that’s what I get (for thinkin’ about it)

(Pulled this out of the pile of drafts I have here. This should hook into the bit about going on the road with reckless kelly.)

Yesterday I bought a little blond blues jr amp. I had woken up with the intention of going into town and shopping for an amp, and I actually did it. First I bought a bench-mounted router from a guy with a guitar repair shop. Ok, let me start this again. Lately since I’ve been home, it’s become my habit to fall asleep with an all-talk station on my iPhone turned down real quiet, just enough to hear a voice. Macon Georgia about 1961 we stopped traveling for a bit and my folks found us the coolest place we probably ever lived, at least in my memory. I actually have memories of that place, and one of them is that me and my little brother david shared a big bed, and that I would get him to tell me stories to help me fall asleep. I was 6, he would have been 3, 4 at the latest. It was great. I would give almost anything to have a recording of any of David’s stories. If I did, I would play them at night instead of the far-away BBC, but these days the BBC is as close as I can get.

So that’s what wakes me up eventually. Well actually, having to take a leak is usually what wakes me, then the goddamn radio news makes sure I don’t ever really fall deep asleep again. So, I finally give in, get up and make my coffee, get back in bed and check my mail and look around the world a little. If I ever have a couple of bucks, which I did the other day, I like to scroll through local craigslist stuff. I like how good craigslist is at recycling perfectly usable stuff that would probably otherwise go to waste. Literally. Plus I just like used stuff I need if the price is right.

Anyway, I usually look through tools, and antiques, musical instruments if I’m really tripping, but normally more like gravel delivery and cars for sale by owner. But in Craigslist the other morning, I found the bench mounted router I’ve been wanting, for 60 bucks, and since this guys guitar repair shop was so close to a bunch of the best Austin music stores I ended up picking up the router and then, sure as hell, I started going into amp shops, and pretty quick I bought one. I wanted this 65 deluxe reissue, which I swear to God, it might as well have been a real 65 but in perfect shape. This is an amp that loves a telecaster. Let me say it this way; they are siblings. But the damn thing was 800 bucks. I know, not a lot for all you gear pigs, but I’ve come pretty close to not spending any money on musical equipment for almost 30 years. No wait, not almost, over 30 years. So for now I’m buying a blues jr, which I’ve gotta say, is breaking up a little early. It might be speaker time.

I say all this because last night after I had some food and unloaded my van from the big craigslist haul, I started absolutely  blasting away on this box, down here on the first floor on mexican tile under a 30 foot roof, with a ton of reverb on the amp for starters. I played for so long that my beer got warm. I played so long that my beer got warm. i said that twice to be sure you would catch it. This went on for hours.

At some point an important thing happened. I have been searching for a dignified way to describe this but finally I can’t. I went back to the kid who just wanted to rock. I reverted. And I could see it for the first time in a long time, a real long time, the big stage, the power, the kingdom…man, I remembered.  I remembered the want, the fantasy. I remembered that I either have to do that or die just slightly pissed off.

Anyway, the funny thing is that today Willie Braun called, asking me to jump in and sub for David Abeyta, who’s wife Dorothy just went into labor a week early. That’s what I get for thinking about it.