Bozeman, MT – “Isn’t it Nice to be Home Again” – Brick Breeden Fieldhouse -Sept. 19, 2001
During sound check, Dad decides I should sing “Sign of Rain,” and then “Close Your Eyes” with him, as an encore. I’m over the moon.
It’s thrilling to be on stage with him – the juxtaposition of being recognized as a “grown-up” singer in front of all those people while feeling like a little girl next to him. It’s a meditation to be on his stage – between the lights and shadows and bows and harmonies and butterflies. I love my Dad.
After the last song, we jump on his tour bus and begin our journey south toward Sun Valley. The bus smells like my childhood.
There’s Mexican takeout on the counter and we make up songs about chicken enchiladas as we sip Stewarts Ginger Beer and brace ourselves as the bus wags its way through the parking lot, dodging cars and fans. Dad has a PayDay candy bar, he’s pilfered from the kraft services table at the gig and offers to share it with me. Arnold McCuller emerges from the back of the bus already in his pajama bottoms. We curl up with the rest of the band, on the cold leather couches and watch “Vampire in Brooklyn.”
When I feel my head nod without my consent for the third time, I excuse myself to turn in for the night. I grab the bunk above pops. It’s the one he cleared for me before the show but already it’s full again with his stuff — half-empty water bottles, a single sock, a medicine kit from the last hotel, and his favorite green sweatpants. Before I nod off, I hear him snoring below and think to myself between the bump and the brake, “Isn’t it nice to be home again.”
Hi Sally,
More vivid imagery: I can smell the Mexican takeout! I can only imagine that traveling with your dad is a whole different tour experience. He has earned that level of comfort many many many times over by comforting so many others with his songs. What an amazing feeling to know how many MILLIONS of people love your dad from afar, but only you *really* know him and receive his love in return. I’ll bet Arnold had stylish and colorful pajamas!
Although there are no similarities between your dad’s work and my dad’s, the “take your daughter to work” experience might have some commonalities: like getting to see how many other people respect your dad, like being so proud of him and his accomplishments, like seeing what your dad has “built” (in my case, dams and canals that bring water to California and other parts of the west).
Thank you for this – makes me say a prayer of thanks for both my dad and yours.
I love that you see the commonalities of our dads. Dads are the best.
So, I’m reading this at 6am, Saturday morning, with tears streaming down my face. My whole world is filled with such precious “Dad memories.”
Dad was a Physics professor at Montana State in Bozeman, until he took a job as a high school teacher in Bozeman, MT, to be closer to his parents, so he could care for his dad. I moved to Kalispell to care for first Mom, and now Dad. Full circle moments. Memories. Emotions spilling out of the corners of my eyes.
Thank you for your stories, Sally.
Great Falls. He left the U, and became a high school teacher 5 hours away to care for Grandpa.
God bless all the dad memories – the ones that teach, and comfort as well as the ones that stretch and grow us.