![\"Terry](\"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/Terry-Mosher-3.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nMy life has been backwards. It started out idyllic and that lasted until my mother died when I was about to turn 13, and since then I have done things to become like many of us, a model of consistency and loyalty who is stuck in a big rut of my own doing.<\/p>\n
But that\u2019s not who I am. I listen to a lot of music when I write (sometimes I think I should have been a musician) and when I run across a song that expresses the joy of freedom, the ability to just take off and be free as a butterfly and roam like Jimmy Rogers, Woody Guthrie,\u00a0 Jack Kerovac and Hunter S. Thompson, it makes me feel good and feel like I can fly away like a bird.<\/p>\n
Not that I would want to do some of the dubious bizarre things those four characters did, but just having the ability to go and experience life at its very basic core without any responsibilities hangs over me and pulls at me, beckoning me to get up and go. And when I hear a particular song \u2013 like American Pie \u2013 the urge becomes very strong.<\/p>\n
I used to talk with John Wallingford about this. John wrote sports for The Sun and later moved on to the Tacoma News Tribune. He is now free, roaming around the country with Becky and son Max, although I believe they have to be back in Philadelphia soon so Max can start school ( you can read about their adventures on the blog \u201cUncle Sam\u2019s Backyard.\u201d.<\/p>\n
What I have always wanted to do was travel the country, taking the back roads and visiting all the small towns and writing the stories that those towns have. Every small town has a character that is worthy of a big story. I don\u2019t know who would want to read those stories, but it would fun to walk along the small creeks, the wonderful meadows and hills and valleys and town squares and meet and greet all the animals and humans that live in them or near them.<\/p>\n
But instead of doing what I wanted to do I went to school (Alfred, Western Washington), got jobs in Oklahoma, Alaska, Seattle and then for the last 43-plus years in Bremerton while raising five kids with Mary.<\/p>\n
That traveling bug is evident in a small way on the inside cover of the book \u201cHarsh\u201d I wrote on Marv Harshman. There you will see the logo of Mo Books with a flight of birds, which I insisted be there because those birds represent freedom \u2013 free, free as a bird.<\/p>\n
My soul desperately wants to be free, free as a bird. Just get up and go. But the chains I have build and nurtured since graduation from Western bind me to my rut, to a life that is safe and somewhat secure.\u00a0 But every once in a while I hear something and it jars me to fight against the chains. The chains always win, but I still struggle against them from time to time.<\/p>\n
And one of those times came last night as I watched the documentary on Don McLean on public television. McLean has written over 300 songs and in the documentary he was tagged as the American Troubadour. He has toured the world singing his songs, and the one that is the biggest is American Pie.<\/p>\n
I was driving around Ferndale (where I graduated high school a 100 years ago) one time about 30 years ago when the radio started blaring out McLean signing American Pie. I had to stop the car I was so overcome by emotion. I turned up the sound and started tearing up as the words \u00a0bombarded my senses.<\/p>\n
Over the years I have lost many friends who died relatively young and did not get a chance or a choice to roam free, to experience this beautiful world from one creek to the next. And as McLean sang this song, which represents the peaceful days of the 1950s when I was still young and my mother was still alive and the 1960s when the \u201850s were turned upside down with my dark years, the killings (JFK, RFK, Martin Luther King) and the Vietnam War and ugly politics and civil rights protest that turned violent, I suddenly couldn\u2019t function and just sat in the car\u00a0 and let the losses I have experienced and the sadness those other things have brung to wash over me.<\/p>\n
The second jolt I got in life (after my mother\u2019s death) was the terrible loss of Buddy Holly, who died in plane crash in Feb. 3, 1959 while I was going to Alfred to study to be an accountant. His music really had a big bear hug on me and when he died, tragically so, it stunned me to my core. I often think, even to this day, how much more he had to give to us in his music, and it saddens me.<\/p>\n
McLean starts out American Pie with an ode to Holly:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201dA long, long time ago\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n
I can still remember how that music used to make me smile
\nAnd, I knew if I had my chance that I could make those people dance, and…
\nMaybe they’d be happy for a while
\nBut, February made me shiver with every paper I’d deliver
\nBad news on the doorstep – I couldn’t take one more step
\nI can’t remember if I cried when I read about his widowed bride
\nSomething touched me deep inside the day the music died<\/i><\/p>\n
So, bye bye Miss American Pie
\nDrove my Chevy to the levee, but the levee was dry
\nThem good ol’ boys were drinking whiskey and rye, singing…
\nThis’ll be the day that I die
\nThis’ll be the day that I die\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n
When he started singing that chorus about driving to the levee and the good ol\u2019 boys were drinking whiskey and rye, I could see Ray, Diane and Dick and Pete when they were young with me and we were all doing crazy and fun stuff and being free, free as a bird. Now they were gone.<\/p>\n
And I was no longer free.<\/p>\n
What happened to us? What happened to me? Where is the smile, the giddiness, the drive to take risks, the 140-mile-an-hour drives down the back roads in Whatcom County, the all-night partying while listening to Hank Williams music in the shed, what happened to the anxious race to Bellingham to play a semi-pro baseball game after 12 hours of work?<\/p>\n
Where is Pete, throwing a hard curve with a wet baseball during a cold and wet wintry day?<\/p>\n
Marriage, kids, responsibilities\u00a0 turned me\u00a0 into something completely different than what I used to be. I should be playing music, singing songs, moving around like a butterfly, floating here and then there.<\/p>\n
But I can\u2019t. I\u2019m tied to a chair that sits in front of a computer. I mow the lawn, I cut down trees, I clean out the bushes, I take out the garbage, I wash dishes, and I get older and slower in my gait.<\/p>\n
What happened?<\/p>\n
Adolph, Frank, Amos, Dave, Dean, Tommy, Eddie, Gary, they are all gone. I\u2019m here. But am I?<\/p>\n
Is there a time machine? Can I go back to the future?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201dDid you write the Book of Love and do you have faith in God, above?
\nIf the Bible tells you so
\nNow, do you believe in Rock and Roll? Can music save your mortal soul? And…
\nCan you teach me how to dance real slow?
\nWell, I know that you’re in love with him, ’cause I saw you dancing in the gym
\nYou both kicked off your shoes – man, I dig those rhythm and blues
\nI was a lonely, teenage broncin’ buck with a pink carnation and a pickup truck, but…
\nI knew I was out of luck the day the music died<\/i><\/p>\n
I started singing, bye bye Miss American Pie
\nDrove my Chevy to the levee, but the levee was dry
\nThem good ol’ boys were drinking whiskey and rye, singing…
\nThis’ll be the day that I die
\nThis’ll be the day that I die\u201d<\/p>\n
My dad died in 1980, my sister, my rock, died in 2011 on March 3. She was there for me when my mother died. Now she is gone.<\/p>\n
What happened to time?<\/p>\n
Where did the days go diving off the buttement, that old cement rock, into muddy water on Dodge Creek and riding g my bike up Steam Valley,\u00a0 hawks circling me wondering if I would be good to eat, bears chasing me out of the blackberries, suckers laughing at my feeble attempt to catch them in the Allegheny River?<\/p>\n
What about those scary nights sleeping in the log cabin we neighbor boys built on the hillside, or watching motorcycle races on the side of the ridge where local adults built a dirt track, or buying a Lincoln red hot and an Orange Crush for 25 cents \u2013 a precious quarter my mom gave me (before I learned to steal them from my dad\u2019s big coffee can rigged to take quarters and not give them back; dad didn\u2019t know I was that smart) \u2013\u00a0 at War Memorial Park, and attending Olean Oilers\u2019 baseball games at Bradner Stadium in the old PONY League, a class D affiliate\u00a0 of the Philadelphia Phillies.<\/p>\n
Where did they go?<\/p>\n
Dale, Lynn, Bruce are gone. So is Cindy and the starry, starry night along Keuka Lake, gentle waves lapping our feet, cooling the desires that burned inside.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m sitting alone on top of Old Baldy, overcome by the stillness, the searing sun and the panoramic view of Cattaraugus County and the wildness across the Pennsylvania border and wondering what comes next? What can be more peaceful more beautiful then this?<\/p>\n
And so it goes.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cI met a girl who sang the Blues, and I asked her for some happy news
\nShe just smiled and turned away
\nI went down to the sacred store where I’d heard the music years before, but…
\nThe man there said the music wouldn’t play
\nAnd, in the streets the children screamed, the lover’s cried, and the poets dreamed, but…
\nNot a word was spoken – the church bells all were broken
\nAnd, the three men I admire most: the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost, they…
\nCaught the last train for the coast the day the music died<\/i><\/p>\n
And, they were singing, bye bye Miss American Pie
\nDrove my Chevy to the levee, but the levee was dry
\nThem good ol’ boys were drinking whiskey and rye, singing…
\nThis’ll be the day that I die
\nThis’ll be the day that I die<\/p>\n
They were singing, bye bye Miss American Pie
\nDrove my Chevy to the levee, but the levee was dry
\nThem good ol’ boys were drinking whiskey and rye, singing…
\nThis’ll be the day that I die \u201c<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n
Be well pal.<\/p>\n
Be careful out there.<\/p>\n
Have a great day.<\/p>\n
You are loved. <\/i><\/p>\n
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