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For The Love Of It

December 17, 2018

All my life I’ve enjoyed learning and I’ve tried to do things to the best of my ability. I do a few things pretty well that I’m kind of proud of:

I learned to play guitar and read music. I like to sing, make harmonies and write songs. I also have a great appreciation for listening to music.

I’m athletic. In High School, I high jumped six feet at a State Meet in Missouri during my Junior year. I played basketball and I was a left half back on the football team and we won the Championship that year.

I embrace and enjoy learning about other cultures and customs during my travels to different parts of the world. I lived in South Korea for 12 years. I learned to read, write and speak Korean. While I was there, I sang Korean songs on all of the Korean TV stations and two of the Korean radio stations. I also traveled throughout Korea.

I have three college degrees.

I write these posts about things that interest me the most.

I enjoy photography.

And last, but not least, I’m a father of three very special sons.

I’m pretty good at a lot of things but I’m not great at any of them. And I don’t know if that’s because I never tried hard enough, or I wasn’t motivated enough, or I simply am not talented enough to be great at one or more things.

But what I think is more accurate to say here is that I am as good at these things as I want to be.

Health and Wellness, Music

Autumn Leaves Revisited

November 5, 2018

Early this morning, while it was still dark, I backed out of my “parkway” (it makes more sense than calling it a “driveway”, right?), paused for a moment to sip some coffee and listen to the song on the radio that was just ending, and then as if to signal to the radio DJ that the “audience” (me) was ready and he could start up the next song, I put it in drive and slowly headed down the road to go to work.

Then after a few seconds of silence, a beautiful guitar chord progression started to play and I soon realized it was the song Autumn Leaves.

That got my attention.

I just wrote a post called “Autumn Leaves” on October 7. At the end of that post, you can listen to Lisa Simone sing her version of “Autumn Leaves”.

The lady singing the song this morning, on the radio, sounded a lot like Lisa so I thought it might be Lisa doing a different version than the one she is singing in my previous post.

So, later on, I searched the playlist on KNKX, the local NPR station I was listening to, to see if it was Lisa who was singing.

Turns out it was a woman named Eva Cassidy. I had never heard of her before. So I googled her and down the “youtube rabbit hole” I went.

This is her version of “Autumn Leaves”. I think it is an equally beautiful version of the song.

As I listened to her version, I noticed another youtube video of “The story of Eva Cassidy”, which was produced by ABC Nightline. So I listened to it.

Her story was interesting but sad. She died at 33 from cancer, before she ever became popular or knew fame.

The people who appeared in the Nightline documentary who knew her and talked about her said she was shy and afraid of what fame might do to her. That she loved to sing any genre as long as she liked the music and the lyrics and she connected with the song. They also said when they listened to her they were blown away by her voice and raw talent, without the need for any fluff or gimmicks. That she had a mellow voice and that she was very melodic when she strayed away from the melody and came back to it. That she was stylistic in her own way. And not willing to change herself for the music execs to be what they wanted her to be. She remained true to herself. She was eclectic and sang blues, folk, pop, soul, rock, jazz and gospel.

As I was listening to all of them talking about Eva, it seemed like they could have been talking about Lizz Wright. There are many similarities between the two. And although I wasn’t blown away by Eva, I do like Eva’s voice and style of singing too.

But for me, no one will ever top Lizz. I was blown away by Lizz when I first heard her sing “Reaching For The Moon”. She’ll always be my favorite.

So now it is evening. I finished work and came back home. And as I write this, I think about serendipity again.

The leaves are still falling all around here in Seattle. And I’m still loving the Fall and wishing it were longer. The fiery brilliance of all those leaves at their peak, stir up passion and warmth in me, and in all of us, I think.

It was 330 a.m. when I slowly pulled away from the house and the beautiful guitar chord progression grabbed my attention. Then, to my delight it was a cool version of Autumn Leaves. How did they happen to play that song on the radio, at just the right time of the morning, when I had just got into my car? Also, I usually listen to Lizz’s music when I go to work. But this morning I didn’t. Serendipitous? I think so.

Special Treat For You From The Youtube Rabbit Hole

I’d like to end this post with a beautiful, audio-visual collage of “Autumn Leaves”.

It’s Fall at its finest with Eva’s version of Autumn Leaves playing in the background.

It’s brought to you by David Borg, Eva Cassidy, and me.

I never get tired of Autumn Leaves-both, the song and Nature’s fiery brilliance.

Health and Wellness, Music, Photography, Travel/Adventure

AUTUMN LEAVES

October 7, 2018

Fall in South Korea, around 1978.

The other day I was filtering through some old photographs and I came across these pictures:

This is Half Dome in Yosemite National Park.

At the time, three friends and I were attending an intensive language course at the Defense Language Institute (DLI) in Monterey, California. Two were studying Arabic. One, Russian. I was studying Korean.

Music, Travel/Adventure

Stalker or Follower?

October 7, 2018

Uncles Doing “The Rounds” In Seattle

My Uncle Walt (79 years old) lived here in Seattle for 20 years, until about a year ago, when he moved back to St. Louis, Missouri, the town where he and the other Adams family members (including me) grew up.

My Uncle Howard (76 years old), his younger brother, came with him on this trip to Seattle.

Uncle Walt drove his car from St. Louis to Grand Junction, Colorado (where Uncle Howard lives). Then Uncle Howard drove the two of them, in his car, the rest of the way to Seattle. Along the way, they made a few stops: Jackson Hole, Wyoming; Yellowstone National Park; Mt. Rushmore; and Butte, Montana.

I think its great that they are active like they are. And they were always great uncles to us kids. Actually, my Dad’s four brothers and two sisters always treated us well with a lot of love and laughter.

Culture, Music

Favorite Means Favorite!

September 17, 2018

Often times, you see headlines on the covers of magazines like “18 Favorite Beaches”, or “Top Ten Scenic Drives”, et cetera. And people (myself included) often say, “That’s one of my favorite songs“, or cars, or whatever they are talking about at the time.

But by definition, favorite means, “Preferred before all others of the same kind”.

Well then, how can there be 18 favorite beaches or one of my favorite songs?

Of course, there are ways to get around it. You might say, “That is my current favorite”.

I remember there was a local DJ, named Ichabod Crane, on FM 94.1 (KMPS), a few years ago when the station was a country station, who always used to say, “This is the greatest song in the world today”. Then he’d play the song. Then the next day, he would say the same thing about another song. That was his way around it.

My current Lizz song favorite is “All The Way Here”, a song she wrote, herself. Tomorrow, my current favorite will be “Grace”.

I’m not a grammar freak or a perfectionist, by any means. I just notice little details like that once in a while.

When I see those kind of headlines, or see the word favorite, it reminds me of ~~one of my favorite stories~~ (OOPS!) my favorite story (there, that’s better!) about my father.

It’s been many years, now, since my parents passed away. When my father died, I was attending his funeral and the preacher of my Dad’s church was there too, standing at the podium, saying a few good words about my dad.

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