Walk the Line, Part 2

Let’s start where the last one left off, with Papa.

Papa, I may have mentioned before, was my mother’s father, and a professional musician for many years. He played with the likes of Buck Owens and Bob Wills, and I don’t know who else. Mama has told me a few times in the past, that there was a big tour Papa was supposed to go out on – I forget the big-name musicians she said had also been part of the tour – and that he had stayed home to be with Nana and his children instead. That tour, apparently, was when those big-name people became big-name people. I never really understood that, because my concept of touring was basically your established artists going out on big stadium tours and such – your Stones, Eagles, even your (vomit) Britney Spears or Jennifer Lopez. But this movie showed the kind of tours Johnny and June went on… with Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis, Carl Perkins, etc… tours where they caravanned in cars, or had one tour bus, and stayed in hole-in-the-wall-looking motels, and shopped in the local dime store. No fancy suites and assumed names, no entourage, no bodyguards, just a bunch of musicians traveling together and playing shows and hanging out. I see the business, and Papa, in a whole new light. I can’t imagine how hard that must have been, as a musician, as someone with a true gift, to give it up. And while my heart aches for him, that he too could have made it big, at the same time I am so proud, because he gave it up to be a husband to my grandmother, and a father to his children. If he had, instead, sacrificed his marriage and family for his career the way Cash did, where would I be right now? With a famous grandfather I may never have met. Instead I have warm memories of the Grampa (he only became “Papa” to me when the great-grandkids started coming along) who always had butter rum lifesavers in his pocket, who loved to watch beauty pageants on TV, and who I saw at least once a week from the time I was born until I moved to Texas for college.

After the movie, one of the many discussions that Cole and I had was actually a continuation from a discussion we had on the way out to go see it. We’re wondering if it’s even possible for a celebrity, to not lead a screwed-up life of some kind? I mean, yes, all people have their secrets and their dark sides. But so many famous people wind up with drug problems, alcohol dependency, violence, deaths at an early age, suicide, mental problems… a whole laundry list of serious issues, and it’s like a chicken-egg question. Does celebrity screw them up, or are they the type of people who would have had those kinds of problems anyway? Is it something about like in the limelight, and all the pressure, that drives them into those situations? Or is there something about people who would naturally live on the edge, that predestines them toward celebrity?

One more thing, and then I’ll quit for now. It made me think, again, about how much of my artistic side and my passions I have quietly allowed to die. I spent seven of the best years of my life in the theater, and I don’t think I’ve even attempted to set foot on a stage in the last fourteen. I love to sing, but have never pursued it further than the occasional karaoke night, though I’ve been wanting to take voice lessons for years. And as for my writing… well, right now my blogs and my school papers are pretty much the extent of it. Though I’ve been thinking lately about a book I’d like to write, and Cole said it sounded like it would be interesting. I’m not quite sure I could do it, nor am I sure I could sell it if I did, but I’m seriously thinking about looking into it. It’s high time I do something with the talents I’ve been given.

And with that, my lunch break is over and it’s back to the grind. Luckily, even “the grind” involves another of those talents, so it’s no real loss.