Archives for July 2016

Just some thoughts:

“Some people worry about chicken manure
 when there are elephants in the yard.”

​(Spoken by one of my wise old golfing buddies here in Tennessee)

​Think about it: sadly it is true.
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July 15, 2016
Keep on,
​Larry Adamson 

Just some thoughts:

​​That is an expression we all have probably heard at least once in our life time. I guess there could be a few situations where that statement might have merit; but I bet not as many times as one might think for those who have used it in their defense.

“Inflexibility: it is the worst human failing; you could learn to check

​impetuosity, you could overcome fear through confidence and laziness

through discipline, but rigidity of mind allowed for no antidote.

It carried the seeds of its own destruction.”

   
​  (Anton Myer: Once an Eagle)
​

 I cannot think of many areas in life where that principle would not apply.  In marriage, I have been married fifty-one  years this coming July 2016; or in one’s career or their associations with people, flexibility has merit in just about every facet of life.
 

“It’s my way or the highway” may be fitting in a few places, but again not nearly as many as folks want to think. If you choose to live by such a creed, sooner or later you may find yourself all alone on that highway; and possibly after a while there may not even be a highway for you to travel.

Truly  inflexibility it can “Carry the seeds of its own destruction.”
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July 8, 2016
Keep on,
​Larry Adamson

Below is something I wrote in 2011.

​LA

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Just some thoughts:

“Beneath still waters there’s a strong under tow
The surface waters don’t tell you what the deep waters know”

​Those are the key lines from a song that was written forty one years ago (1970) and has sold millions for a variety of artists. Emmylou Harris had a hit on it a few years back. She has a great cut on this song. She delivers the lyrics…some folks sing songs…a few deliver.
 
 Dallas Frazier wrote that song. I have had the opportunity on occasion to sit and talk with him. Often when I am around songwriters I will try to encourage them to talk about their creations and most are interested in doing so.
 
Once while sitting with a writer, I quoted most of the lyrics of his song to him. He then smiled and said, “You must be a musician.” I told him I had no musical talent whatsoever. He replied, “Well, one of the best compliments a writer can receive is when someone, especially a non performer, can quote your writings.”
 
 I once asked Dallas about the birth of the song “Beneath Still Waters.” He told me that at the time he was living near a river. He woke up early one morning and walked outdoors. On this morning while looking at the river he thought how the surface waters of the river don’t always tell you what all is really going on underneath.
 
He then said that can also be true with people. He asked me, “Have you ever gone back to your hometown to a reunion with family, school, church or community?” I told him I had. “You see people there that things appear well and things look good, but later you learned the relationships were really not as they appeared on the surface. Beneath, things are very different.”
 
Still waters are not always a true indication of what is really going on. Appearances can often be deceiving and don’t always tell you “what the deep waters know.”
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May 27, 2011
Keep on,
​Larry Adamson

Just some thoughts:

Today in Nashville, Tennessee there is a small (4,700 students) faith based Christian university that had its beginnings in 1891 through the efforts of David Lipscomb.

Lipscomb was born a southern and lived during the Civil War. He was a member of a group that opposed war. Lipscomb also was a minister and was preaching at one time in a church in Columbia, Tennessee. Confederate troops were in the area at this time. Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forest sent a subordinate to hear him speak. This person was sent with the expressed purpose of hoping to determine if Lipscomb was advocating treason to the South, to the Confederacy.

The soldier who had been sent to “check” on Lipscomb reported back to Forest saying:

​ “I have not reached a conclusion as to whether or not the doctrine of his        

 is loyal to the Southern Confederacy, but I am profoundly
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convinced that he (Lipscomb) is loyal to his Christian religion.”

​Crying in the Wilderness–Robert E. Hooper

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What the officer was saying was, “Maybe I don’t know about his position on all matters regarding the war and politics, but I am assured that he believes sincerely in what he is preaching.”

It was said of Lipscomb that his life and his actions were always consistent with his words.

You know sometimes one can be in disagreement with another, but because of the convictions with which one speaks, they merit the respect of others.
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June 30, 2016
Keep on,
​Larry Adamson

Below is something I wrote May 27, 2014.

Sometimes words—lyrics are not needed…the melody gives one  the picture…if you ever heard Floyd Cramer doing “Last Date”  ….I make my case….

LA

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Just some thoughts:

Songs with no words… You ever wonder why they became popular? I have an idea why.
 
Why do songs that have no words occasionally become hit songs? Is it because of a beautiful melody or the blending of various notes and sounds? Maybe; but I bet that’s not always the case. Yes, they are pretty, but I think they become popular because folks are able to create a picture to what they think the lyrics might be saying. They may equate the pretty music with a person, a happening, an event, a time, or place, and they create their own lyrics.

 
Floyd Cramer’s hit song, “Last Date,” first came out as an instrumental. For me, no words were ever needed. I hear those beginning piano licks, and I have a picture. Sometimes things happen in our lives that place us at an event, time, or with a certain person or persons when we hear the sound and thus no words are needed. “Moonglow” was a song that came from the movie “Picnic.” Again, a picture and no words needed. Dwayne Eddy’s hit rock-n’-roll “Rebel Rouser” has no words, but I get the picture. Songs like Bill Justus and “Honky Tonk;” or Santo and Johnny’s “Sleep Walk.” Nelson Riddle’s “Route Sixty-Six.” Right now I can see Buzz and Todd, top down and headed west on that famous road drivin’ that 1962 Corvette.
 
There are many instrumentals that become hit songs and never need lyrics. Sometimes we can write our own words to what has happened; all we need is a bit of background music and we have the picture, a picture that does not go away.
 
There are some songs that need no lyrics. Likewise there are things that happen in one’s life that no words are needed. There are “instrumentals” when heard they create a picture, a memory of something that happened in your life, in which….. no “words” are needed.

 
You have such a song? Most all of us do.
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May 27, 2014
Keep on,
​Larry Adamson

Just some thoughts:

Some say he was the greatest to ever play the game.
 
He received more votes placing him in the Baseball Hall of Fame than any player in the history of the game. Ty Cobb was a great player no doubt, but what is equally agreed upon by many is he was one of the most disliked people to ever play the game. Maybe “despised” would be a more correct description.
 
He once climbed into the stands at a game and physically beat up a heckler. The heckler was handicapped, having lost a hand and three fingers on his other hand in a work accident. Teammates tried to stop him only to hear Cobb say, “I don’t care if he has no feet.” Another time he pulled a knife and stabbed a man who came to the aid of an elevator operator that Cobb had gotten into a fight with.
 
He played twenty-two seasons for the Detroit Tigers, establishing over ninety records during those years. He won twelve batting titles, nine in a row. He still holds the record for the highest lifetime batting average of any player in the history of baseball. He had a lifetime batting average of .366. That’s lifetime, not for one season but for his entire career. He was great on the field but had many problems off. At his funeral not one former teammate came, and only three players from all of baseball attended. That speaks volumes. He was buried in his hometown of Royston, Georgia. 

​                                         “If you and I are going to get along, don’t increase my tensions.”
​                                                                                 (Ty Cobb)

A few years ago I talked to a man who knew Cobb, in fact played golf against him as a young boy. He had little good to say of Cobb.

One year as I was driving back to my home in New Jersey from some work responsibilities at the Masters Golf tournament, (tough assignment) I drove through Royston. I stopped and found his grave. As I visited his grave I was reminded of something supposedly he was to have said on his death bead. “I only wish I had made more friends.” Maybe he could have tried a little harder.

​What a statement of one’s life. To come to the end and your last wish is,  

​                                                  “I only wish I’d made more friends.”   

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March 9, 2010
Keep on,
Larry Adamson
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