By Dave Turner

A dial telephone rings on the wall. It’s the only telephone in the house. The eye on the Hotpoint stove is red under the kettle that’s about to come to a boil, and my mother is writing a letter.

She picks up the phone. It’s a call from a friend just across town and she’ll call her back later.

The steam rises in the cup and the tea bag floats before it sinks. The color begins to swirl.

The unfinished letter is there on the table made of yellow formica and chrome with matching vinyl seats that have been around since before the dawn of my memory.

It’s a cold winter day, but the oil furnace keeps the house warm as can be, along with the iron stove that sits in the fireplace, on it an orange coffeepot filled with water to boil to keep the air from getting too dry, outside the firewood stacked on the front porch.

It’s a shotgun house built in the 1920s and the neighborhood isn’t too fancy at all, a far cry from the showplaces up on the mountain.

A typewriter sits on the leathertop desk with broken handles, my grandfather’s desk. In the middle drawer are the pencils and paper and sticky little white circles to reinforce the holes on loose-leaf notepaper. Marks in the leather, words run together.

The light in the hallway is on.

Sometimes I wish I could be there, back to letter writing and dial phones, WWNC in the morning with weather and news and a local announcer whose voice painted a picture of a face I’m quite sure wasn’t what he really looked like.

The mailman would pick up letters and news would be days old by the time it arrived, but that didn’t matter. It was still fresh.

When the telephone was broken we’d go to the neighbor’s house and call Southern Bell to send out the truck to see what was the matter.

Days like this the outside air smelled of frost and woodsmoke. Most of the cars had V8 power and were too wide for the driveways made for Model Ts that Mrs. Howell, who lived in the big brick house across the street, remembered like it was yesterday.

One day Mrs. Howell fell and the neighbor had to carry her to his car and he drove away with her to the hospital. That was the last I saw of her. Her daughter said I could spend some time with her at the funeral home but I didn’t want to see her dead so I never went. Now I remember sitting with her talking in the parlor, in old chairs with doilies on the arms and backs.

Today I launched a new service: Custom songwriting for those looking to give a unique gift, honor a special person or commemorate an event like a wedding or anniversary. Lots more information here:  DaveTurnerMusic.com/CustomSongs.cfm.

December's free song download is a live studio version of my song "Troubled Times." The recording features the Dave Turner Band with me on piano and vocal, Mike Berlin on drums and vocal, Joe Totherow on bass and vocal, and Mikell Usher on guitar. To download your copy, log in or create a username and password to access the download page.

Troubled Times
words and music ©2004 David Dwight Turner BMI

Well you must think that you're mighty powerful,
That your sky will come tumblin' down,
That the actions you take are somehow cosmic mistakes,
To produce on your face such a frown.

Well if you ask me, and I know you haven't,
I'd say take a few steps to the side,
You'll see you're blood and flesh pretty much like the rest,
Are you takin' your livin' in stride?

Troubled times that you live in
Troubled times these days
In your mind are your troubles
Time to think them away.

Life is fleeting, it passes so quickly,
Even Shakespeare will one day be gone,
Forgotten in time, the years will unwind,
Will you change now before yours are done.

If you listen to me you might set yourself free
From the times that your troubled with now.
Take yourself less seriously, you might finally be
To the point where you really know how to live.

Well if Shakespeare is one day forgotten
How eternal can your problems be
Send your worries away, live a bit for the day,
Will you open up your eyes and see?

Last weekend I was listening to the local community radio station WPVM-LP (http://wpvm.org/) and chanced upon a broadcast lecture by Alan Watts (1915-1973) that really blew me away, so I thought I'd share it. Watts held a master's degree in theology and a doctorate of divinity. From what I've read since he was quite well known and from what I heard on the radio program he was uniquely able to discuss philosophical and theological concepts with great intrique and wonderful humor.

Upon further reading I discovered that the lecture I heard was entitled "Images of God" and is available in full in his book The Tao of Philosophy and can be heard in its entirety on http://deoxy.org/watts.htm, also the source of his photo here. From the web site:

With characteristic lucidity and humor Watts unravels the most obscure ontological and epistemological knots with the greatest of ease.

You can find many books and videos by and about Alan Watts. One video I especially enjoyed is entitled "Life and Music." View it on YouTube.

For more information, visit http://www.alanwatts.org/

By Dave Turner

She looked to be in her 20s
But moved like she was very old,
Shuffling slowly,
Hanging on to her man.
She wore a red hooded sweatshirt
and hiking shoes.
Her cheeks were rosy.
Her eyes were young.
Patiently waiting for a table
In a crowded restaurant,
Unable to stand for long,
She took a chair
and everyone was aware
of her and tried not to stare.
Her frame was thin,
Her body afflicted,
And every move was a victory.

When I was Johnson City, Tenn., to perform last week I read the city's free entertainment weekly The Loafer and enjoyed an article by Jim Kelly entitled "Let's Give Thanks, Part Two: Woody Allen and The Marx Brothers" (story and image from The Loafer, November 11, 2008). Unfortunately, the piece isn't available anywhere online, but I'll share some highlights because it struck a chord with me:

Now that we have a new President I hope he will take my advice and institute a national book, music, and movie list, the contents of which should be a part of every citizen's education.

The films of Woody Allen and The Marx Brothers should of course be at or near the top of this list.

Woody Allen is without a doubt one of our greatest national treasures. In a career that has lasted for over forty years (his fifty-first film is currently in post production), he has given us a body of work—characterized, I must admit, by its share of hits and misses—that truly makes our lives worth living.

The article recounts a scene from Allen's "Hannah and Her Sisters," one of my all-time favorite movies, that drives home Kelly's point about the director and the Marx Brothers. It gave me a better outlook on life despites its challenges:

Allen's character, Mickey Sachs, is contemplating suicide. When his pistol misfires, he goes on a walk and passes by a Manhattan movie theatre showing "Duck Soup," the Marx Brothers' 1933 anti-war satire. Watching this movie gives Sachs his reason to go on living, and he presents us with his rationale at a later date in the form of a voiceover:

"The movie was one I'd seen many times in my life since I was a kid and I always loved it. I'm watching the screen and I started getting hooked on the film. And I started to feel: 'How can you think of killing yourself? Isn't it stupid? Look at all the people on the screen. They're funny, and what if the worst is true? There's no God, you only go around once, that's it. Don't you want to be part of the experience? It's not all a drag.' And I'm thinking, 'I should stop ruining my life, searching for answers, and just enjoy it while it lasts.' And after, who knows? Maybe there is something. I know 'maybe' is a slim reed to hang your life on, but that's the best we have. And then I started to sit back and I actually began to enjoy myself."

How can you argue with that? The way I see it, if more people would watch Marx Brothers movies there would be far fewer reasons to take prescription medication.

And who can forget these unforgettable lines? "I would never belong to a club that would have me as a member." "Those are my principles. If you don't like them, I have others." "Don't look now, but there's one too many in this room and I think it's you." "I didn't like the play, but then I saw it under adverse conditions—the curtain was up." "From the moment I picked up your book until I put it down I was convulsed with laughter—someday I intend on reading it." And, "Marriage is the chief cause of divorce."

In these perilous and uncertain times we need these movies as much, if not more, than a government bailout. So watch them and join me in giving thanks for the precious gift of laughter.

Contact The Loafer at www.theloaferonline.com.

I picked up a copy of the Asheville Citizen-Times this morning and learned that crews are coming in this week to tear down the setting for my song "Rockola Motel" today (at the end of this post are links to listen and download free). My story about the Rockola, a 1940s-era motor court in West Asheville, N.C., is fiction. I always thought there should be a song about it - after all, a motel that took its name from the old Rock-Ola jukeboxes? It had to be.

My photos
I took some photographs a couple of years or so ago of the signs and the motel. (Click on the photos in this entry to see all of the photographs.) The main sign has been gone a year or two now because it began to lean and was touching the power lines so Progress Energy had to take it down I guess.

The Citizen-Times article
Today's article by Mike McWilliams in the Citizen-Times tells a little bit of the real story of the Rockola:

ASHEVILLE – Back before Holiday Inns and Best Westerns dotted the landscape along four-lane interstates, there were places like the Rockola Motel.

Located on Patton Avenue and Old Haywood Road, all travelers driving toward Asheville from the west would pass the Rockola.

“We had a lot of nights when we had no vacancies,” 93-year-old Gladys Haynes remembers. “We didn't have a full house every time, but during the summertime, we were always full.

“We had people that would come from Georgia, and they'd come up and spend a week on vacation.”

Haynes and her husband, J.W. Haynes, started the Rockola more than 60 years ago after J.W. Haynes finished a four-year stint in the U.S. Army. (full story on www.citizen-times.com)

Rockola Motel - Lyrics
Words and music by Dave Turner
©2008 David Dwight Turner BMI

Ronnie B. and Wanda Lu
Had a weekly rendezvous
West of town
In a hideaway that Ronnie found.
The place had seen its better days
Before the Interstate highway,
No more neon,
They never turn the sign on.

Rockola Motel,
It was a motor court affair,
A room in the corner
Toward the back and up the stairs.
Roadside lovers
Full of passion and despair,
Rockola Motel.

Wanda Lu and Ronnie B.,
They would talk about their dreams,
Running far away, they said they would one day.
But Ronnie was a married man
Who never, never took a stand
And then his wife caught wind
Of Wanda Lu and Ronnie's sin.

Rockola Motel,
It was a motor court affair,
A room in the corner
Toward the back and up the stairs.
Roadside lovers
Full of passion and despair,
Rockola Motel.

It was the first day of June,
A sunny Friday afternoon,
They found 'em lying in the bed.
The blood was crimson red.
And Ronnie's wife, she disappeared,
I guess it's been almost a year
Since she busted in
With Ronnie's own .410.

Rockola Motel,
It was a motor court affair,
A room in the corner
Toward the back and up the stairs.
Roadside lovers
Full of passion and despair,
Rockola Motel.

Listen to and download a free copy of the song below:

I really enjoy the people I meet when I perform, and the conversations I have with them.

At last night’s show at Hannah Flanagan’s I met James, a 22-year-old at the bar who used to work as a cook there. He recommended the Reuben but they’d run out of sauerkraut so I got an “Irish Dip” which he said was also good.

He was buzzing from five cups of coffee and was having beer and food to offset the caffeine. He said he’d been out partying late the night before. He began the conversation thinking out loud about his growing book of girls’ telephone numbers and a good-natured lament about how every beautiful girl he meets says something like she has a boyfriend back home but we can cuddle. I thought, what kind of teasy bullshit is that? His strategy is to get the phone number anyway. I told him I lost a girl’s phone number once but remembered her name and I called all the Mary Kellers in the Atlanta phone book until I found her. We’ve been married for 19 years and have three great kids.

We started talking about music and literature and he told me the book I’d been looking for – I told him I’d been earlier to Malaprop’s bookstore in downtown Asheville and had mentioned “loud” and the image of someone falling from the World Trade Center but they couldn’t find what I was looking for. Immediately, he said Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer. He also recommended Everything Is Illuminated by Foer and was kind enough to write the titles down for me.

He was also reading The Best American Nonrequired Reading (the 2008 version, I think) edited by Dave Eggers. There was a story in it that I have to find and read about a boy who’s freaking out with an obsession and fear of non-existence. Quite up my alley. (It’s probably not something that I should read while traveling in a car in the Midwest on a grey winter day.)

Anyway, I really enjoyed our conversation about music and good books and physics. We talked about Medeski Martin and Wood and Weather Report, and his love of electronic music, and the mathematics behind everything. It led to a discussion about learning music early in life and creating the pathways in the brain that make performing intuitive. We talked about the instantaneous mathematical calculations that go into a pro quarterback throwing a football and reaching his target 50 yards downfield.

I’m looking forward to visiting the bookstore today.

This morning I wrote a little something about my drive home late last night from my show in Johnson City, Tennessee:

The clouds were piled up in the coves like blankets.
The moon peeked out just a couple of times.
I turned on the AM radio to listen for voices
Coming from far places like Chicago and St. Louis.
Late night talk show hosts
Like the one who took a call from an assembly line worker
Who thinks the car companies in Detroit would make it OK
If somebody who’s actually built a car
Was to run the company.

Some of these college boys have never even bought a car,
Came in fresh from graduation
Got company wheels gratis from the go.
Some of the men and women on the line
Come from family traditions
Of living wages from Detroit.

But I’ve seen the assembly lines in Korea.
Hardly a soul around, just machines doing the work
Only human hands could do.
They’re talking about a bailout
And I think that’ll work out fine
If somebody who’s actually built a car
Was to run the company.

(a poem from my journal written today)

Alone in a chair.
Suddenly it rises up inside me,
Anger and despair,
Gotta get out into the air.
But the cold wind blows
Beneath winter clouds
And I don't like the light
Or the shortness of the day.
I stay inside and imagine being out on an open plain
Swallowed up and erased by the colorless place
Straight long highways, no fast escape,
The goddamned rain and snow refusing to fall
Like we're in limbo,
The in-between place,
Pergatory.
No pain, no pleasure
Except for occasional terror,
Existence, everything
Seeming to hang on a thread
That could be cut at any moment
Sending me into oblivion.
A tree,
Or an overpass,
Anything under which to hide,
Standing outside of a running car,
My family waiting, waiting
After seeing it coming
In the color of my skin,
In my eyes,
A longing for sunlight and mountains
To protect me.

-Dave Turner, November 12, 2008

Every month I make available to members of my web site a free download of a recording of my music that is not available anywhere else. For November 2008, the free download is a song entitled Chevy 10. This live recording is one of my favorites. It's from a show I did in 2007 at The Root Bar in Asheville, NC. Joining me on stage was Guy Schwartz playing guitar, and Paco Ship on harmonica. This was all improv on their part - they'd never heard Chevy 10 before. It was one of those occassions where we all connected with one another and it was a blast!

To get your free copy of Chevy 10, click here to log in. If you've never downloaded the free song of the month before, you'll need to enter your email address and create a screen name and password. Then you will be able to log in and download a free song today and a new free download every month.

Please contact me if you have any questions or concerns.

Lyrics to this month's song:

I enjoyed making new friends in Johnson City at the Acoustic Coffeehouse last night. Looking forward to returning there for three more shows before the end of the year (details in calendar).

I always love traveling to a show because the time in the car, the white noise of the road—they give me time to think. This time of year, crossing the mountains between Asheville, NC, and Johnson City, TN, is wonderful. I admit it. I'm a leaf gawker. I couldn't help but wonder as I was driving through and looking at the ridge tops: Who owns all this land? Is it too bad that I can't look at fall leaves in the Appalachian mountains without wondering who owns it all? Well maybe it's because I hope it doesn't fall into the hands of developers.

I'm working on a couple of audio projects - another EP in the short term and a full length album in the long term. More on these efforts soon. Oh, and happy halloween!