In the meantime

Music City USA Under a Blanket of White

NASHVILLE - We arrived here last night for the National Religious Broadcasters Convention which begins Sunday at the Gaylord Opryland, and we apparently brought the snow with us.  The whiteout conditions we experienced yesterday in Kentucky arrived here in full force around 7:00 pm as we were walking down Broadway.  We stopped off in Ernest Tubb's record store and then made our way down to Big River for dinner.  By the time we left 90 minutes or so later, the snowstorm was so intense there was lightning accompanying it.

Nashvillians are about as adept as Atlantans are at handling snow, which is to say they stink at it.  The streets were empty except for a occasional car or truck you would see sliding toward you.  (We were in an Audi equipped with Quattro, which gets high marks from me for keeping us between the white lines, at least those you could see.)  I-40 was closed in both directions because of a nine car pile up, so we had to make our way back to the hotel on secondary roads which were rapidly becoming difficult to navigate.

We got back to the hotel in one piece, although we did have to dodge one Dodge truck (hence the name, I suppose) that was coming down the hill sideways toward us.  Bubba don't do snow apparently, and Bubba also don't understand that it takes BOTH four wheel drive AND common sense to drive safely in heavy snow.

The NRB Convention should be interesting.  At it's core, the NRB represents and exists for mostly traditional TV and Radio broadcasters.  That means we are a new media company at an old media event.  Multicast is sharing a booth with Adobe.  Our partnership with them has been mutually beneficial to both companies in the deployment of live Flash. Adobe has embraced Vidego because it combines ease of use with powerful CDN delivery of video content.

One of the rewarding things for me about working for Multicast has been to see some of the church media market be on the leading edge of new media technology.  We've noticed the NRB folks have been a little slow to embrace new media, but that is somewhat understandable since they are so heavily invested in more traditional broadcast technologies.

It will be interesting to see the blend of new vs. old media at this year's convention.

Hope Springs Eternal

ST.LOUIS - It is a rabid baseball's fan's dream.  My room at the St. Louis Hilton at the Ballpark overlooks the new Busch Stadium.  It's a beautiful park, designed in the style of Camden Yards and Turner Field.  The Cards moved in here for the 2006 season.  The room itself is decorated with framed photos of Cardinal players of old like Rogers Hornsby, Stan Musial, Enos Slaughter, and the 1934 Gashouse Gang, along with modern day icons like Lou Brock, Bruce Suter, Ozzie Smith and Mark McGwire.

There's something strange about looking at an empty baseball park covered with a layer of snow.  I am well aware that as I write this the Cards, along with the rest of their MLB counterparts, are in spring training. "Grapefruit League" preseason play is now underway, which means opening day is just a few short weeks away.  But opening the curtains in my room this morning and looking out at Busch Stadium, it feels like baseball season is a long way away.

There is a reason baseball is called America's National Pastime.  The baseball season is a 165 game marathon, not the quick sixteen-game sprint of the NFL.  The season stretches from Spring until Fall, providing ample opportunities for teams and individuals to prove what they are made of.

At the end of the day, baseball is a game about hope.  I was in college before I learned that the phrase "hope springs eternal in the human breast" was actually written by Alexander Pope. It was just quoted in Thayer's classic "Casey at the Bat." 

Hope springs eternal.  That phrase applies so perfectly to baseball.  Every year, no matter how dismal the year before might have been, diehard fans look at the season ahead and think, "This will be be the year!"  (Isn't that right, Cubbies fans?  Hehehehe...)

The 1991 Atlanta Braves went from worst to first.  The year before, they were in the cellar of the National League's Western Division, and they won it the following year.  It is precisely that kind of outcome that every baseball fan is looking for from their team at the start of each new year. 

Oh, there are those who would tell you that Braves fans were surprised by the dramatic turnaround in 1991, but those folks don't know baseball fans very well.  At the start of the 1991 season, we were confident that would be the year the club's fortunes would change.

But, I must hasten to add, we were also convinced of that at the start of the 1990 season and it didn't happen. Ditto 1989.  And 1988.  And 1987...  You get the picture.

As Christians we also embrace the concept of hope.  But hope in a biblical sense is different from the "hope that springs eternal" for baseball fans.  The hope I have that the Braves will win the World Series this year is not the same as the hope I have in Christ.  Hope in the baseball sense is - let's be honest here - little more than wishful thinking.  My hope in Christ, on the other hand, is a settled assurance.  It is a hope that does not disappoint.  (Romans 5:5)

The difference lies in what that hope is founded in.  My hopes for the Braves rest in the abilities of men... very gifted, very talented men, but men nonetheless.  They might get hurt, their bats might all grow cold, all the breaks might go against them.  That hope is far from a sure thing.

But as for my hope of heaven, that hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness; I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name.

Baby It's Cold Outside

MINNEAPOLIS, MN - A few summers ago we were traveling out west by van, which, parenthetically, is my favorite way to get from point A to point B because you don't miss all of the great stuff along the way. We left El Paso, Texas that morning and headed toward California. As we passed through Arizona and New Mexico we noticed the temperature readout in the overhead display kept going higher and higher until it said 105°.  About that time we needed to stop for gas and, well, you know, the call of nature. 

When we left El Paso, it was probably in the 70s and for the entire morning the air conditioner in the van kept it a pleasant 72° inside. When we opened the car door, it was literally as if we had stepped into an oven.  I remember making a mental note that the next time someone from the west said, "But it's a DRY heat..." I was going to slap them upside the head.

Today I am experiencing the polar (and I mean that in both senses of the word!) opposite.  When I left Atlanta this morning it was in the 40s and pleasant.  Today the high in Minneapolis is expected to be 2°.  No, that is not a typing error... two degrees above zero!

I'm sure at sometime in my distant past I experienced temperatures in this range.  I did, after all, spend the first eight years of my life in New York.  But my body has long since forgotten what that feels like and certainly wouldn't register it as anything approaching "normal."

Prior to today, the coldest I ever remember being was a couple of years ago in Lower Manhattan.  It was about 12° that morning and We were walking in the Financial district.  The wind coming in off the Hudson River put the wind chill factor in a range that would make Nanook of the North seek shelter.

That doesn't even compare to the cold that welcomed me to the land of 10,000 lakes and Jesse Ventura this morning.  One lady stepped off the plane and into the jetway and immediately said, "Holy icicles, Batman!"  We all laughed.  And the condensation from our laughs immediately froze and crumbled to the ground.   OK, I'm exaggerating. But not much.

I couldn't help but wonder if folks up here make excuses to pretend that the cold isn't really cold like the folks out west do with the "it's a dry heat" fairy tale.  What would they say?  "It's a dry cold?" "It's a warm cold?" Or perhaps, "It's a wet cold?" (followed of course with the obligatory, "don'tcha know" which is the Minnesota equivalent of "y'all.")

My reply is it is a cold cold.  A cold, cold, cold cold!  The next time a Northerner says we Southerners are wimps, I promise I will heartily agree,  The folks who live up here are made of sterner stock than I.  My hat would be off to you, but then my head would freeze.

In case you were wondering, the low here tonight is supposed to go down to -13°.  I can assure you, I will not be outdoors after the sun goes down this evening!

Jekyll Island getaway

Jekyll Island, GA -- This patch of land springing out between the ocean and the Intercoastal Waterway is referred to as "Georgia's Jewel."  In its history it has been a colonial outpost, a plantation for an expatriot French nobleman, home of the most exclusive club in the world, an abandoned millionaire ghost town, and now a unique tourist destination.

Jekyll Island is only nine miles from end to end and these days it is easily accessible from the mainland via a modern causeway.  There are reminders on the island of each of the periods in it's history.  On the north end of the island are the ruins of the Horton House, named after it's first owner, Major William Horton, successor to James Oglethorpe as the leader of the Georgia colony.  Horton built the house around 1740 out of tabby, a local construction material made of sea shells, lime, sand and water.  After Horton died in 1748, the house was vacant until it came into the possession of the DuBignon family. Christophe Poulain DuBignon had amassed a fortune and retired to his country estate in Brittany, only to be flee to America during the French Revolution.  DuBignon came into possession of "Jekyl" Island (the second "L" wasn't added until the early 1900s). 

For the next 100 years, Jekyll was in the hands of five generations of the DuBignon family.  Just 50 yards or so from the house ruins is the DuBignon cemetery, where three of the family members (and two people unrelated to the family) are buried.

In 1896, John DuBignon sold Jekyll Island for $125,000 to a group of 53 investors that included Marshall Field, Henry Hyde, J.P. Morgan, Joseph Pultizer and William K. Vanderbilt.

This group wanted to create a winter retreat for themselves and their families that would combine utter seclusion with every luxury and amenity imaginable.  The result was the Jekyll Island Club, which for a half a century was the most exclusive club in the world. It's membership list was a who's who of America's wealthy elite at the turn of the century: Morgan, Rockefeller, Astor, Pulitzer, Vanderbilt, Macy, Kellogg, Goodyear, Sears, Whitney, Hunt and Heinz.

In 1907, the club hosted a secret meeting of the country's most influential banking leaders.  That meeting laid the groundwork for the Federal Reserve System which was put into place five years later.

The Great Depression even touched the very rich, and membership declined throughout the 1930s.  In the early 1940s, World War II brought not only a change in how wealth was perceived in America, but also the very real threat of German U-boats off the coast.  The club never reopened after the 1942 season. 

In 1947, in a move that rivals the acquisition of Manhattan Island for $24, the state of Georgia condemned Jekyll Island and bought it for $675,000.  It was at first slated to become a state park, but in 1950, an Association was formed to preserve the Island and run it less like a state park and more like a business venture. In the years since, the magnificent clubhouse and many of the "cottages" that were home to the Goodyear, Crane and Rockefeller families have been restored.  There are several that are yet to be restored - The Jekyll restoration project is one of the largest and most successful public/private partnerships ever.

Jekyll Island has just about everything I desire in a getaway location. It is uncrowded (you can walk for hundreds of yards on the beach in June without encountering another person), underdeveloped and rich with history. You can spend a day on a bike and explore the entire island (there's some 20 miles of bike paths).  The pace is slow, the people are incredibly friendly, the seafood is fabulous and the sunsets are magnificent.

Not to be missed: Dinner at Latitude 31 on the Jekyll Wharf, walk along the seawall in front of the clubhouse at sunset, biking around the island, walking on the beach, especially among the driftwood on the North Beach, the Art Gallery in the Goodyear Cottage, and Faith Chapel with it's signed Tiffany stained glass window.

Walking in Memphis

Then I'm walking in Memphis
Walking with my feet ten feet off of Beale
Walking in Memphis
But do I really feel the way I feel

I took an hour for lunch today and just like the song says I went walking in Memphis. 

For a musician, this town is full of history.  They say the blues was born on Beale, two blocks over from the Peabody Hotel where I'm staying. After decades of decay and decline, Beale Street is alive once again with blues clubs and restaurants.  It was here in 1909 that W.C. Handy wrote the first blues song, a campaign theme for the mayor called Boss Crump Blues.  After the campaign, Handy renamed the song Memphis Blues.  Handy would go on to write standards such as St. Louis Blues and, of course, Beale Street Blues ("If Beale Street could talk, If Beale Street could talk, a million married men would take their bed up and walk...")

I popped into B.B. King's blues club—it was way too early for anything to be happening there—just to say I've been there.  B.B King's real name is Riley (what a great name!) B. King.  Shortly after arriving on Beale Street he became known as the "Beale Street Blues Boy" which was shortened to "Blues Boy" and then to "B.B."  Just down the road from the Peabody on Union Avenue is Sun Studios, where Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, and some fellow named Elvis got their starts and recorded their early hits.  It's a little hole in the wall on the corner, really, but it's chock full of music history. 

Saw the ghost of Elvis on Union Avenue
Followed him up to the gates of Graceland
Then I watched him walk right through

Then there's the Peabody itself.  The Peabody Hotel has been an integral part of Memphis for more than 100 years.  The original Peabody opened in 1869, and the current incarnation at 149 Union Avenue opened its doors in 1925.  The Peabody is best known for the ducks that for most of the last 75 years have marched in and out of the hotel lobby (in at 11 am, out at 5 pm) via elevator and red carpet from their rooftop Duck Palace to the marble fountain in the Grand Lobby to the strains of Sousa's King Cotton March.  Much more than just a novelty, this hotel has long been a centerpiece of southern culture.  Historian David Cohn (as far as I know no relation to Marc Cohn, the artist who wrote and performed "Walking in Memphis") wrote "The Mississippi Delta begins in the lobby of The Peabody Hotel… If you stand near its fountain in the middle of the lobby… ultimately you will see everybody who is anybody in the Delta…"

They've got catfish on the table, They've got gospel in the air
And Reverend Green be glad to see you when you haven't got a prayer
But boy you've got a prayer in Memphis

The national Holy Convocation of the Church of God in Christ is here in Memphis this week, and there really is gospel in the air— and I'm not just talking about music, although there's lots of that here this week.  There's gospel in the air in the way these dear folks conduct themselves, practicing what they preach in their speech and conduct.  They've made me feel welcomed and loved.

Now Muriel plays piano every Friday at the Hollywood
And they brought me down to see her
And they asked me if I would do a little number,
And I sang with all my might
She said, "Tell me are you a Christian child'
And I said "Ma'am I am tonight"

Then I'm walking in Memphis...