It was 12:30 in the morning, and I thought I was pretty well lost on a back-country road almost a hundred miles from home. Mind you, the Maps app on my phone didn’t agree. It knew precisely where I was and it fully expected me to trust it without question.
I didn’t, though, mostly because the trip from Columbus to Findlay had been really easy: 315 to 23 to 37, and boom… there. For reasons I can’t imagine, the very same Maps app decided that such a simple route back home would be boring and pointless, since I’d already been on that path. Why not try something new?
Honestly I do love back-country roads, especially when the weather starts to turn cool in the early Fall, just as it had done that night, September 3rd and into the wee hours of the 4th. My preference would be to drive such roads during the day when I can take in the rolling farmland and intermittent forests. Also, it’s a lot easier to take in the road I’m supposed to be watching, with all its twists, turns, rises and falls. An unfamiliar, two-lane roller-coaster track at 12:30 a.m. is less than ideal. But Maps swore it was taking me home, so I hung in there.
Every so often I’d pass a farmhouse, its windows pitch black as the occupants enjoyed the sleep I was looking forward to in another two hours. I started to think about how my headlights would make the shadows of the bedrooms slowly travel from one end of the room to the other. When I was young and shadows ambled across my bedroom, it always made me wonder where the people in that car were headed.
That thought warmed my heart and made me think again about all the fun I’d just had at the Findlay Country Club, playing with Scarlet Fever Band for the Atkins/Grosselin wedding. I’ve often written about how much we love playing for newlywed couples who hold music in very high regard in their own lives, and this couple was no exception. In fact this was the first wedding reception we’ve ever done where we were asked to play one song to get the guests’ attention so they would know dinner was about to start. That could have been handled with a simple announcement obviously, but the choice of having dinner ushered in with a song was especially clever and cool.
This was also one of the rare weddings where the planners held the photographers, caterers, bartenders and all other participants to the letter of the itinerary so they could make sure to have friends and family up and dancing as much as possible.
Dance they did, which, as you know from reading my prior ‘blogs, provides us with the highest level of fun. All of the participants and guests were wonderful, caring folks who let their love and appreciation of the newlyweds bounce off every rolling hill, putting green, sand trap and water feature of the gorgeous golf course that surrounded us. The giddy, giggly glee of a sorority cheer; the reverential military tribute that was done for the multiple Air Force members and veterans present; the goofy, golden wayfarer glasses provided for all the guests—it all made for an incredibly fun evening.
I wondered if, in some way, our music was the light of my headlamps, the farmhouse bedroom was the wedding reception, and the shadows being cast were the memories the bride and groom will keep with them for all the years to come. They’ll build their lives together, start a family, and experience the constant craziness of that life that I wouldn’t trade for a billion dollars, and neither will they.
Maybe one night, many years from now, they’ll retire to their bedroom, exhausted from a full day of work and an evening of fun with their children. Just as they doze off, lights from a distant, passing car will heave shadows across the room, and they’ll wonder who is in that car, and where are they going at such a late hour? Maybe they’ll remember that warm summer afternoon giving way to that cool autumn night in September of 2016, and they’ll realize that even though old memories begin to become shadowy and lurch from one side of the room to the other, they will be right back where they started when the next car drives by—happy thoughts enough to last a lifetime.
“Okay iPhone,” I said, grinning, “Let’s get home.”
I didn’t, though, mostly because the trip from Columbus to Findlay had been really easy: 315 to 23 to 37, and boom… there. For reasons I can’t imagine, the very same Maps app decided that such a simple route back home would be boring and pointless, since I’d already been on that path. Why not try something new?
Honestly I do love back-country roads, especially when the weather starts to turn cool in the early Fall, just as it had done that night, September 3rd and into the wee hours of the 4th. My preference would be to drive such roads during the day when I can take in the rolling farmland and intermittent forests. Also, it’s a lot easier to take in the road I’m supposed to be watching, with all its twists, turns, rises and falls. An unfamiliar, two-lane roller-coaster track at 12:30 a.m. is less than ideal. But Maps swore it was taking me home, so I hung in there.
Every so often I’d pass a farmhouse, its windows pitch black as the occupants enjoyed the sleep I was looking forward to in another two hours. I started to think about how my headlights would make the shadows of the bedrooms slowly travel from one end of the room to the other. When I was young and shadows ambled across my bedroom, it always made me wonder where the people in that car were headed.
That thought warmed my heart and made me think again about all the fun I’d just had at the Findlay Country Club, playing with Scarlet Fever Band for the Atkins/Grosselin wedding. I’ve often written about how much we love playing for newlywed couples who hold music in very high regard in their own lives, and this couple was no exception. In fact this was the first wedding reception we’ve ever done where we were asked to play one song to get the guests’ attention so they would know dinner was about to start. That could have been handled with a simple announcement obviously, but the choice of having dinner ushered in with a song was especially clever and cool.
This was also one of the rare weddings where the planners held the photographers, caterers, bartenders and all other participants to the letter of the itinerary so they could make sure to have friends and family up and dancing as much as possible.
Dance they did, which, as you know from reading my prior ‘blogs, provides us with the highest level of fun. All of the participants and guests were wonderful, caring folks who let their love and appreciation of the newlyweds bounce off every rolling hill, putting green, sand trap and water feature of the gorgeous golf course that surrounded us. The giddy, giggly glee of a sorority cheer; the reverential military tribute that was done for the multiple Air Force members and veterans present; the goofy, golden wayfarer glasses provided for all the guests—it all made for an incredibly fun evening.
I wondered if, in some way, our music was the light of my headlamps, the farmhouse bedroom was the wedding reception, and the shadows being cast were the memories the bride and groom will keep with them for all the years to come. They’ll build their lives together, start a family, and experience the constant craziness of that life that I wouldn’t trade for a billion dollars, and neither will they.
Maybe one night, many years from now, they’ll retire to their bedroom, exhausted from a full day of work and an evening of fun with their children. Just as they doze off, lights from a distant, passing car will heave shadows across the room, and they’ll wonder who is in that car, and where are they going at such a late hour? Maybe they’ll remember that warm summer afternoon giving way to that cool autumn night in September of 2016, and they’ll realize that even though old memories begin to become shadowy and lurch from one side of the room to the other, they will be right back where they started when the next car drives by—happy thoughts enough to last a lifetime.
“Okay iPhone,” I said, grinning, “Let’s get home.”
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