C minus one thirty and counting....

That is 130 hours, as I write, until Legacy Choir takes the stage for a once in a lifetime concert, live, right here in River City. Eighteen months ago, this week seemed it would be another lifetime, at least, in coming. It's GOOD! making someone else's dream come true!

This guy here, Mr. Don Cowan, claims to be 79 years old, officially, as of tomorrow. I sincerely believe he is fudging low, because he had to be at least late middle age when I first walked into his choir room back in 1964. Yet, by his math, he only has 17 years on me!

How many here remember being an outsider, entering into sophomorehood, the no man's land of high school? Second week in I heard an S.H. Rider High School A Capella Choir for the first time; and when I say, heard, I'm talking heart and soul grab hold and don't let go gut wrenching kinda heard that borders on a spiritual experience. I heard the Voice of God, children.

Looking back on it now, that 1965 choir wasn't all that good. I mean, really, these guys had only two weeks together! Sure, there were some great, experienced senior voices in there, but you also had all those rookie juniors who may have had a mixed choir with Old Honker Face, the Father of Our Alma Mater, at best. Before the school year ended, of course, the 1965 choir would take its rightful place on the roll of 32 Greatest Choir Evers.

Before the performance ended I had learned you had to be at least a junior and pass an audition/screening with Mr. Cowan himself to even be considered for membership in this choir. Membership? Making it into the a capella choir was nearer an adoption into a whole 'nother family, but it would be a good year or better before I would find out firsthand. Before that day ended, I dropped out of French class to join the fiery furnace that was mixed choir!

Those years with Cowan may not have been the best three of my life--so far--but I guaran-damn-tee the last two as a tenor with the 1966 and '67 Rider A Capella Choirs are solidly in the top five. 

Here's the thing, Lord.....

I've had a good run. I came in with the thirty-three and a third, long-playing phonograph record, and if it should all end today, I'm going out with my lifetime music library on a thumb drive in my pocket.

How many people woke up today disappointed over still being here after this rapture buzz? Thought that by now they would at least be up to security screening on the Stairway to Heaven, right? Well, I wasn't one of them, Lord, and yes, I'm smiling.

My two eldest grandkids, Michael and Diana, came to see us yesterday. They'll be staying until Monday before continuing their road trip across America. Twenty-one years since last I saw and touched these two cubs. Damn near a generation, Lord, and I lived in fear Diana would bring on the next generation before...if ever...I saw her again! The image of Michael I've carried in my mind is a snapshot: two-year-old boy caught from behind, buck naked, holding a garden hose in a suggestive pose, watering his Granny Smith apple tree.

For some time now, Lord, I've been feeling what I imagine Moses felt; standing on that mountain top after a 40-year road trip, looking into that promised land of milk and honey and knowing he didn't make the cut. Oh, I brought it on myself, same as he. If only I had worked harder on memorizing the music....

We formed the Donald B. Cowan Legacy Choir January of last year, 30-something of us from all the Rider A Capella Choirs Don had nurtured, given voice to and directed for 32 years. His last hurrah, as it were, would be a grand reunion concert by a choir composed of all his a-cap alumni, a choir nearly 200 voices strong spanning the years 1961 to 1993 and all coming back to River City from all across the country.

The first of two concerts is June 25 at Memorial Auditorium, the same venue where I last sang with the Rider 1967 choir. Lord, I can never forget that last note of You'll Never Walk Alone dying in that hall, Don smiling as he mouthed "Good bye" and just waving his finger tips to us before turning to acknowledge the audience.

Now, today, begins the final weekend rehearsals before concert week, and I do NOT know the music! It's been praying on my mind since last month's rehearsals. I play the MP3 recordings through my head as I go about my days, but, Lord, these few remaining brain cells must not be as tacky as they once were. Nothing seems to stick. I told myself, "Self, shape up by May or ship out."

But here's the thing, Lord. If I don't make the cut, I'm okay with that. No, I'm good with that. I've had a great ride, helping to form this choir and bonding with a family that transcends blood. Tomorrow is our first dress rehearsal at Aiken Auditorium, and all our family and friends are invited. I'll get to sing with them one more weekend, and my grandkids will be in the house to experience The Greatest Choir Ever!

Lord, it truly is a God thing.

Thank you, Lord!

First zucchini coming in yellow?

First zucchini of the spring '11 crop. What's with the yellow?

Got a bet going with Mike Allen, the oldest living dude in the Donald B. Cowan Legacy Choir, that my zucchini can whoop his yellow squash.  I would not want Mike to know, but I'm a touch concerned about how my fingerlings are looking.  This first one off the vine seems to me a bit yellow.

They say that just because you're paranoid doesn't mean someone isn't out to get you.  Maybe I am concerned about this color thing simply because it has been years since I've had space to play in the dirt.  Been so long since I last saw a baby zucch, I've forgotten how to read sign!