left myself a tough down-hill putt for my birdie. Crap. Not where I wanted to be. As I straddled over my putt, I kept thinking “I’m going for it. Never up, never in”, so I hit it a little harder than I should have to make sure it had a chance and it rolled about 10 feet by. Yikes! Not a 3 putt on the last hole! Damnit!

Sure enough, I missed left on may par putt and took a bogey on 9, but still ended up with 35 for the day. Rounds under par are pretty rare for me, but this one was special because it was with Dad and I can tell you many years later, he could practically play the whole round back to me because it was still fresh in his mind. He probably remembers it better than I do.

And today is the last day of Colwood National. Sad in a way, but fitting that it’s on the same day that Dad passed away 6 years ago.

A few random band axioms

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Twelve years I toiled in the D leagues of the Portland band scene. I may have gotten up to C level a time or two, but most of it was clearly in the D leagues. Farmers Markets, Private parties, and an occasional corporate event or business opening. I think the most I ever banked from a 3 hour gig was $100. Not bad by some standards. Money-wise that’s as good as some A-B league bands do. But clearly we were operating (intentionally) at the lower levels where mistakes are not a big deal. My goal was usually to get through the night with no quinker-dinkers and I got to the point where I could pull that off more often than not.

I was fortunate enough to ‘play up’ and got to work with some really good mentors who (thankfully) had patience. Along the way you learn some valuable lessons. Here are a few I thought I’d share, for whatever it’s worth.

The singer gets to pick the songs This may seem obvious, but I don’t think it’s often followed.

Travel light You can tell the smart guitar players because they aren’t packing around 500 lbs of shit to every gig. They keep it simple. I watched the best guitar player in Portland show up for a gig one time at Bridgeport Village with The Patrick Lamb Band. He was carrying about 3 things. His guitar on a shoulder strap, a small ( quality ) tube amp, and his pedal was in a bag along with a few cords. That’s it.

Myself, ability-wise about 15 steps down from him, had a habit of showing up for the Annual ZeeRocks corporate gig with my truck loaded to the brim with gear. Let me be the first to admit, the extra gear did not help. And it took an hour to assemble and I was exhausted when I was all done. Worse, I had to remember how to use it all during the gig…. to the point where I’d play the song wrong. You see that’s the point. If you can’t play the song right, then forget about all the other stuff. Priority 1 is learn the song and play it with no mistakes.

Keep the songs moving Some bands/duos do this exceptionally well. Nobody does it better than Tim Ellis and Jim Walker. They can string a medley of 20 songs together without ever stopping. It’s truly amazing. Too often I’ve run into a band member who see a microphone and seizes the opportunity to fulfill his lifelong dream of being a stand up comic. It usually goes over like a lead balloon. Dude, you’re not funny. Another band member couldn’t stop fucking around with the PA and it drove me nuts. It’s like the entire gig was this 3 hour sound check. That messed with my mojo, but you do what you have to to get along. The point is, the listener wants to hear the next song, not your jokes, or a continuation of the sound check, or anything else.

Coming unprepared to practice is rude When one former band member announced that, “Yeah, I gotta go home and woodshed that one” for the 3rd practice in a row, I was ready to SCREAM. By contrast, nothing is better than coming to practice and cruising through new songs and having them sound pretty good the first time. Enough said.

Keep the gear simple ( see also, Travel light ). The more pedals and extra stuff you have to tweak, the more than can go wrong technically and throw your song off. I know this from personal experience. One of the worst flaws I had as a player for most of the time I played was having to tweak my pedals in the middle of a gig. Cardinal sin. All that stuff should be dialed in and operating it should be second nature during a gig. You can observe the good players doing this.

Put your best material in the middle of the set list. I finally learned to do this after realizing it was fallacy to think that you’re going to play a Farmer’s Market and there will be some sort of ‘grand finale’ that you will go out on. Fact is, most people show up to these sorts of events somewhere in the middle, so that’s where you want to put your best stuff.

Don’t take breaks right when you have some momentum going The set list is a guide, not the Bible. Be flexible. If your band has the mojo going and people are getting into it, keep playing. Just because the set list says set 1 is over and it’s time for a break doesn’t mean it’s the law.

Don’t spend a bunch of time in practice re-writing the arrangement Agree to either ‘do it like the record’ so that everyone has the same reference point coming in, or else document the arrangement and give it to everyone beforehand.

Don’t play too loud Better to have people asking you to turn it up than turn it down.

Be flexible with your band mates’ goals It isn’t he 1960’s anymore. Playing with another band is not a form a cheating. The pay is low, so naturally musicians who need the money are going to try to get as many paying gigs as they can. Sometimes the customer wants a duo. Other times they want a full 5 piece. The best musicians I know play in several different configurations… whatever the gig calls for. Give your band mates some room to breath in the area and try not to get your undies in a bunch when a band mate gets an opportunity to play with other musicians.

Let’s not get all idealistic here

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Keeping a band together can be a real challenge. Especially for us working stiffs who know good and well we need to keep our day jobs and try to do this as a semi-serious hobby or else risk starvation.

There’s the chore of finding others with similar musical tastes, ability, age proximity, and commitment levels. There’s dealing with personality types and communication styles that are different than yours. There’s aligning work and weekend schedules for practice and gigs and commuting distances. The bigger the band, the more of a challenge it becomes. A lot can go wrong on the road to becoming a paid band member, even if it’s just beer money.

But every now and then the planets align and you find a group of people where it comes together pretty well. Keeping that going however, is also hard work. Even if it looks good initially, the opportunity for a band-ending kerfuffle is right around every corner.

Let’s say you work up a couple of sets with a new group, it sounds pretty good and you think you might be about ready to take your show out to the local watering hole. You soon realize you need some demo tracks for potential customers. It’s nearly impossible to get a paying gig without giving a customer who is not familiar with your work something to listen to. The group gets together and decides the solution is to do some recording, put tracks up on Reverb Nation or SoundCloud and link to them from your band’s new Facebook page. How does one go about that?

Studio time is great but bring your wallet. Recording live in your garage probably isn’t going to yield a quality level you’ll be comfortable giving to a customer. The recording process takes time, patience, skill, technology, and smarts.

It’s the last one that eludes a lot of prospective bands in this writer’s opinion. It’s easy to become impatient and post a low quality recording because everyone just got burned out on the recording process and wants to move on. But smart bands know the quickest route to getting those tracks up is to record one instrument / voice at a time and mix until you’ve got what you want. Forget the live recording idea. Someone might go to jail before you reach consensus on enough tracks to release. It’s the story of the tortoise and the hare all over again, with different players.

The last band I was in had the debate about recording live vs. laying down tracks. This turned out to be a real fork in the road. I knew it was a huge mistake at the time but couldn’t convince my peers to layer and mix. One band member in particular was on this idealistic “No False Advertising” campaign and wouldn’t consider mixing tracks because “Then our customers will think they are going to hear one thing when they listen to mixed tracks, but will then be disappointed when they hear us live.” To that I say bullshit. If you can get pretty close, you’re golden and the customer won’t give a damn. They aren’t that stupid as to not know the difference between live sound and a recording.

I do sympathize with the position however if what we’re talking about is mixing in extra effects that we can’t reproduce, or screwing with the features of Pro Tools, or Garage Band (pick your tool) to where you are essentially in the role of song manufacturer vs. recording your musical abilities. That part I get and agree with. I think sometimes band members get so caught up in the bells and whistles of the tools that they forget to play the song.

Anyway, having said all of that, real fork in the road. There were only 3 of us, but the probability that we were all going to play (6) 3-4 minute songs from start to finish with no mistakes, with the right mix of voices to instruments and to the quality level that we wanted to release was next to zero. Take after take after take we struggled to keep our patience with each other and find some half ways decent. It damn near killed the band right then and there. We played the songs so many times we now hated the songs and didn’t want to play them again for 6 months.

Laying down tracks could have been done separately, in the comfort of our homes without the pressure of screwing up and having to start over when everyone else’s part was perfect. And it could have been done in one-third of the time and without the battle scars of trying to record live.

Next time someone says “Let’s record our demo tracks live”, don’t listen to them.