I’m pepping up. But it’s a slow process. I had a HARD time getting up this morning. Presumable because the sleepening was SO good. We woke up a little south of Plains, KS – and the place Lives up to its name.
But the house, our friend Richard’s HOUSE – is amazing. And such a product of Love and skill and sweat. What was once upon a time a single-room school house has been expanded and reimagined, rebuilt and revamped into a beautiful, sprawling home with nooks and beautiful crannies, a piano and wood stoves, cats and a goat, ducks and dogs and above all a beautiful sense of family. I can’t thank Richard enough for how he shared his environment with us – especially his art, fantastically carved and turned bowls and tables and picture frames – and for that matter, the house as a whole – marvelous creations of wood…
But I was TIRED last night and had some trouble kind of taking it all in, and I was TIRED this morning and am still having trouble taking it all in. Kansas as a whole seems to simply have too much sunshine. We were aware of it yesterday – that even as we passed fields and fields of dead sunflowers, bowing and browning, the sun was relentless.
It wasn’t necessarily hot outside, but dry and dusty and BRIGHT, glare shimmering off the asphalt and glancing back off of every bit of glass and chrome. Yesterday was an early-rising day, and I frankly didn’t sleep much the night before, my brain swirling and filled with all the math that goes into our Lifestyle. We had about a 5 and a half hour drive ahead of us, but betwixt losing an hour to time zones and teaching a “Master Class” in the afternoon, that meant leaving the house at 8am.
Hard for us on the best of days.
We rolled into Liberal, KS with only minor delays caused by Heather’s Spoon Debacle and a little bit of misdirection – and then we presided over a Master Class at Seward County Community College, where we chatted to a bunch of music students about making a Living in the arts, telling stories and showing photographs. We talked about open mics and community and filing taxes and eating right, before grabbing a quick Wendy’s meal before our evening show.
Sigh… do as we SAY kids, ignore what we DO.
Good stories, important stories. Listening to the choir singing a capella Christmas carols, listening to a kid talk about being uprooted from his violent home in California and finding rescue in the foster care system, only to be suddenly uprooted by a suddenly-interested-father who dragged him to Kansas where everything is different. Suicide attempts and salvation through music… We are traveling storytellers, tinkers and priests, here to tell tales, do some IT and hear your confessions. We lead a strange Life.
guarding the chickens (?!)Â
