When October goes

It took me awhile, but I have learned to love October.

I don't much care for fall. Oh, some of it. I love football. Falling leaves.

But autumn means winter awaits -- that bleak, gray season when, in these parts anyway, the sky won't snow and the sun won't shine. You know the song. It's hard to tell the night time from the day.

October is an aberration. Warm afternoons and cool nights. No HVAC. Go Vols. Sam Adams seasonal, out of this world.

I was too sick to celebrate the passing of the 10th month this year. So I watched UT on the tube while lying on the couch. And I contemplated the turn into November.

Missing this October were the plethora of picture-perfect afternoons, azure and awesome. Their replacements were depressing rain, too much and too often in too much monochrome, usually ruining a weekend. But those we were given were ones to savor, much like this too-short month itself.

I will remember the crisp Friday afternoon I saw elk running wild in the Smokies. I will remember the Wednesday of wonders when I talked with an old friend I'd never met. I will remember the cold Saturday in the park when the harmony blended together.

And tonight, as thoughts pass to the stifling commercialization of the coming holiday blitz, I'll hum a line or two from Johnny Mercer.

Because I, too, hate to see October go.

Meeting Rheta

Rheta Grimsley Johnson has been sweetening my Sunday morning coffee for as long as the mind recollects.

Writing from her home in Fishtrap Hollow, Miss., or at various ports of call throughout the South, she finds wisdom in Williams (Hank, that is), joy in the morning, peace in a Louisiana parish. She makes me laugh. She makes me cry.

She is a graduate course in good writing.

I guess you could call me a fan. And, it's funny, whenever I finally meet those whose work I've long admired, I tend to tie my tongue. Did it to Tom Selleck in New York in 2001. Almost did it to Robinella in Michigan a few years ago.

But yesterday, when I met this Southern voice that has sweetened many Sundays, I found comfort in her genteel kindness, and managed to talk. She recognized my name from a letter I sent her after her husband Don passed away earlier this year. She was gracious. She was everything I had pictured her to be.

I don't know if you read her column or not. If you don't, you should. If it isn't carried in your local paper, you can find it online through King Features Syndicate.

She has written two books. One is a delightful biography of "Peanuts" cartoonist Charles M. Schulz. The other, "Poor Man's Provence," tells the tale of her decision to purchase a second home in Henderson, La., down in the Atchafalaya Swamp.

Among the million reasons I love to read Rheta is the fact that her words flow like a mountain stream, natural and calm. I sometimes disagree with her politics, but she often gives me points to ponder.

Later tonight I will go hear a speech she's giving for a fundraiser to promote literacy. Come Sunday, her column will be the first thing for which I'll reach after brewing a pot of JFG.

But, I will forever carry with me the crystal clear fall Wednesday afternoon that I met a favorite writer, a Southern poet, a kind woman with a gentle voice.

Much like reading her columns, meeting Rheta Grimsley Johnson warmed my heart.

Chris Newsom: 'Safe at home'

There are no words left to describe the tragedy that is the murder of Chris Newsom and Channon Christian.

Don't know how you feel about it, but I've gotten to where I can't watch the television coverage of the trial. It's too tough. It's too close.

I've been reading the daily newspaper reports. I've been hearing from friends. I think about the families quite a bit.

Yesterday, several of you called or e-mailed saying that Mr. Hugh Newsom quoted one of my pieces on Chris during his impact statement. I am humbled beyond belief to say the least.

I don't know which one he quoted, but by request I'm sharing with you the article I wrote following Chris's funeral in January 2007 and the Chris Newsom Memorial Baseball Tournament in April 2009.

Take a minute today and remember the Newsom and Christian families in your thoughts and prayers.

'Safe at home' -- originally published in the Jan. 15. 2007 Halls Shopper-News

He was a great kid with a great smile.

All you’d see, Beaver Dam Baptist Church youth pastor Scott Hood remembers, was “teeth and a hat.”

He had a sensitive heart, the kind that made him weep at the movie “The Fox and the Hound” as a child.

He was No. 14, the leadoff hitter for the Halls High School baseball team, a natural born athlete who also loved to golf, fish, ride motorcycles and have fun.

He was a true friend, the kind that those who knew him best say they’ll never forget.

And it’s for all these and a million other reasons that Halls mourns the loss of Chris Newsom.

Newsom, 23, a 2002 Halls High graduate, was killed Jan. 7, the victim of an apparent carjacking and murder along with his girlfriend, Channon Christian, 21, in East Knoxville. Family and friends gathered at Beaver Dam Baptist Church last Friday night to celebrate Chris’s life.

Friend Steven Marshall first saw the skinny kid with the super smile playing basketball in his Halls subdivision, next door to the house that Marshall’s family was building. He noticed him a couple of times and finally went to say hello.

“Then I had a friend for life,” Marshall said.

They played on the Knoxville Stars baseball team together, going all the way to the Little League World Series in New Orleans. They’d while away the hours together on Norris Lake — fishing, laughing, doing what buddies do.

“We had some wonderful times together. His friends will never forget him.”

Josh Anderson told the large crowd to look at each other, to “see how big Chris’s heart was.

“He loved everybody here. And he’s still here with us. A piece of his heart is with all of you. He’d want us to be closer. He’d want us to learn something. Something good will come out of this.”

Travis May says he considers Chris to be a brother. They’ve been friends since childhood, back when their families went to church together.

He remembered them playing in a mud puddle together, laughing and splashing one another until 5:15 p.m. rolled around — dinner time.

“(His mother) Mary came out and yelled, ‘Chris, dinner!’ She saw us about 30 yards off and a big smile came over her face. She hosed us down in the coldest water I’ve ever felt.”

Travis was there at Windy Gap Camp when Chris gave his life to Jesus Christ.

“One day I know I’m going to see him again.”

Hood recalled the biblical words from the Book of James that describe life as “a mist that appears for a little time, then vanishes.”

“Life is short. But Chris had a life with Christ. He’s not going to come through that door again. But we know where Chris is.”

A family will mourn and a community can’t help but ask why. But Chris Newsom is in a better place.

The leadoff hitter, the great kid with the great smile, is safe at home.

'What Chris Newsom will never see' -- originally published in the April 6, 2009, Shopper-News

It is tempting to say that Chris Newsom was with us last Thursday night at the Halls Community Park.

No. 14, the digits Chris wore on his back as a Halls High baseball player, were displayed in big white numerals just behind the pitcher’s mound on one of the baseball fields. Hugh Newsom threw out the first pitch to kick off the second annual Chris Newsom Memorial Tournament. Chris’s mother, Mary, and members of his family stood nearby. A dapper gentleman sporting Scottish regalia played “Amazing Grace” on the bagpipes. The recipient of the Chris Newsom Memorial Scholarship, Halls High baseball player Taylor Babcock, was also present.

His memory is very much alive, but I don’t believe Chris was there. I’ll tell you why in a minute.

Halls Community Park president Todd Cook has high hopes for this special Little League baseball tournament. For starters, it’s named for Chris, a Halls native who was murdered along with his girlfriend, Channon Christian, in January 2007. Cook says he’s received calls from Powell teams, Karns teams and others wanting to participate next year. He hopes it becomes a countywide tournament.

State Sen. Tim Burchett made a special trip from Nashville to present the Newsoms with a flag flown over the state Capitol and a letter from Gov. Phil Bredesen. Zane Duncan represented his dad, U.S. Rep. John Duncan. Knox County Sheriff Jimmy “JJ” Jones showed up to pay his respects, too.

As the sky began to gray, and the wind began to blow, and the young baseball players placed their caps over their hearts, one couldn’t help but lament the tragedy of it all.

That’s why I don’t think Chris Newsom was with us last Thursday night. So many people miss him, so many people feel so much heartache, so many tears are still shed in his memory.

And, you see, friends, Chris Newsom will never see any of our grief. He is safe at home. Where he rests now, he’ll never know pain again.

For info on how to participate in or sponsor next year’s Chris Newsom Memorial Tournament, call Todd Cook at 659-4682.

A few more words about the Rhinestone Cowboy

Further evidence that I possess an addictive personality:

After seeing Glen Campbell last Friday in North Carolina, I came home and set about trying to get my hands on everything he recorded.

This is nothing new. I am an "all or nothing at all" kind of guy, especially when it comes to music. What can I say! It soothes the soul.

Anyway, I tracked down the second volume of a CD trilogy Capitol Nashville released in the mid-1990s that chronicles Glen's years on that label. I bought the first volume the year I graduated from high school, but never followed up on the other two.

Big mistake.

Both are long out of print. The third volume now sells for anywhere from $65 to $100. But, I secured the second set -- an unopened copy -- for a whopping four bucks. It's easily my favorite Glen Campbell collection to date.

My favorite tracks are the live and rare songs and the album cuts that never became hits. One is Gordon Lightfoot's "If You Could Read My Mind." Glen delivers a beautiful cover, one that threatens to make my top 10 list.

He probably owes his career in part to songwriter Jimmy Webb. A handful of Webb gems are here, including a nice live performance of "Didn't We" and the often maligned psychedelic "MacArthur Park." I don't care what you say. I like that song.

(Did you know that Jimmy Webb wrote "Highwayman"? Me either.)

Other rarities are covers of Porter Wagoner's "The Last Thing on my Mind" and Paul Simon's "Homeward Bound" and a stunning rendition of "Greensleeves."

The hits are here, too. "Gentle on my Mind" and "Rhinestone Cowboy" and "Houston (I'm Coming to See You)."

Wish I could find even a burned copy of Volume 3. Alas, alas. This is what happens when you don't buy something when you see it.

For once, though, I'm glad for my nutty obsessions. I don't know how you feel about it, but to me there's nothing like discovering a gem of an album by a favorite artist.

Waters of March

Did you know that in Brazil it only rains in March?

Well, neither did I.

Last night, while listening to that modern marvel that is the iPod random shuffle, I came upon a song I'd never heard, an "album cut" on a Nancy LaMott live CD. (Aside: If you want to hear a tragic story, Google Nancy LaMott.) The song is called "Waters of March" and was written by the legendary guitarist/composer Antonio Carlos Jobim.

According to Wikipedia, March is the rainy season in Rio de Janeiro. Inhabitants look forward to it because the water quenches thirst. Inhabitants fear it because it brings floods.

This is an incredible, almost Shakespearean, dichotomy. The song is poignant, but not dramatic or sentimental. I think I expected something with distinct movements and bombast, a Brazilian "MacArthur Park." Instead, it is understated, but with a downward progression, like precipitation.

Here is a piece of the English translation of the Portuguese lyrics:

A stick, a stone, it's the end of the road; it's the rest of a stump, it's a little alone; It's a sliver of glass; it is life, it's the sun; It is night, it is death; it's a trap, it's a gun.

Believe it or not, Coke used the song as a jingle in the 1980s. Art Garfunkel recorded it. So did others.

What elevates this above trivia is the notion that what brings you life also kills you.

A point to ponder, in March or any other rainy month.

Jesus on a marquee

I first noticed the Jeep 4x4 because it sported a scrolling marquee.

Didn't catch the words at first. I was startled by the driver, who appeared to be yelling.

All this happened on Henley Street downtown near the World's Fair site. I couldn't make out the driver's words, so I looked again at the marquee.

Scrolling across it in red letters were ditties like "Adultery is a sin."

It hit me that the driver was yelling into a speaker system the same stuff I sometimes hear street preachers yell on Market Square at lunch hour or on Saturday mornings at the corner of Maynardville Highway and Cunningham Road. This one, I guess, decided to take his show on the road.

I turned onto Hill Avenue, mulling this over in my mind, when I noticed a bumper sticker on a Volvo in front of me.

"Jesus would recycle," it read.

Bookends, on a Monday afternoon, driving to the school board.

To stop or to go, that is the question...

If you want to see some of the worst driving in these here 50 states, come out to Halls on any given day of the week. Set up a chair somewhere along Maynardville Highway. Be entertained.

Charlton Heston starred in a fun little film in the mid-70s called "The Omega Man." At the first of it, Heston thinks he's the only human being who has survived a nuclear attack.

He's driving around town like a bat out of hell. At one point, he makes a sharp turn and crashes his convertible into a curve.

"God," my dad, who was also watching the film, said. "That looks like somebody driving in Halls."

A few minutes ago, I was sitting in the left turn lane on Maynardville Highway at Crippen Road and watched three cars run a red light, one after the other after the other.

I know what you're thinking. We've all done it.

A police officer told me once it's probably a good idea to go on through the light if you're right under it when it is turning red. Locking up the brakes usually causes accidents -- even if it won't be your fault.

But, I've watched three, four, five, six, seven seconds go by after the light turns red. Cars speed right on through. And I always cringe.

Seems like this is more evidence of the increasing egocentric, solipsistic nature of our culture. It's all about me, baby. I don't have time to stop.

Course, then there's the other extreme. Don'tcha just love the folks who stop at green lights?

See it all, have a ball, right here in Halls, or at a neighborhood near you.