Preparations:
It's the night before and I already have the back of the Subaru jammed with
too much stuff. I'm ready to cram a week full of weekend into the next few days.
The trip to Kalamazoo from Davenport took about 5 hours. It was good to see Rich, Julie and their kids
Leslie, Melissa, and Zach. They had refinished their kitchen floor and gutted
their old bathroom to make a new one. They wanted to make room for all the
"Prine Shriner's" who would be wandering in and out of their doors.
Julie, her kids and I
immediately took off to "see the sites" around town while
the boys set to making the almost remodeled privy private. Lawton and Pawpaw
are small cozy little towns with lots of antiquated houses and grapevines that
stretch past the horizon. We stopped in the middle of the road while Leslie jumped out of
the car to snag a bunch of grapes courtesy of Welch's. After eating a few, they
warned me that the skins had pesticides and not to eat them
(thanks), I then warned Melissa a little late to roll up her back window as
I did a little skin spitting. Once again, we were cruising
like a bat out of hell through the winding back roads of Lawton, MI. If you want to
go back to where things are slower, more relaxed, and just beautiful -
then
travel to Lawton, it will impress you. Lot's of nature, especially this time of
the year when the air smells like grapes and there's not a whole lot of cement
or skyscrapers. Be sure
to stop by Rich and Julie's and maybe she will let you in the garage where you
could make a purchase from her perpetual garage sale. I made a nice little
haul (thanks Zach).
We did a few trips to Feldpausch's Grocery so there was lots of food and
hungry people constantly coming in and
out the doors. I had a chance to try something that some Southern restaurants
swear by, and half filled a couple ziploc baggies with water, shut the bags, and
then taped them to the outside of their doors. It is supposed to
keep the flies out. I only saw one fly in the house after that - as dumb it
looks, I think it works. Anyway… It created some interesting conversation, and is more fun to do to someone
else's house than your own.
We spent Thursday night making
tuna salad, cakes, chopping too much cabbage, and drinking beer and coffee while meeting all the Lawton locals as they stopped in and out of
the house until about 4am. Jon rode in on his just 'put up' salsa laden motorcycle from Ohio and later
KathyO arrived from the windy city.
Rich and Julie worried about everything: Was it
enough? Will they get lost? Do we need this, should we get that? They
went all out to make sure that no one would have to do without. They were prepared for an army…
I had another beer.
Friday morning the boys headed out to the campground and got things set up
to cook "Barbara Lewis Hair Krispy Beaurehog" that night after the
concert. Donna and Dennis
arrived from Memphis, after a 12 hour drive and needed to rest their heads
somewhere, so they followed the boys. I whacked on my hair some since Terry had
started calling me "mullet head" and became confused at the clothes I
packed - I was so ready… ready
to go to the concert at 11am. We were to meet other folks in Kalamazoo at 4:00 and
were all hyped
up for all the new faces. We finally made it to K-zoo about
5pm.
As we passed the State theatre, John Prine had just gotten out of an SUV and
was heading toward stage door, carrying bags and passing papers, I whistled (half
expecting him to turn around and look for me like my husband and kids have been
trained to do) but he continued to scurry on. For a brief moment I thought
about heading toward the theatre also to… to…. and that's about as much as I
thought about it. We entered the box office, picked up show flyers and tried to
get the advertising posters for his show, unfortunately it must have been the
millionth time they had been asked, and they sort of laughed us out the door.
Our small group stepped inside the Olde Peninsula Brew Pub and where Jon and KathyO were
bellied up to the bar with drinks and grub. Grabbing a couple of
tables we sat down to enjoy the rest
of the evening. 
Joining us immediately were Mike and Pam from
Kalamazoo, a fun (and hard-working) couple. A tall good looking man with a killer smile
came with our appetizers - it had to be that
Canadian, Ralph Hale. It was a thrill to meet him after writing to him for so
long, he just radiated an energy with that wonderful smile of his. We
spent the next few minutes getting to know each other taking pictures and when the
Wisconsin Burly boys: Crusher and Eddy and the Lawton crew arrived on the scene. The excitement was
building as we mingled, and overflowed outside, anxious to get to the show…
time just wasn't passing fast enough.
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