Month: October 2019

The Tao of Q

The Tao of Q (except for monkeys)
originally posted July 11 2013
Aidan doesn’t really do much electronic communication. No facebook, not big on email. So you don’t get to hear the things he has to say. You miss a lot. So here is a little bit of the Tao of Q.
When Aidan was quite young he went to the Napa County Fair. His older brothers decided to spend the day with their dad in wine country. Aidan had a fun day; rides, exhibits, arcade games. He told his brothers all about it. They said they visited their father’s client as planned, at a vineyard, with an island in a lake that had a shipwreck and monkeys. That sounded pretty amazing and Aidan felt he had made the wrong choice.
Decades later, Aidan and I took a trip to Napa and drove through the wine country. I asked for recommendations on where to drop in – smaller places, with nice people who were enthusiastic about their farms. Aidan asked if there were any vineyards with lakes, perhaps a boat. Fortunately he never asked about monkeys.
One afternoon on a dirt road we saw a very large pond out past a tasting room. There was a small island in the pond. We walked around the far side of the pond and there was a boat, a sort of Chinese junk, leaning on its side. There were no monkeys. The folks at the vineyard said the boat had been there forever, they never remembered any monkeys.
Aidan was thrilled. He called his brothers. “I found the winery with the island and the shipwreck!” They had no idea what he was talking about. “Where you guys went when I went to the Napa County Fair.” They had gone on a boring trip with their father. They had missed the fair and had made up a fun story.
You can make your beliefs happen, will your desires into existence, create your own reality. Except for monkeys.
This month our desires become reality. We hit the road for a short tour playing lots of songs from the new CD. We are performing at the places we always wanted to play. We’ll be leading some workshops. It’s going to be fun. Hard to believe we are going to make the dream our reality. But there won’t be any monkeys.

Highlights of concerts and appearances

Acoustic Brew Concert Series, Lemont PA
Americana Community Music Association, Fort Myers FL
Arca Towers, Kinchicho Tokyo, Japan
Bach to Bluegrass Series, Hendersonville NC
Baton Rouge Library, Baton Rouge LA
Blue Note Cafe, Capetown South Africa
Bone Doc’s House Concert, Richardson TX
Central Florida Folk Concert Series, Orlando FL
Chesterfield Folk Club, Chesterfield UK
Christopher Street Coffeehouse, New York NY
Church Street Station, Orlando FL
Cooperstown Concert Series, Cooperstown NY
Cosmo’s, Shibuya Tokyo Japan
Deer Creek Coffeehouse, Darlington MD
Down East Folk Arts Society, New Bern NC
Devil Mountain Coffeehouse, Walnut Creek CA
The Evening Muse, Charlotte NC
Florida Folk Festival, White Springs FL
Friendship House Concerts, Pittsburgh PA
Falcon Ridge Folk Festival Emerging Artist Showcase, Hillsdale NY
Falkirk Folk Club, Falkirk Scotland
Fiddle and Bow Society, Winston-Salem NC
Focus Music, Alexandria VA
Glades Edge House Concerts, Sunrise FL
Green Swan Festival, Swannanoa NC
Historic Cooper’s House Concerts, Columbia MD
Horsham Folk Club, Horsham England
The Hoy at Anchor, Westcliff on Sea England
Isis Music Hall, Asheville NC
Kansas State Book Festival, Topeka KS
Kerrville Folk Festival, New Folk Showcase, Kerrville TX
Labyrinth Cafe, Ft. Lauderdale FL
Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile AL
Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, Barcelona Spain
New Haven Folk Consortium, New Haven CT
Open Door Coffeehouse, Arlington TX
Our Times Coffeehouse, Garden City NY
River Of Grass Cafe, Davie FL
Riverhawk Music Festival, Arcadia FL
Sandhill Stage Concert Series, Gainesville FL
Sarasota Folk Concert at the Sailing Squadron, Sarasota FL
South Downs Festival, Bogner Regis UK
South Florida Folk Festival, headliner! Ft. Lauderdale FL
Spanish River Library, Boca Raton FL
Star Folk Club, Glasgow Scotland
Susquehanna Folk Music Society, Lancaster PA
TEDXGreenville, Greenville SC
Thoreau Woods Concerts, Huntsville TX
Uncle Calvin’s, Dallas TX
Windsong House Concert, Arlington Texas
WFMT’s Folk Stage, Chicago IL