Wayfaring Stranger…

Dixie Voskamp has several dulcimers (I think they all do, but as a guy who owns between 20 and 30 cameras I’m not commenting here….) and today’s version has this beautiful inlaid hummingbird…

Natalie did butterflies.

And they all did music. Oh, did they do music. Old standards, period pieces… Red River Valley, The Eyes of Texas, Wayfaring Stranger… felt like I really HAD stepped back in time. I wandered around, shooting pictures and looking around (I shadowed Mr Arnold for a bit while he was taking a tour – gonna have to go up there SOON and let him give me the full run. The man’s sharp, I tell you.) and they went right on playing, talking, figuring out what to play next and what they hadn’t played in a while, discussing how much practice they hadn’t had and how “off” things sounded, although they sounded just fine to me. (In the interest of fair disclosure I have to point out that while there’s musical talent in my family, my sisters got every last bit OF it – I’m doing good to play a CD. I tried to play guitar, as I think I’ve mentioned, and I bought a bowed psaltery back in the day to relax with. As far as I recall, it wound up with one of those sisters, I believe – a much better home for it. My job in this is, it turns out, to be audience — I get 90% of the enjoyment and 0% of the work. I think I’m winning.)

And I get to wander around and listen to this and make pictures… Yupyup. I’m Definitely Winning here.

But as the song says, you gotta know when to hold `em and know when to fold `em. I got back to the truck and settled the cameras in the shotgun seat, and then looked up and west and heard a low distant rumble, the kind that tells this old Texas boy, “It’s gonna hit the fan here.” The sky looked a bit, well, if-ish, so I pulled up the weather report on the phone (sometimes the 21st Century has its redeeming points) and realized that the plan that had looked good on paper had gone to looking REALLY ugly on the radar. Home Sweet Nylon Taffeta Home is a great little cottage in the woods and all, but Nylon Taffeta and quarter-sized hail are not a particularly happy combination… so I decided “it’s time to fold `em,” hopped into the truck, and ran for it.

Scratch part two. I made part three happen on Sunday, but that’s another story.