GUEST-BURKE, can you say a little more about who Aunt Jenny Wilson is? This is such a nice song, it makes you want to know more about where it came from.

Sorcha, I'm still getting my feet wet, but having a lot of fun. I grew up in East Tennessee, southeastern Iowa, and southern Florida, spent 25 years in Colorado, and just recently moved to the Blue Ridge of central Virginia. I'm an old folkie from the '60's - what's called a "revivalist" now, which I don't much care for - and I'm interested in the old ballads and mysterious little songs like "Buckeye Jim".

"Turtle Old Man" is a my Trail name, from a hike I did on the AT in the spring of '01 from Central Virginia to Georgia. My mother had always wanted to hike the Trail from Maine to Georgia but never did and got too old. She just turned 85. She lives down in Georgia and I told her I would walk down and see her and tell her all about it. My first day out, which was St. Patrick's Day, I had to climb a mountain called "Three Ridges" and I moved like a turtle and felt like an old man, with a pack that was way too heavy. Eight hundred and fifty miles and a little more than a year later, I still feel that way. The hike took me through ballad country all the way and reawakened an active interest in Appalachian music. I have found Mudcat to be a welcome place.