Stan Hitchcock-View From The Front Porch-June 2, 2013

Rained some last night and the drops are on the tips of the grass, shining in the early morning light. It's a pleasant Sunday Morning, just me and old Buck The Collie on the front porch so far, to watch the sun come over the mountain.

Decades ago, most Sunday Mornings would find me, pulled over off the road somewhere, catching a bit of sleep, after I had got to tired to keep driving after the Saturday night gig, and headed back to Nashville. Kris Kristofferson caught those Sunday Morning feelings well in his song, "Sunday Morning, Coming Down", so maybe that is why I so much enjoy the time I have on my front porch at this stage of my life. Those early years of going til you dropped or stopped, took a toll on most of the pickers of my generation. But, we did it because the upside of the joy of picking, of singing, of songwriting...of living the dream. We weren't just creating a song here and there, we were creating a whole genre of music, all the artists, musicians, songwriters, producers and studio engineers that worked for the love of the craft....yeah, it was pretty exciting times.

Except, when you woke up in the seat of your car, or motorhome, or bus, and the morning sun was just coming over someone else's mountain, and the adrenalin that you had been running on for several days had give out, and you would have traded places with about anyone with a real life, and give some boot to do it.

Well, that was long ago, and far away...a distant memory of a picker's life that once was. But now, I just saw a Red Headed Woodpecker...first one I have seen in years...big and bold with a bright red head, now that is worth the waiting for, after a night of sleep in our 150 year old bed with the feather bed that cushions and soothes those old musician aches. Seems every stage of your life, has different sets of blessings, doesn't it? Stan