I’m the kind of person that will listen to a new CD over and over again until I know every line and every chord in the song.
A few years ago while living in Los Angeles, I had the pleasure of seeing Derek Trucks perform with Eric Clapton on his Road to Escondido Tour in 2007. I was blown away by Derek’s talent that night. It was soon after that show that Trucks went out to perform on his own and then merged his band with his wife, Susan Tedeschi’s band to form the Tedeschi Trucks Band.
I’ve spent a lot of time listening to Tedeschi Trucks latest CD, Made Up Mind and I can categorically say the best song on the CD in my opinion is The Storm. Derek Trucks raging guitar solo that covers Allman Brothers, Clapton and Hendrix guitar licks is simply psychedellic in its ultimate genre. It’s a masterpiece…
I’m taking classes at UML. My first writing exercise for English Comp is to write about a “special place” that is meaningful to me. I spend a lot of time at the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge. It is my “special place”…
When I think of a “special place”, the first place that comes to mind is the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge on Plum Island in Newburyport, Massachusetts. As a child growing up in West Newbury, Massachusetts in the 1960’s it was legal to camp on Sandy Point, which is the southern tip of Plum Island and the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge. As a small child, I grew up spending a few summers in my early life, camping with my family and numerous aunts, uncles and cousins on my mother’s side of the family. Days were spent climbing dunes, building sand castles, racing snails and simply living simply. Those early childhood memories of the Refuge, fuel a deep abiding love for the 7 mile stretch of estuary land along the coast of Massachusetts.
Salt Pannes at the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge
The Refuge, as folks acquainted with refer to it, is unique in its diverse landscape and wildlife. Now, decades after my childhood and a 20 year stretch of living in Los Angeles, I am drawn to the Refuge at least once a week to revel in its beauty, and immerse my self in the sheer peace of mind that being there invokes in me. Each visit is a new view as the skies, tides and seasons change to colors and contrasts of the Refuge on a daily, if not hour to hour, minute to minute basis cycle. In my world, the Refuge is church. It is there I go to seek solace. It is there I go to celebrate. I have lived on both coasts of United States, visited the south of France, Paris, London and Amsterdam and still for every other place, I have lived or visited, no place can claim the designation of my “special place” more than the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge.
She walks, she paces, stops, twirls slowly taking in the 360 degrees as if it were a panoramic film. For aren’t the scenes about us that we see from moment to moment just photographic memories that thunder through our minds like a slide show. It’s all out there, on the big screen. There is no veil, no curtain, just a screen or maybe… it is a moving window on life.
I have not shared here on my blog that last month I received my Contemporary Communications Certificate at UMass Lowell and I am now enrolled in a Bachelor Of Arts in English progam at UML.
It’s been a very rewarding experience for me, at 56 years old to take my life’s work and add to it an education that I can utilize on a new path in my life.
The word, the written word, has long been a passion for me. I’m finding my craft expanding in new ways for the first time in a decade as I delve into my memory bank for scenes to write about.
Writer’s love feedback… I’m going to start sharing some pieces “From My Journal” that I hope readers will enjoy.
Summer slipped away yesterday. A fog rolled in off the shore and it encapsulated the coastline in a gauze so thick there was no ocean view from where I staked out my strip of beach for my end of Summer beach day.
The fog kept rolling in, in… spreading its reach until it crept up the mouth of the Merrimack River like a blanket slowly being inched up on a cold night.
Summer slipped away yesterday… But Summer isn’t over yet. It will be back again to warm my soul another day.
Sometimes I muse and I ramble because I can... I muse about life and things that matter to me...
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