Hey, Pete:

A few years ago, I was asked to perform for a street fair sponsored by a black church in the poorest section of town. Now, I'd rip right in to a set of black gospel with my electric guitar and amp (not blasting, though) and get people dancing. Black gospel with an electric guitar is something the people are familiar with, and dance to. I just had my acoustic guitar and a feeble sound system, and it was the end of the day. They were already packing up the chairs and tables. Not your long-dreamt for chance to perform.

As I was tuning up over by the side of the church, three or four young teenage girls came over and asked me if I was going to play any top 40 hits. I told them, no, but I would do some "lower 40" hits. (over here when you talk about the lower 40, it was the poorer section of land... 40 acres of lowland, probably not suitable for planting.) When I finally got up to "perform" the crowd had thinned out and the older folks were packing up the folding chairs and tables. A good sized group of kids came over, though, and started dancing to my music doing an impromtu Buck and Wing. Now, folk music is good to dance to if your name is Morris or Square or Contra, but it doesn't easily lend itself to the Buck and Wing. Black kids have never heard folk, unless it's an insipid version of On Top of Old Smokey in third grade. But, I do a few country gospel songs that have a strong back beat and that was enough to get the kids out in the parking lot dancing up a storm. We surprised each other.

And yes, my cold is gone and I'm deep in writing Christmas cards. They've also told me that I will get two original cover designs for my book to chose from before the end of next week.

Jerry