My Teachers
thanks to Linda Cheek, Allen Dixon, and Buck's
I am retiring from teaching at Hendrix College in December, 2018. I will be retiring from one phase of my life and retiring into another which, for me, seems full of promise. I look forward to the next phase. But I find myself looking back on the people and places that have so shaped the passing phase. I could never step forward without them. I'd like to tell you about a few of them.
*
About five years ago, Kathy and I drove out to Toad Suck Buck’s restaurant. It overlooks the Arkansas River just outside a very small town called, yes, Toad Suck.
I had heard that the restaurant had live music and I wanted to hear some. Toad Suck Buck’s has two venuest: an indoor space and an outdoor patio. Kathy and I sat outside on the patio, where there was a small makeshift stage.
There was a relatively small crowd that night: maybe twenty people. At a table next to us sat three women who worked in Conway at a greenhouse. I knew this because I could hear them talking about work and plants. At one point one of the women left the table. walked up to the stage, strapped on the guitar, and started playing. I had no idea that her voice would be so compelling: rich, hoarse, textured, right on target with melody, and more than a little soulful. Her name was Linda Cheek.
At one point that night Linda took a break and asked if anyone wanted to come up to the mic and play while she was out. Although I had not played much in public - one time in high school as a member of a folk group - I’d always wanted to give it another try. The whole idea of playing music that people either want to dance to or to singalong with is very attractive to me, not just because it is fun, but also because it is hopeful. If people sing or dance to what you are playing, there is a momentary kind of togetherness of spirit. A moment of what an anthropologist, Victor Turner, calls communitas.
Communitas is a fancy word for what Jesus meant by the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven: that is, a state of affairs in which love is the reigning spirit. I have always been intrigued by the possibility that, in moments of music making, something of the kingdom really is felt “on earth as it is in heaven.” Truth be told, I think music is a stairway to heaven.
Still, I had no intention going up to the makeshift stage that night. But Kathy had intentions for me. She had heard me talk for years about how I might like to be part of a band. When Linda offered the invitation, Kathy looked at me and said “Do it. Go up there. And if you don’t, I won’t go home with you. I’ll walk home.” She said this three times. I knew she was kidding, but I also knew she was right: this was my chance.
I walked up to the stage and introduced myself to Linda. I explained that I played the guitar and that I might like to give singing a try, maybe next time that I come out to the restaurant. I didn't have the confidence. Linda immediately said: “Great. Here; take my guitar. Thanks.” Then she went to take her break.
I stood there, with a crowd of about fifteen people on the patio drinking beer, and sang a Buddy Holly song: "Oh Boy." They seemed to like it and for a moment, during the song, two people danced. I had never had that experience before. It was a fifteen second dream come true.
I sang a couple more, and then Linda came back from her break and we sang together: “My Girl” by the Temptations, as I recall. It was, for me, a night to remember. That night Linda became my teacher.
*
Linda liked my voice but she also knew that, as I sang that night, I was tentative. I really wasn’t giving myself to the song, as she put it. So in her kind but direct way, over the months that followed, she taught me to give myself to whatever song I was singing and to the capacities of my own voice, whatever they were. As far as I can tell, Linda gives herself to most every song she sings. Not only by advice, but also by example, she is my teacher.
I’m still not there. Sometimes I give myself and sometimes I don’t. So much depends, for me, on the crowd. But Linda’s advice rings in my ears all the time, plus so much more.
In the months that followed, I went to Toad Suck Buck’s restaurant more and more. Linda sang with another musician who wasn’t there the first night, Allen Dixon. They had worked up many songs in which they harmonized. Allen has a strong voice in his own right; he does darn good versions of songs I love: Mad World, What's Up, Every Rose Has a Thorn, and (my favorite) Breakfast at Tiffany's. And boy he can hit a high harmony when Linda sings! The two of them together are, to my mind, quite magical.
They began to include me when I would go out to the restaurant, and we worked up some songs -- California Dreamin’, It’s So Easy to Fall in Love, Peaceful Easy Feeling, Eleanor Rigby – as a threesome.
Put simply, Allen became my teacher, too. I would listen to his harmonies, enjoy them, and then try to find a “third place” beneath his voice. The very act of finding that third space is, for me, quite as rich as singing the melody. It’s a life lesson, too. As far as I can tell, life is not about being in the spotlight all the time; it’s about learning to fit in with others such that the whole becomes richer.
Having been tutored by Linda and Allen, I began to form two bands of my own: The Fat Soul Band and the Four J’s. The Fat Soul Band plays at restaurants and parties; the Four J’s play at senior living centers every Tuesday and Sunday. Others were added to these groups: David Allen, Jeff Clanton, Josh Cole, Joe Lombardi, and Mike Manion. I started what I like to call the Fat Soul Network, with Linda and Allen as prime members of it.
*
Linda and Allen continue to play at Toad Suck Buck’s on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Some other musicians with great talent and spirit play there, too: Josh Cole, Terry Parker, and the owner, Ken Buck. Ken is a singer par excellence, putting soul into what he sings. And he likes the "oldies but goodies" like me. He is the only person I know who remembers Hurdy Gurdy Man by Donovan. I join them on occasion.
Inmy mind, my teachers will always be Linda and Allen and Toad Suck Buck’s, including Ken and his wife, Deb. A student of mine, Meg Boyles, captures the restaurant's spirit and aspiration in her video. She interviews Ken, too. Meg romanticizes it a bit; Buck's is not a utopia where diversity and love reign supreme. But thanks to Ken and Deb, it does have a vision of the way the world should be, and it approximates it in its way: a world where status and prestige are leveled and, as Ken says in the video, all are on the same level -- having fun, we might add. I like to think of Buck's as an experiment in everyday democracy.
*
As I retire from 39 years of college teaching, I realize that a phase of my life is soon to end. I will be turning to other things: working with the Center for Process Studies in Claremont, California; working with the Greater Arkansas Interfaith Network; continuing my work in China; working on my website; and, happily, playing more music.
I am trying not to be too nostalgic. But I find myself so grateful to the many who have been my teachers over these years: Linda and Allen and Ken, for example.
So it was with pleasure that, on a recent Saturday night, I was able to go out and join them. It felt like coming home. And then, to add to the pleasure Ken came and sang along with us: as he does in the video above.
There was a huge crowd at Toad Suck Buck’s - and there I was with my teachers. Maybe there's a lesson in this for all of us. Life is a process, after all. We are never quite the same at any two moment; and yet at every moment we emerge out of felt relations with others, some happy and some sad, but all real. And as we emerge we are blessed with fresh possibilities for taking a step forward in life, even if only the best for the situation at hand. These possibilities are one way that we touch the very Mind of the universe, who is in fact on the side of life and its flourishing. That's process theology.
These possibilities become available to us, not simply out of our own inner resources, but through friendship with others, and the guidance we receive from them. They become our mentors. Linda and Allen and the folks at Buck's are among mine. I cannot thank them enough.
*
About five years ago, Kathy and I drove out to Toad Suck Buck’s restaurant. It overlooks the Arkansas River just outside a very small town called, yes, Toad Suck.
I had heard that the restaurant had live music and I wanted to hear some. Toad Suck Buck’s has two venuest: an indoor space and an outdoor patio. Kathy and I sat outside on the patio, where there was a small makeshift stage.
There was a relatively small crowd that night: maybe twenty people. At a table next to us sat three women who worked in Conway at a greenhouse. I knew this because I could hear them talking about work and plants. At one point one of the women left the table. walked up to the stage, strapped on the guitar, and started playing. I had no idea that her voice would be so compelling: rich, hoarse, textured, right on target with melody, and more than a little soulful. Her name was Linda Cheek.
At one point that night Linda took a break and asked if anyone wanted to come up to the mic and play while she was out. Although I had not played much in public - one time in high school as a member of a folk group - I’d always wanted to give it another try. The whole idea of playing music that people either want to dance to or to singalong with is very attractive to me, not just because it is fun, but also because it is hopeful. If people sing or dance to what you are playing, there is a momentary kind of togetherness of spirit. A moment of what an anthropologist, Victor Turner, calls communitas.
Communitas is a fancy word for what Jesus meant by the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven: that is, a state of affairs in which love is the reigning spirit. I have always been intrigued by the possibility that, in moments of music making, something of the kingdom really is felt “on earth as it is in heaven.” Truth be told, I think music is a stairway to heaven.
Still, I had no intention going up to the makeshift stage that night. But Kathy had intentions for me. She had heard me talk for years about how I might like to be part of a band. When Linda offered the invitation, Kathy looked at me and said “Do it. Go up there. And if you don’t, I won’t go home with you. I’ll walk home.” She said this three times. I knew she was kidding, but I also knew she was right: this was my chance.
I walked up to the stage and introduced myself to Linda. I explained that I played the guitar and that I might like to give singing a try, maybe next time that I come out to the restaurant. I didn't have the confidence. Linda immediately said: “Great. Here; take my guitar. Thanks.” Then she went to take her break.
I stood there, with a crowd of about fifteen people on the patio drinking beer, and sang a Buddy Holly song: "Oh Boy." They seemed to like it and for a moment, during the song, two people danced. I had never had that experience before. It was a fifteen second dream come true.
I sang a couple more, and then Linda came back from her break and we sang together: “My Girl” by the Temptations, as I recall. It was, for me, a night to remember. That night Linda became my teacher.
*
Linda liked my voice but she also knew that, as I sang that night, I was tentative. I really wasn’t giving myself to the song, as she put it. So in her kind but direct way, over the months that followed, she taught me to give myself to whatever song I was singing and to the capacities of my own voice, whatever they were. As far as I can tell, Linda gives herself to most every song she sings. Not only by advice, but also by example, she is my teacher.
I’m still not there. Sometimes I give myself and sometimes I don’t. So much depends, for me, on the crowd. But Linda’s advice rings in my ears all the time, plus so much more.
In the months that followed, I went to Toad Suck Buck’s restaurant more and more. Linda sang with another musician who wasn’t there the first night, Allen Dixon. They had worked up many songs in which they harmonized. Allen has a strong voice in his own right; he does darn good versions of songs I love: Mad World, What's Up, Every Rose Has a Thorn, and (my favorite) Breakfast at Tiffany's. And boy he can hit a high harmony when Linda sings! The two of them together are, to my mind, quite magical.
They began to include me when I would go out to the restaurant, and we worked up some songs -- California Dreamin’, It’s So Easy to Fall in Love, Peaceful Easy Feeling, Eleanor Rigby – as a threesome.
Put simply, Allen became my teacher, too. I would listen to his harmonies, enjoy them, and then try to find a “third place” beneath his voice. The very act of finding that third space is, for me, quite as rich as singing the melody. It’s a life lesson, too. As far as I can tell, life is not about being in the spotlight all the time; it’s about learning to fit in with others such that the whole becomes richer.
Having been tutored by Linda and Allen, I began to form two bands of my own: The Fat Soul Band and the Four J’s. The Fat Soul Band plays at restaurants and parties; the Four J’s play at senior living centers every Tuesday and Sunday. Others were added to these groups: David Allen, Jeff Clanton, Josh Cole, Joe Lombardi, and Mike Manion. I started what I like to call the Fat Soul Network, with Linda and Allen as prime members of it.
*
Linda and Allen continue to play at Toad Suck Buck’s on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Some other musicians with great talent and spirit play there, too: Josh Cole, Terry Parker, and the owner, Ken Buck. Ken is a singer par excellence, putting soul into what he sings. And he likes the "oldies but goodies" like me. He is the only person I know who remembers Hurdy Gurdy Man by Donovan. I join them on occasion.
Inmy mind, my teachers will always be Linda and Allen and Toad Suck Buck’s, including Ken and his wife, Deb. A student of mine, Meg Boyles, captures the restaurant's spirit and aspiration in her video. She interviews Ken, too. Meg romanticizes it a bit; Buck's is not a utopia where diversity and love reign supreme. But thanks to Ken and Deb, it does have a vision of the way the world should be, and it approximates it in its way: a world where status and prestige are leveled and, as Ken says in the video, all are on the same level -- having fun, we might add. I like to think of Buck's as an experiment in everyday democracy.
*
As I retire from 39 years of college teaching, I realize that a phase of my life is soon to end. I will be turning to other things: working with the Center for Process Studies in Claremont, California; working with the Greater Arkansas Interfaith Network; continuing my work in China; working on my website; and, happily, playing more music.
I am trying not to be too nostalgic. But I find myself so grateful to the many who have been my teachers over these years: Linda and Allen and Ken, for example.
So it was with pleasure that, on a recent Saturday night, I was able to go out and join them. It felt like coming home. And then, to add to the pleasure Ken came and sang along with us: as he does in the video above.
There was a huge crowd at Toad Suck Buck’s - and there I was with my teachers. Maybe there's a lesson in this for all of us. Life is a process, after all. We are never quite the same at any two moment; and yet at every moment we emerge out of felt relations with others, some happy and some sad, but all real. And as we emerge we are blessed with fresh possibilities for taking a step forward in life, even if only the best for the situation at hand. These possibilities are one way that we touch the very Mind of the universe, who is in fact on the side of life and its flourishing. That's process theology.
These possibilities become available to us, not simply out of our own inner resources, but through friendship with others, and the guidance we receive from them. They become our mentors. Linda and Allen and the folks at Buck's are among mine. I cannot thank them enough.