Redeemed

  I grew up in a Christian home.  Thanks to my father's job, I met a lot of giants of the faith, and they knew me by my first name.  I can't remember a time growing up that I didn't go to church.  I accepted Christ as my savior in 1964.  I was baptized by my father.  The concept of "Once Saved, Always Saved" was the key to my life going forward.  

 During my junior high school days, I was bullied a lot by my fellow students.  Every day.  Mostly physical abuse but also mental.  I was told I was a loser.  I got picked last for all recess events.  Even up to the 1980's, I was picked last for sports.  In the late 1960's, despite having psychiatric counseling, I sank into deep depression.  By 1969, I had tried to kill myself six times.  In 1970, my parents and I joined another church.  I met some kids who changed my life.  They taught me love and acceptance.  Two things that I had not gotten from my peers at school.  I started coming out of my shell and began smiling again.  I also took Drama classes at Columbia College and discovered I might have a talent in acting.  After all, I pretended a lot to escape the horrors of bullying, so acting was an extension of that.  I could be someone else.

 I went on to college.  I found that I could excel in Speech and Drama.  During my sophomore year at Anderson College, I got several awards and people applauded.  Two more things I hadn't gotten before.  I found that applause was a drug.  I craved applause, and I got it.  Unfortunately, I also craved other stuff too.  The big five:  Smoking, Alcohol, Drugs, Pornography and Cussing like a Sailor.  I discovered smoking, when I was 14.  Pornography:  when I was 8.  Drugs: when I was 18.  Alcohol: when I was 20. Cussing: when I was 16.   I led a lot of secret lives, but according to my faith, I was saved.  

 The college trip to Europe was eye-opening.  I saw many things like poverty and danger.  I also understood what it was like to be needed by others.  I then transferred to PC and majored in Drama.  I also got involved in activism and student government.  The applause continued.  I took a year off after college to save for graduate school at a seminary that my parents had attended.  My goal was to teach Theatre in a Christian college somewhere.  Despite some at the seminary trying to get me kicked out for not being conservative enough, I graduated as the first student ever to major in Christian Drama/Communications.  I was one of four Christian dramatists in the country at that time.  I got offers from several schools to teach, but they all wanted me to sign a paper agreeing with ten principles.  I couldn't do it, and those doors started to close.  I stayed in Fort Worth an extra year, because I was in love.  That door closed, too.  I was also drinking heavily during this time, consuming a six pack of beer and a quart of vodka a day.

 I moved back to Columbia and stayed with my parents to become their caregiver while working in jobs.  I had worked in retail in Ft. Worth and Columbia previously, but I found that I had success in retail.  Everything I touched was a success.  Awards started coming again.  I also developed some Bible-character monologues, which I presented in churches and camps.  I wrote a series of puppet shows that we took on mission trips to Philadelphia and Tennessee.  I stopped smoking and drinking in 1984.  I had a short relapse in 1999 but then stopped for good.  I stopped doing drugs in 1981, although I got high at a concert in 1997 and saw a UFO in the sky.  I then stopped for good.  The other two things continued.

 I was also acting in movies and TV.  I worked with a lot of great people like Burt Lancaster, Kris Kristofferson, Gary Oldman, and Dennis Hopper.  I met a lot of famous people like Charlton Heston, George Clooney, Jack Palance, Halle Berry, Susan Clark and many more.  I met musicians like Roger McGuinn, BB King, Micky Dolenz, Gary Lewis, Jim Sonefeld and more.  I wrote songs for a band called The Cobbwebs, and we had some success in Europe.  

 My retail life was coming to an end.  Despite my successes and awards, I hadn't gotten a raise in four years.  A friend invited me to move to Greenville, and I jumped at the chance.  I didn't have a job, but I could start a new life.  That ended a year later.  I moved back to Columbia with some money but no job.  I stayed in motels for six months, until that money ran out.  I became severely depressed again and tried to kill myself by hanging.  As I was about to pass out, I heard an audible voice tell me:  "Stop!  I have more for you to do."  That was followed in my head by the hymn "I Surrender All".  "All to Jesus, I surrender.  All to him I freely give."  I began to loosen the sheet from my neck and started crying.  At that moment, the other two vices didn't seem important anymore.  

 The next day, I became officially homeless.  I went to see someone at church but just cried throughout the meeting.  I no longer had a car (it blew up).  I didn't have a job.  I slept in a shelter and then on the street.  Every night, before I tried to sleep, I prayed to God to deliver me out of this hell.  He told me to affirm Proverbs 3:5-6.  "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not unto your own understanding.  In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths."  Those became my life verses.  One day, I was rescued off of the street by some very kind people.  I started getting help for my physical and mental needs.

 In 2012, another group took over my recovery with some in depth mental treatment.  God showed me what I was to do next by being an advocate for bus riders in the Columbia area.  He stood by me, while we got a lot of things accomplished for the good of the riders.  He held my hand, when I needed Him.  I learned about unconditional love.  No matter what I had done in the past, that was gone.  I could be a force for good.  I was redeemed by the grace of God.  In 2009, I lost everything.  In 2009, I gained everything.  I was just going through the motions.  Now, I am a new creation.  I used to have an ego as big as all outdoors.  Now, none of that matters.  I can look back on my laurels with a smile.  I can look forward knowing what does matter.  God spared my life on many occasions.  I was just too stupid to see it, until now.  "Jesus loves me.  This I know.  'Cause the Bible tells me so."  I sang those words, when I was a child.  I understand them now.  Redeemed.  It is an amazing feeling.  

 

Museums

  In 2020, my church was planning a trip to Washington, D.C. as part of our Seniors travel.  We had taken a trip to see the Ark in Kentucky a few years before, so this would be the next big trip for us.  I really wanted to go, because I had not toured Washington since 1964, even though I had been there other times but just not to tour.  The trip was called off, when the pandemic hit.

 Two years later, it was announced that we were going to try again.  One thing that I was dreading was taking a tour bus.  It wasn't because of the comfort of the bus, but rather it was going to be a long ride.  Having been on trips with these folks before, I knew we would have to stop several times along the way to go to the restroom.  That was the nature of going with seniors.  Rest Stops!  So, I decided to get prepared.  I started recording a bunch of music onto an MP3 player.  I got some stuff off of the internet as well as my vast cd collection.  Everything from Jazz to Disco to Rock to Soundtracks to Folk.  Bob Dylan, Steppenwolf, Village People, Chicago, Kiss, James Bond, The Beatles, Woodstock, Prince, The Who, The Bee Gees, Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd and so much more.  It took me several months to get it together.  I also got some cheap noise-cancelling headphones for the trip.  I was ready.

 When we got the itinerary, it showed that we would leave the church at 6am on Thursday, but we had to be at the church at 5:30 to load up.  Much too early for me.  I started training my body a week ahead of time to wake up at 4am.  I also knew I would have to call an Uber to get me there, since the buses didn't run that early.  Back in 2020, I had bought a couple of pieces of Luggage that were from the Presidential days.  I got a hanging bag that had the seal of the National Security Council from the George W. Bush administration and a computer bag with the seal of Air Force One from the Bill Clinton administration.  They were originals.  I thought it would be cool to impress the hotel workers.  When I boarded the tour bus, I went toward the back to sit and found that the bus was equipped with a restroom.  The only stop we were going to make along the way would be for lunch.

 As the bus pulled away, the first thing on my player was the soundtrack to "A Star Is Born" from the 70's.  It was great!  We went through Richmond on the way.  I was there last in 2008 for a family reunion and saw some familiar places from the highway.  We stopped for lunch about an hour outside of Washington.  We had a little over 40 people on our trip, so we had to go to a few different restaurants to be able to get back to the bus within an hour.  Easy Peasy!  

 We got to downtown Washington around 3pm and headed toward the Smithsonian.  A couple of us wanted to go to the Washington Monument, but we were told that there were no more timed tickets.  The Smithsonian was cool.  American History in a nutshell.  I was looking forward to seeing the Entertainment section with memorabilia from TV and the movies.  That part was closed for renovations, which made me very disappointed.  After a couple of hours there, we boarded the bus and went for supper at a sports bar near the Potomac.  Breakfast and Dinner were included in the trip, so they knew we were coming.  The food was good.  We then headed to the hotel to check in.  It was located in Arlington near the Pentagon and Reagan Airport.  

 The next morning, I went down to breakfast and found about 200 middle school and high school students in line for breakfast.  The middle schoolers were from Indiana and the high schoolers from Chicago.  I talked to one of the chaperones, and they told me they had flown in the night before.  I hoped it was a charter plane and not commercial.  Imagine working on a plane with that many kids.  I asked the chaperone where they were going.  She told me the Spy Museum and Arlington National Cemetery.  I asked if I could go with them, but she said no.  

 Our first stop was the Bible Museum.  My hip was hurting from all the walking the day before, but I trudged on.  This museum was beautiful.  There were frescoes on the walls and ceilings made of Tiffany glass.  The exhibits were too many to take in with the time we had, but we saw a lot of old Bibles and some multimedia presentations.  It came time for lunch.  They had a restaurant in the museum.  One thing I realized was that the air was warm inside the museum, even though it wasn't cold outside.  I started getting faint while waiting in line to get my food order in.  I needed to get to a restroom to put cold water on my face.  I got out of line and looked for a chair to sit down.  I then stood back up to look for a way to the restroom.  I realized I couldn't make it, and I fell.  Thankfully, our tour director saw I was having trouble, and he caught me as I was going down.  I hit my elbow on the floor but not my head.  A woman came over and put her purse under my head, and they called for help from the museum staff.  They asked me if I had hit my head, and I said no.  After getting back up in a chair, they brought me some ice and water.  The tour director took me to the restroom, and I started to feel better.  I had some french fries and felt I could continue.  

 Most of us left the Bible Museum, although a few people in our tour stayed.  Some of the folks wanted to go to the Holocaust Museum.  That sounded too depressing to me, so I went with others back to the Smithsonian.  The tour director wanted to stay with me to make sure I was okay.  He was nice, but I had other plans.  A friend's husband was a record collector, and they were going to a used record store near the Capitol.  I asked if I could go too.  They had gone on to the Natural History Museum, and I was to meet them there.  I asked several locals where it was, and each person said it was next door or across the street.  I finally found it, and I hooked up with my friends.  We were going to ride the Metro over there, and I had to be reeducated how to get a Metro Card.  

 When we got to the address, we didn't see the record store.  I went into a bank and asked someone, but she didn't know.  We found a bookstore.  I asked the workers where the record store was.  They didn't know either.  It turned out that the store had closed during the pandemic and had been replaced by a gaming store.  We then found that the Metro train didn't go back to the Smithsonian stop, where we were to meet our tour bus to go to dinner.  We took it as far as we could and began to walk.  My hip was killing me, but I had to keep going.  We walked through a downtown mall and found ourselves in an unknown place.  We were never going to make it back in time, so I told my friend that we should get an Uber.  She had never done that before, so I walked her through it.  The Uber came, and we hopped in to get to the restaurant.  

 It was after 5pm on a Friday in downtown Washington.  Traffic was very heavy, but our Uber driver must had one time driven in NASCAR.  He flew through the city streets, and we got to the restaurant before the tour bus did.  It was beautiful Italian restaurant with autographed pictures of patrons on the walls.  I saw a Frank Sinatra signed picture that would have looked great in my apartment, but it probably had an alarm on it.  I chowed down on the food, since I hadn't had much to eat all day.  

 We left the restaurant and did a tour of the monuments by night.  We went to the World War II Memorial; the Lincoln Memorial (where I stood on the spot where Dr. King had given his "I Have a Dream" speech; the Vietnam Wall (which was very emotional for me, because I had been in the Anti-War Movement back then); and the Korean War Memorial.  I was glad that a friend suggested I bring a winter coat for this portion of the tour.  I needed it.  We then drove by the White House from two blocks away.  It was as close as we could see it.  We also saw a small motorcade drive fast past us.  It was probably the White House Chief of Staff.  I was exhausted, when we got back to the hotel.  It was overall a good day.

 We left the hotel Saturday morning at 8:30 to head back to Columbia.  We had all thought we really needed one more day of touring up there, but we were glad we went.  I listened to music all the way back.  We stopped twice.  Once for gas and the other for lunch.  We got back around 5pm.  I took an Uber home.  It was an amazing trip, even though I did have that health problem.  One thing that was a takeaway from the trip was that buildings don't believe in air conditioning.  If they had, it could have been better for me.  When are we going back?  I still have a lot of music I haven't listened to.

  

Soni

  Way back in another life, I did a program for 8th grade History students called "The Charleston Tea Party".  It was produced by ETV's instructional service.  I played the evil Mr. Lindsay who bought tea before the Revolutionary War and brought it into Charleston.  I, along with two other evil men, had to dump the tea into the harbor.  It was based on an actual event in South Carolina's history.  One of the actors in our merry band of evilness was a guy named Mark Shelley.  He went on to work for Lexington County Hospital and directed all of those award-winning commercials for them.  

 Mark has directed other projects including music videos.  He put out a call for folks to participate in a Christmas music video being done by Jim "Soni" Sonefeld which was being shot at the Town Theatre in downtown Columbia.  I told him that I would do it.  After all, I wanted to work with Mark again.  It had been over 40 years since our being evil.  I also wanted to work with Jim.  He had written a book about his journey from alcohol and drugs to being a Christian and wanting to help others.  

 Back in that other life, there was a friendly rivalry amongst bands in the 90's around Columbia.  The rivalry got to jealousy, when Hootie and the Blowfish hit it big.  Jim was their drummer, and he wrote "Hold My Hand".  As we, The Cobbwebs, were sending our music out to record companies to listen to, we were hoping that somebody would release a song that either had the same lyrics or tunes as ours.  Then, we could sue the pants off of them, since everything was copyrighted. The trick was that a song had to have eight measures the same in order to sue.  A song by the Blowfish came out that was seven measures the same as one of our songs, but there was nothing we could do.

 The music video was being shot on a Sunday.  We had to wear colors that looked like Christmas.  I had a red cardigan sweater that my father gave me back in the 70's that I might have worn once.  I was surprised that it would still fit me.  My job in the video was to decorate a tree with a woman.  There were other people there doing Christmas things like preparing ornaments and passing out cookies.  We did take after take.  After three hours, it was done.  

 I had only been to the Town Theatre once before.  Back in the 4th grade, my best friend was a boy named Tom Phillips.  His mother was in a play there, and we were backstage or outside in the parking lot.  Our love was "The Man from U.N.C.L.E.", so we pretended to be Napoleon and Illya while waiting for his mother to be done.  I have to say that I have an aversion to community theatre.  I know that good work can come from that, but it is not for me.  Why?  Because so often you get a cast together, and some "actors" want to use it to show their friends how good they are.  Usually, they aren't.  I care too much about the Theatre, and I don't want to ever be someone who says "Look what I can do".  Theatre shouldn't be a status thing.  

 While I was working under the hot lights, I started sweating a lot.  I had to take a break and get hydrated again.  During the break, I talked to Jim and told him about our similar journeys with alcohol and drugs, and how we both were better on the other side of that.  I also said that we had a mutual friend.  When he asked who, and I told him, he asked how I knew that guy.  I said he was the brother of the former lead singer of The Cobbwebs.  Jim sort of chuckled.  He knew us.  It was from those days long ago in another life.  

 I saw the finished product a couple of weeks later.  It is called "It's Love".  It looked like I was in it twice:  once a bit out of focus decorating the tree and once setting a poinsettia down on the stage.  I didn't get paid for the video.  Nobody did.  It was a volunteer project.  I did get to talk with a humble guy who has made boatloads of money, and he is very grateful that he is still around.  He and I both. 

Chicago

  I love music.  I always have.  My mother used to play music, as we ate dinner.  Her favorite music to play were Broadway showtunes like Camelot, South Pacific, My Fair Lady, and The King and I.  When The Beatles played on The Ed Sullivan Show, it was my mother who told me to watch it that night.  I was hooked.  I came to love other singers including The Rolling Stones, The Monkees, Peter Frampton, Bob Dylan, The Who, Prince, Willie Nelson, Madonna, The Carpenters, Suzi Quatro, The Carter Family, The Cobbwebs, The Allman Brothers Band, Wet Willie, Goose Creek Symphony, Elton John, Canned Heat, James Taylor, and many more.  One band that stood out during the early 70's to me was Chicago.

 Back in 1970, when I was going through some tough times and wanted to end it all, a group of young people at Kilbourne Park Baptist Church accepted me for who I was.  We would listen to records.  One band in particular was Chicago and their second album.  It is a classic.  Every song on that album speaks to me in one way or another.  I bought every album that Chicago put out up until Terry Kath's death.  He was their lead singer.  Their music was the best during the 1970's.  Even when I got into disco, I would come back to Chicago.  They worked on the soundtrack for one of my favorite films from that period called "Electra Glide in Blue".  Listen to Terry Kath sing the song "Tell Me" from that film.  It will change your life.  It did me.

 I have seen Chicago twice in concert.  Each time was wonderful.  I knew all of the songs and sang right along with them.  So, when I saw in 2022 that they were going to do a live zoom chat with their fans to promote their new album, I just had to participate.  They were going to answer questions from people on the call.  I wanted to tell them what an influence their music had been on my life, but I thought they probably get that all the time.  The three original members on the call was Robert Lamm, Jimmy Pankow and Lee Loughnane.  They are the only three still participating in Chicago.  Most of the comments were how great they are.  I wanted to ask a more musical question, so I asked them about their band coming out after Blood, Sweat & Tears.  Both had horn sections.  Was there competition between the two bands?  The moderator asked my question to these superstars.  They answered it in a long discussion about the two bands managed by the same person and record label.  It was a fascinating discussion on the business of music.  My question was the only one the moderator asked of the three.  There were hundreds of fans on the zoom call.  They answered MY question!!  These same people who contributed to me turning my life toward a positive outlook.  They answered ONLY MY QUESTION!!!  The rest of the hour was spent talking about their new songs.  One thing I have learned in talking to musicians over the years:  don't tell them how great they are, but rather ask them about their craft.  They are much more willing to talk about that.  Now, I have given away my secret.  You want to know another secret on how to talk to celebrities?  I will keep that one to myself.