DONKEY JACK'S BIG ADVENTURE

jenny and jack

 

This morning I woke with the old-time song playing in my head, Rabbit In a Log, Arnold Spangler singing it with the Laurel Fork Travelers. There's a rabbit in a log and I aint got my dog. How will I get him, I know. I'll get me a briar and twist it in his hair. That's how I'll get him, I know. The song has been in my head all morning. I love it when a good song gets in my head and sticks around. Ralph Stanley and Jimmy Martin recorded together Rabbit In a Log in the late 1960s, Ralph's second album after Carter died. But Arnold Spangler owns the song. He does it the old hillbilly way playing his squawking fiddle and Melvin Felts clucking his banjo. Makes me wet-eyed just to remember them. Lord have mercy, how I love old-time hillbilly music. It's the only music I've heard in my life that makes me cry for the beauty in it. I wept all the way through a Ralph Stanley concert, start to finish, for the beauty in the music. I can't play Stanley Brothers or Ralph Stanley much, their singing is so in line with my vibration, or something, that I weep. Carter Family too. When I'd play Carter Family on the radio show, I couldn't talk between songs for weeping and choking up at the mention of the name of any one of the three. My eyes are damp now just thinking about them. I didn't need to say anything about the Carter Family to any of my listeners. All loved the Carter Family, knew a great many of their songs. Never had to introduce anything. Just let it play, the more songs the merrier. And I sat in the chair and wept. It was the same when I played the Stanley Brothers or Ralph. Baptist hymnals have a considerable number of songs attributed to AP Carter. AP was a severely nerdy mountain boy in the time before WW1, who never got into fights, didn't run with the boys, but took all day long walks along the railroad track singing. He had a tremor in his voice the other kids made fun of and he quit school to get away from them. It's the tremor in his voice that makes his vocals AP Carter's alone.  

 

 

jack

 

Their story is told in a wonderful biography of the Carter Family, Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone?, told in such a way that when it's over you feel like these are people you have known. Somehow, it brings them to life. And a wonderful autobiography by Ralph Stanley, Man of Constant Sorrow. He took that old, old forgotten song, recorded it and it, too, was forgotten. Then that silly movie about hillbillies, O Brother, and Dan Tyminski's version of Man of Constant Sorrow made the song immensely popular. Then it was discovered that Ralph Stanley has been singing it all along. Ralph Stanley, in his old age, began to get attention and big royalties since the movie made his song so popular. A rock version of the song has been made by the Charm City Devils. They have a great hard-metal version of it on utube that makes me want to see them in concert so bad I may find a way to drive to Johnson City, Tennessee, Aug 26, to see them the closest they'll come to here. I'm ready for another concert. I need a good rock concert every now and again. Looks like a two to two and a half hour drive, same as to Charlotte, Roanoke or Greensboro, the places I have to go to for a concert anyway. But it is so great to drive less than twenty miles to see Ralph Stanley in a place where only hillbillies go, the people who love him in their hearts, and bring out the people homebound in wheelchairs, the people whose bodies are out of control twisted up in knots, strapped into a wheelchair, faces glowing with joy. And the people around them regard them the same as if they're ok. His voice is the voice of the soul of these mountains. He sings in the old Primitive Baptist style like Aretha Franklin sings in black gospel style. I'm not an autograph seeker, don't care about them, but I carried my copy of his book to a concert and asked him to sign it. Only his name. It is one of my book treasures that will not leave this house as long as I'm living. Loaned books never come back. I love that book from my soul. Books are too easy to find on amazon for me to be a lending library. Most recent one I loaned had with it the stipulation I really do want it back. I'll never see it again. It's gone forever. Nobody knows what happened to it. It just went poof, vanished into infinite space. I've found a used copy on amazon to replace it, but would prefer my own copy. The book, itself, doesn't matter as much as the trust that was broken. Trust has a way of not coming back when it's broken, like fine china. Glue doesn't fix it.

 

jenny and jack

 

Talking on the phone this morning with Carole, I saw Jack walk by the windows exploring my territory. I jumped off the phone in a hurry, picked up 4 carrots from refrigerator, went out the door calling to Jack. I did not know what to do. I thought carrot might be an attraction for him. Not. He was on an adventure. I followed him talking to him like I do, called him by name, keeping him knowing I'm behind him and aware of him. He was walking along my rock walkway to the parking lot for one, sniffing every rock. I let him take his time, have his adventure, hoping a car would not drive by and scare him. He was smelling my footprints, Caterpillar's and the possums that walk around here at night picking up bird feeder leavings. He was exploring my meadow he sees across the fence, knows it's the meadow I live in like I see the meadow he lives in. I walk into his meadow. Why not Jack walk into my meadow? I was a bit anxious, because a car always goes by when you don't want it to, even if only three cars go up the road in a day. I didn't want Jack to feel my anxiety. I wanted him to feel that I was walking with him, having a stroll. He sniffed his way along, pulled up some jewelweed and snacked on it, tried some grass, pulled up some plantain, chewed it some and spit it out. He was in a place he'd only seen from the fence. He was up close to the car he sees me ride by in. I honk at them when I drive by the meadow and holler out an open window, Donkey. Today was Jack's first experience with the car up close, to walk by it, smell it, smell the ground around it. He put a front hoof on the pavement and I thought, Oh no, let's not go walking on the road. The new surface, asphalt, his first time feeling it, he pulled his hoof back and would not step on it again.

 

jack

 

Jack made a turn toward the grass in the tracks that lead to the gate to the other meadow. I thought maybe he was heading that way. No. He turned around and walked back to the stone walkway with intent, walked past me holding a carrot, taking no interest. He walked back to the gate like he was in a hurry. He walked to the gate and it didn't move as easily as the other way. It spooked him. He walked a ways to the left and grazed in a jewelweed patch. I gave Jenny some carrot. I went through the gate, left it open and walked out into the meadow along their trail with Jenny following. Jack watched us go away into the distance. He stepped through the gate and came running, ran by us with a big smile on his face like he was having a great time. I gave carrots to Jenny, Jack came around for a carrot. Jack got too close, Jenny swung her ass end around on me, quick as a cat, and I hollered, Jen! She calmed down, I stepped out of her range and said, I'm going to my barn. They went at each other, slinging their heads around each other's necks, donkey martial arts sparring. They even raised their front legs high off the ground, standing on their back legs like pictures of rearing horses. It was beautiful. Their teeth were bared, they came down and Jack went into domination mode. Jenny ran, Jack behind her with his chin on her rump, her kicking him in the chest and neck, running. She came to a flat place by the creek and he ran up, took hold of the back of her neck and walked her where he wanted her to go. She broke free and he took hold of her again, took the fire right out of her. He let her go, they pretend tussled a short bit and both went to grazing. I replaced the baling twine I use to hold the gate closed. It was from last winter and is getting rotten, breaks easy. No problem. Easily replaced. I love the ratty old gate too much to put up another one. The wooden frame is all rotted, none of it would hold a nail, but the wire mesh holds it all together. It looks like it would fall apart from just touching it. I like about it that it's a soft gate, a gentle gate. It was old when I was new.  

 

jenny scratching on the gate

 

 

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A MAN OF CONSTANT SORROW

     charm city devils

The jukebox in my head has played over and over this week, MAN OF CONSTANT SORROW by the Charm City Devils. Heard it the first time on the return trip from Bass Pro Shop at Concord NC with Justin, listening to the Serious (or whatever it is) satellite radio riding up the interstate, the hard rock channel. It's not what I listen to for pleasure, though I do like it maybe more now than back when I only listened to rock. I've slowed down somewhat over the years of dealing with gravity 24/7 such that I resonate a bit better with somebody like Gaither Carlton playing a fiddle and Kyle Creed pickin a banjo, and banjo pickers from an E Kentucky 2cd set that I luv. Because old-time resonates better with my spirit in this time of my life, it doesn't mean I don't hear it when Five Finger Death Punch delivers the next thing in rock. There's no way around it, the 4hr round trip rocked. I liked hearing it quite a lot. It was a good review of what's happening now in that arm of rock. Mostly names of bands I'd never heard before. Korn is still making music, yet what I heard lacked much of the vitality of their earlier sound assaults; though how far can you go driving your audience through the back wall with a bass sledge hammer like driving a spike twenty feet long through oak. They played some Rage Against The Machine, a band from just before I dropped out. I don't listen to them much for pleasure, but when I hear them, it's in full appreciation. Tom Morello rules.


Haven't listened to current rock in a lot of years, like a couple decades. Bands like Garbage and Mazzy Star were some of the last bands I paid close attention to. Too much stuff started coming on. Too much to keep up with and a huge variety. It seemed to me like a new wave of Punk. Initially, punk was about making music the way you like to hear music. Anything went. Sex Pistols, the Damned and so on, set the standard for "punk" the hard-driving sound assault that it became. Which I liked then and still do. In the 90s, thereabouts, give or take a decade, every kind of thing started coming along, every kind of singing, every kind of music making. Punk again, this time closer to the original intent. It seems like a dynamic time in rock, but in this time of my life it's way too much and it's all youth-specific, which is ok by me, the best part about it; rock has a spontaneous vibration of heedless youth. Stories are told, feelings felt. Rock is a living music that changes every year, new people coming into it continually bringing fresh ideas and reaching for the next thing, the next sound yet to be heard.


Best of all, no matter if the parents grew up jamming in the front row at Rolling Stones concerts, the rock the kid listens to is guaranteed to make the parents say, "That's not music." Listening to Elvis in 1956 when he swept the world, my parents said, "That's not music. Glenn Miller is music." Many years later, an old hippie I knew who had grown up into a yuppie wannabe said to his teenage boy, in my presence, who was listening to Adam and the Ants, "That's not music. The Beatles are music." That knocked me on my ass. I couldn't help it, had to laugh out loud. "Did you hear what you said?" Of course he did. Of course he's right. That's not music. I went within a moment to remind myself that I will never get like that unto the day I die, even if I'm over a hundred with dementia for 20 years. It's why I went to a rock concert on my 60th birthday (Papa Roach) and 70th (Thrice), so I will never hear myself start a sentence, "The kids these days." In my late 50s, two sentences began with those words, catching my attention each time, not sounding right. After the 2nd time, I made a vow to myself it won't happen a third time. Going to the concerts is a reminder, as well as a celebration. It puts me in a world of the kids these days where I see they are just like the kids of my days or any other days. It's people being people and everybody is happy. Bump into somebody and it doesn't start a fight. I can swim among them as happily as among white-headed people at a Ralph Stanley concert, and enjoy both to the same degree.


I feel blessed in that way when I look around at my own generation. My generation is the 50s. In high school I saw Chuck Berry in concert Jr year and Sr year. I saw Chuck Berry's gold 1957 Cadillac with fins and venetian blinds in the back window in traffic downtown Wichita, Kansas, from the sidewalk as he drove by. The license tag said C BERRY. It was the Alan Freed Rock & Roll Show that lasted two years before he was taken out of the picture by the anti-rocknrollsquad. Saw Bill Haley & the Comets, Buddy Holly & the Crickets, Ricky Nelson, Fats Domino during high school years. Elvis played in KC when I was 14, but it meant taking a bus into a part of the world I was not familiar with at all, downtown Kansas City at night, taking the bus back and walking a half mile from the bus to home. I wasn't brave enough at that age. It was the time of duck-tails and hoods with their collars sticking up; zip guns, motorcycle chains, switchblades, rumbles. I wasn't into that scene. It was Los Angeles and New York, but it was in KC too. Something like an Elvis concert would be a hood magnet. Just what I didn't need, to get my throat cut by a gang of high school dropouts in black leather jackets with zippers all over them, a teen crime statistic. A Dave Gardner comedy from the time: He had zippers up his sleeve and zippers on his back and a tattoo on his arm sayin Mammy You The Most. The comedy part was one thing, but on the street it was quite another for a kid, esp for a kid with no experience outside church and school.


Both Justin and I love the old song Man of Constant Sorrow, and we're running down the road hearing what we don't believe we're hearing. We looked at each other at the same time, his hand automatically went to the knob and cranked it up. It was a jam. I said farewell to old Kentucky, the place where I was borned and raised. Later, at the house talking about it, we checked the YouTube to see if we could find it. Neither of us remembered the name of the band. When he said Charm City Devils, I said, "I remember seeing Charm City. That's it." Sure enough, it was. I loved that they did it right. They did it just right. I was glad to see that great song translated into rock for the next generations. It doesn't get more traditional American music than Emory Arthur, Ralph Stanley, Bob Dylan and the Soggy Bottom Boys singing that song. It goes way back. I don't know if its origin is known. Probably is. Ralph Stanley owns it. It's his song and always will be. Even though this rock version does it right and makes a teen male anthem of it, they have not taken it away from Ralph Stanley.


Joe Cocker took She Came In Through The Bathroom Window away from the Beatles, but the Charm City Devils have not taken this song from Ralph Stanley. It's still his song; they just added their name to a list of very well done versions of that beautiful song nobody dares take on unless they can do it right. Fiddler Whit Sizemore sang it on one of his Shady Mountain Ramblers albums. It translates very well from genre to genre. It has universal meaning and speaks from the heart. I've looked at it every day on YouTube since hearing it first time. I like both the videos of it. One is a collage of flashing images from early black and white silent movies. Awfully good video. The other is a black and white of the band in a small space performing like on stage. For the band, this is the break they've been aching for. I'm happy for the band without knowing anything about them but their name. I'm grateful to them for doing it well, for doing it right. It seemed to my ear like they do the song with a nod of respect to Ralph Stanley. I don't know how to make it more clear than that. It's not something I can put my finger on, just a hint of a feeling. Last week I told Justin that Thrice concert ruint me. He said, Ruint you? I said, Now I want to hear everything full volume. I meant it. The concert and the drive with the satellite rock station woke up the dormant rocker within. I might put on some Marilyn Manson and let Caterpillar go outside for a while.    


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