Working Out...

So as I sat here looking at the turkey tonight (butterball belly) I started thinking back to a time long ago when I was but a wee lad. I weighed in at about a buck and half some 10 years ago and that was soaking wet. I had the chiseled stomach, and arms, blah, blah, blah f'in...anyway, I wasn't a muscle man. I was a skinny, but in shape guy who played sports and ran around all the time...and then I graduated high school and joined the Midwestern State University all-american skip class to drink team, and its all been pretty much down hill from there. As with any muscle, if you don't use it you'll lose it, and that is what happened.

So this gets me to this blog moment, you see I used to write all the time. At twenty I was writing for my small town newspaper, and had just started experimenting with writing songs, I was writing poetry, and pages among pages of very sad things that I don't want to dwell on (damn women!)

Just like having to get over the embarrassment of doing the Billy Blanks workout, I also had to get over the embarrassment of wanting to write in my small town. Let me take you all back on a little ride.

I was born a poor black child....wrong one

I was born in a very small town in North Texas, in the county Hospital June 6, 1978. Its still a debate today whether I'm lazy, stubborn, or both, but the doctors chose to come in and get me out when they thought it was my time to see the light. I almost killed my mother that day, and
I know I could never say I'm sorry enough, because I haven't made it much easier on her to this day.

I grew up just like every other boy in a small texas town...I was eating ticks at a young age, and was always trying to ride something...whether it be on four legs, or four wheels, and sometimes I didn't care whether I was clothed or not.

I'm not going to sit here and tell you I had a rough childhood...I was warm when it was cold, and cool when it was warm. I never went to bed hungry, and didn't want for much that I really needed. I will just say that I had some challenges, especially in my younger years, and I'm not even talking about the time that I had some weird eye infection and my eyes were crusted shut in the morning when I'd wake up. That was a long time ago, but I remember that vividly.
I can say that I was always a little strange, even though I was one of the popular kids. Of course, I graduated with 36 people, so its hard not to be popular in one way or another. I was one of those crazy guys, that usually does atleast one thing in his young life that people still talk about today...

I got older and did what the older kids in small Texas towns do...I played football, practiced basketball, played baseball and even dabbled in track. The problem was, that I also liked to do what is sometimes looked down upon from the cow punchers or oil field workers that made up the majority of our little town. I liked to write...but it was not something that I just came out and said I liked to do. In my town you had to be tough, you had to drink beer, and you had to hit it with the ladies at a young age...and I'll tell you, I was pretty good at meeting the bar...there are some of these things where I might have even raised some standards among my immediate peers.

I'll break a moment to ask, that if you know anyone, young or old who has a talent, but fears to grow and show it...give them a push...that's all it takes sometimes; just a little positive reinforcement.

So, anyway...stuck in a town where being creative often meant that you were weak...I hid my talents behind Wildcat Football and High School Whoremongering until the phenomenon called Texas Music came along. That's not appropriate, Texas Music has been alive for a long time, and Bob Wills is still the King, but the phenomenon I like to call Robert Earl Keen did come along and all of the sudden it was cool to write as long as you wrote something cool.
So, I used that to my advantage. I wrote things I thought were cool, or thought provoking, or just plain funny for my little paper...I also did sports, and some other little things, but the byline was my main focus there. I also bought a guitar and wrote some horrible songs. I knew maybe 5 chords, and man it was bad. One of my first songs was titled, "I guess I'm unhappy, not being unhappy" now is that a country title or what?

This is getting long eh?

The thing was... the more I wrote...the better I got (imagine that) and the better it flowed, and the better it felt. I was always thinking about something to write...I was always writing about something I'd seen or done. Sometimes it was in song, sometimes it was for the paper, and sometimes it was just for me, but I was always writing and growing my muscle (man, did y'all feel this thing reconnect or what?)

So here I am, got the butter ball hanging out over the keyboard, and banging on these keys...telling a story. Because for some reason lately, I quit using my writing muscle. Its been blocked...I haven't written a new song in quite some time. I've been messed up in the head or something. I had shifted focus to an up and coming band, and some matters of the heart, and had quit using the writing muscle.

Well, its time to start working out again. Myspace has actually been one of the key ingredients to getting me going again. As you can tell, I love to put my words out there, and it gives me one hell off a resource.

So I'm feeling pretty good about things right now. I'm trying to be more healthy, and phsyically fit...but also, I'm trying to get the old creative spirit alive again. Sometime, when I've got some more time, I might go digging through the old Archer County News archive and pull some of my articles out of there. They're entertaining, in one way or another, and I'll try to repost some.

Sometimes the only way to move forward, is to go back a bit.

I'm going to bed...my muscles hurt!