Musician's Widow

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what makes a house a home.

Having your name on the owner’s papers does not make a house a home.

Nor does having your name on the lease.

Receiving mail at a house does not make it a home.

Nor does staying there for a few days.

A home is much more. It’s a place you feel safe. It’s a place that makes you feel warm inside. It’s a place that makes you feel content and happy.

A home is where you make memories. Most happy, some sad. It’s where you laugh. It’s where you feel comfortable enough to cry. It’s the only place you want to be when you don’t feel well.

A home is where you welcome friends and family. Where you break bread around the table, or perhaps in front of the tv. Where you put up your Christmas tree and wait for that holiday with anticipation.

When you welcome someone into your home, you’re extending a level of intimate trust. That service guy, your best friend, your neighbor, your family… all of those people are afforded a glimpse into your home and your psyche. You decorate your home and arrange your furniture based on your likes and needs. It’s a part of who you are.

Houses I once called home through the years will forever tug at my heart a bit, thanks to the memories that were made there. I even sometimes dream about those houses, especially the one I lived in most of my life. But at this point, they’re someone else’s home and for me they’re just a house in which I once lived. The memories they once held now are held deep in my heart and memory, not within those walls.

The place I call home today holds my todays and tomorrows. It holds happy memories. Some day it’ll become like those other houses, and I’ll have another home to create and love. But until that time, I’ll care for my home and find comfort in it. To anyone else out there, its just another brick house they drive my on their way to work or to the store. But for me, when I pull into the drive way, I don’t see a house… I see my home.

It happens to all of us at some point, if you ever travel by car… getting stuck in traffic.

I’m currently on a quick little road trip to see my family in Texas. In fact, I write from my phone in the truck. WordPress app for the win!

Don’t worry, I’m not driving and blogging. Promise.

I’m in Northeast Texas on a state highway I’ve never been on before. It’s beautiful! Luckily, storms that were through here today have long moved on… blue skies and puffy white clouds, wide open fields.

This is not where I was supposed to be, though. I usually take the Interstate the whole way. I like to just keep moving. No small towns with Barney and his one bullet and ten stop signs. It’s fast and I can go into auto-pilot on that route.

However, today, we got about half an hour out of Dallas, and it was a parking lot. Our handy dandy smart phones informed us this was due to road construction. No love for TxDOT from me due to this. Especially when you see traffic as far as the eye can see, both ahead of you and behind you.

Oh okay, it was a little amusing until a Barney stopped people from cutting across a closed Interstate on-ramp onto the access road to catch an FM road away from the madness. Then I got annoyed. There seemed no way out. No end in sight. 45 minutes passed, we moved about a mile.

In comes the handy smart phone and a crossover and a state highway. Yay! Now we are moving and enjoying better scenery. Live in the moment and find the positive in the situation.

Stuck in traffic stinks, but it forced us to take the path we’ve never traveled. There is something cool about that.

Back in July, I read a post in Living in the Moment called Future Unsure. It really resonated with me, and I bookmarked it so I could some day write my own version of that post. Here I am, just over a month from my 30th birthday, and it seems as good a time as any to tackle that post.

Ten years ago, I was a sophomore in college at Temple College. (Yeah, I was a transfer student to Texas A&M, but I bled maroon from birth.) I’d, luckily, already figured out that I didn’t know everything. I used to joke that at 18 I went blonde literally and figuratively. I’d colored my dark blonde/light brown hair to a bright blonde, and around that same time I felt like I went “stupid.”

Perhaps a big part of that was the fact that I had, thanks to exam exemptions through high school, forgotten how to take tests and, beyond that, I had a general “whatever” attitude regarding my grades in school. They wouldn’t transfer as A’s anyway, so why bother?

Herein lies something I’d tell my going-on-20-self: Just because you might not get to keep credit for a job well done, its no excuse to not do your best. Give everything you do your all. If you give everything your all, you’ll always either succeed with greatness or fail miserably, but you’ll be able to solidly stand behind what you did either way. Giving anything only half-yourself, you’ll always wonder if you could have done better. If you could have been the best of the best as opposed to just running with the crowd.

But, as I said, I knew I didn’t know it all, but it doesn’t mean I didn’t think I had it all figured out. See, I knew I would soon be going to Texas A&M and would graduate with a degree in journalism. I also knew I’d some day live in Nashville, TN. I knew I’d one day throw myself towards the dream of writing a book. I got all those things right on the money!

However, I didn’t know my husband yet. I didn’t know I’d be a “musicians widow.” I didn’t know I’d grow disillusioned by the newspaper business. I didn’t know I could actually enjoy working for my parents bookkeeping and tax business. I didn’t know I’d get myself deep in debt. I didn’t know I’d at any point in life feel unsure of myself. I didn’t know I’d end up a cat person. I didn’t know I’d this deeply wish I’d studied photography. I didn’t know that the path I dreamt of could ever change direction and course… and that I’d actually be more than okay with that fact.

With every thing I didn’t know, I’ve learned a lesson and grown. There is one thing I can say for certain: I don’t have a clue what to expect in the next ten years. If I could tell my 20-year-old self another thing, it wouldn’t be all those details I listed. It would simply be: Keep your goals and your dreams alive and chase them with all your might, but know that nothing is guaranteed except for the many twists and turns along the way towards those dreams.

See, at 20, I was career woman extraordinaire. I had a set path that would take me eventually to NYC for a huge journalism career that would eventually wind around down into Nashville… some day. I would live life in power suits, attending big events, rubbing elbows with all the elite people you’d want to meet.

I’ve traded in my power suits for sweats most days, but I keep a healthy selection of business attire for any number of potential meetings or events. I can say I’ve been blessed to still rub elbows with some of the elite people in the music industry. But I tossed NYC off my list of places to live. I’ve realized I’d not be happy there… I’d love to some day visit, but I don’t think it would fit me to live there.

I have a much more down to Earth view of myself. So in the next 10 years, my goals are for us to have a beautiful family, be as debt-free as possible, and to make a solid living with my writing and photography while my husband continues to tickle the ivories for a living. Those are sensible goals and dreams, leaving plenty of opportunity to chase any number of possibilities as they come along the way. Leaving myself room for adventure, learning and growth.

So to my 20 year old self and my 30 year old self: keep the dream, but realize you might not get there along the exact path you think… you’ll get there along the path you’re meant to take, complete with joys, sadness, successes and failures. Embrace that fact, and simply LIVE.

Dog vs Cat -- a scene from my house this weekend

This last weekend I had both a dog and a cat in my house. Growing up, I always considered myself a “dog person” with a dislike for cats. That dislike probably came more from others not liking cats than any real opinion of my own, because once I got my first cat… I began to discover a “cat person” in myself.

This weekend confirmed the transformation was complete. I am without a doubt a cat person.

A cat you can leave for a day without any concern. As long as they have food, water, a litter box and maybe a toy or two, they’re good to go. Self-sufficient, they are. A dog, though, you have to take out and walk. There’s no leaving them for more than a few hours! I also discovered a need for constant attention. This is just something I can’t do working from home. Working Friday ended up being a total bust, and I chalked it up to a life lesson kind of a day.

Anyone who knows me, though, knows those life lesson days usually end up with my doing research and learning about whatever phenomenon I’ve run into. So, I did a quick Google search for “dog or cat personalities” and stumbled upon an article summarizing research done by the (*gulp*) University of Texas in Austin into this exact idea — a difference in the personalities of dog and cat owners.

The article found:

• Dog people were generally about 15 percent more extraverted, 13 percent more agreeable and 11 percent more conscientious than cat people.
• Cat people were generally about 12 percent more neurotic and 11 percent more open than dog people.

So, based on those findings, I’m neurotic, disagreeable, not very conscientious and open. Makes perfect sense to me. Describes me to a T.

Or not.

For me, being a cat person is more about the fact that I want a pet companion, but my schedule is just not structured enough to have a dog. I need a pet that I can snuggle with now and then (especially when the husband is on the road), but that I can also not have to worry about being upended by a sudden change in plans. (Plus, if I am gone for a few days, I only have to worry about finding someone to check the cat every other day at most, versus a friend having to make a daily commitment to the task.) Yes, I want the protection that only a dog can provide, but ultimately the frustration I’ve felt having to care for a dog has made that want a little less important. I’ll stick with my checking the locks every night, keeping a head’s up about my surroundings, and just using my head in every situation in front of me.

So, hello world. I’m Denise. I am a cat person.

(I can hear my brother groaning now.)

groupie \ˈgrü-pē\ noun 1. a fan of a rock group who usually follows the group around on concert tours; 2. an admirer of a celebrity who attends as many of his or her public appearances as possible; 3. enthusiast, aficionado

A couple years ago, my husband played his hometown fair. It was a dream come true for him. Being a smaller town, I thought perhaps the local newspaper would want to do a feature news article on “local boy doing big things” as part of their promotions of the show. I mean, what would be a bigger draw than seeing someone in the national artist’s band who grew up in the town that the fair is being held?

FANS pack a show

As part of the article, the reporter for the newspaper did a phone interview with me. It felt a little weird to be the one being asked the questions as opposed to asking them myself! It was a neat experience, though, until she asked THE question. The one that I admit, I snapped over.

“So… were you a groupie?”

I’d been asked that question before, and I’ve been asked that question countless times since then. It’s an innocent enough question, I suppose, but the word “groupie” in the music-sense has just this negative connotation. It doesn’t help when that question is asked with a snicker.

Groupie… *snicker*

UGH! Talk about being offended!

I can’t remember now what I told the reporter, but I remember that I snapped and quickly set her straight. I made it clear the question was actually offensive in nature. Being a groupie implies that you follow a band around and you spend all your energy attempting to insert yourself into that band’s world. Oftentimes, its implied you’re actively trying to get close to the artist via the band… doing absolutely ANYTHING in takes to get “in the inner circle.”

Being a groupie is not the same as truly being a friend of a band member. Being a groupie is not even the same as being a FAN of an artist. Being a groupie CERTAINLY could not be further from being the spouse of a band member.

I was not, nor will I ever be, “a groupie.” It’s pretty much a dirty word within the music industry; it’s insulting to imply that of someone. As I said, I’ve been asked the question a million times, and I know I’ll be asked a million more times in the years. I accept that fact. However, I will never “like” that question. Never.

I’m being one of THOSE people today. You know the kind. Those people who go to a coffee shop with their laptops, sit in the corner, and type furiously. The ones you wonder if they are writing about you or a term paper. Why do they have to do that in public? How… pretentious!

Well, first off, I AM writing about you. (I’ll get to that in a minute.) Second of all, its not pretentious, its just me needing to get out of the house! Yes, I could do this from home. I have been for the last week! But its lonely at home. My cat does not hold conversations very well. And, seriously, as much as I love my house… I can’t handle being in it almost non-stop for seven days.

See, my husband in right in the middle of a two-week run to the west-coast. And I am just WAY out of practice of his being gone so long. I’m used to a maximum of maybe four days out, then home for at least a day or two.  Not this run. Two weeks solid. And talking on the phone only gets me so far in the sanity department.

I’ve wanted to come down to Starbucks for awhile now. It’s kind of a no-brainer. Its barely three miles from my house, in fact. But I just couldn’t justify the cost. I have coffee at home. I have internet at home. I even had cupcake mixes at home!  But, you see in that picture above, the card? Yeah, that card pretty much gave me back some of my sanity. My cousin sent me that with a little treat inside that resulted in my gleefully hitting Starbucks today for a Grande Vanille Latte and a big, fat slice of banana walnut bread. So. Very. Yum.

So here I am, right in the corner of my local Starbucks, sipping my latte, people-watching and eavesdropping.

My favorite thus far has to be the guy who, for what ever reason, had to sit at the table right beside mine. Even though there were probably 15 empty tables in the building. And he’s not having anything. He’s just sitting at the table, playing with his phone. Interesting. Seems to be a soldier, in full army fatigues. Maybe he’s waiting for someone to end their shift. Or maybe he’s waiting to meet someone. Who knows. But he proceeded for have a ten minute conversation on his phone in which he kept saying, “Oh, she went home already? Are you sure she went home already? That’s what she said, she went home already?” After about the eighth time of this, I almost looked over and went, “Look! She went home already! Deal with it!” But, you know, I thought that might be a little rude. So I didn’t.

Another fun one has to be the girl on crutches whose friends didn’t bother to get up and get her coffee order for her. They watched her struggle to get up, then once she did went, “Oh I guess I could have gotten that for you.”  *facepalms* Teens.

My final favorite was watching a lady come in, order a drink, then sit down and proceed to pay her bills. Then for each bill she paid, she’d rip the statement in half and throw it away. Don’t get me wrong, but that doesn’t seem like the safest way to protect yourself from identity theft. But, hey, maybe Starbucks trash cans have some sort of super-sonic-bill-destroyer-system in them.

Or maybe not.

This, folks, this is what that “pretentious person with laptop at the coffee shop” wonders. That’s deep, man. Deep.