My first guitar lesson was in the late summer of '05. I don't know why I made the effort at that time, more than some other, to get the lesson really. I had never studied music before other than waitin' tables in, and frequenting, live music venues in Houston and Austin. But life had shifted again. My son was getting older but at the same time I wasn't necessarily getting free-er. Both of my parents had passed. I pulled out my late husband's guitar and got after the work of finally feeding my soul. And so, I guess the songs that had been waitin' to, started pouring out.
I was raised in Houston, the youngest of four with lots of years between me and my siblings (the oldest being my brother with cerebral palsy at 13 yrs my senior), by a motherless mother and a fatherless father in an alcoholic home. Although I yearned to express myself creatively in a musical way during my childhood, it just didn't happen.
I moved to Austin under the guise of transferring to The University of Texas where I majored in Anthropology. I ended up graduating nine months pregnant. Back then we made our home in the Lost Pines of Bastrop, TX, where I'd hang cloth diapers out on the line to dry and my husband would leave every morning before the sun came up to go to the rig. He worked seven days a week as a derrick man and had a day off only if the rig was down. We had three sweet traditional years together. He passed away when our son was two years old, leaving us with not much more than a '71 Olds Cutlass Supreme (hard top) and a '72 Olds Delta 88 Royal. Thinking I needed more reliable transportation, I regrettably sold them and put a down payment on a lil' Chevy S-10 pick-up.
After a few hard years in Smithville, TX (which included another short and semi-tragic marriage), my son and I moved to Wimberley where I almost killed us in that pick-up while driving on Purgatory Road off Devil's Backbone.... and the rest of the stories are working their way into my songs. I've done a lot of livin' since then, been down some more rough roads, and I figure I have a few more yet to go. But I'm also blessed beyond my wildest dreams all at the same time. And that's something I don't take for granted.
photo by Todd V. Wolfson
