Once Upon a Farm

by Rory Feek

  Movies are the same way. I can’t begin to tell you how much Forrest Gump has impacted my life and my desire to live simpler, with more innocence and love. It doesn’t matter that he is a fictional character from a book and movie. It only matters that I saw him and I heard him do things that have inspired me.

  I believe that it’s the same way, actually, with Jesus. None of us have met Him. Only through the books in the New Testament and the story of His life and words. And from that, we are continually learning how to become better men and women and followers of Him.

  “You’re a soul man, Rory,” Harlan went on to say that day, with a smile on his face and a burning cigarette in his hand. I wasn’t sure how to respond . . . part of me wondering if Harlan’s seventy-plus years were catching up with him. I guess he could see my wheels spinning and the confusion in my mind. “What I mean is that you write from your soul, son.”

  Then he took another drag from his cigarette and went on to tell me the story about when he wrote “I Fall to Pieces” for Patsy Cline. I had heard it before. A dozen times probably, but I acted as if I was hearing it for the first. And that story turned into a Buck Owens story, then one about listening to his hero Ernest Tubb play the Opry on the radio when he was a boy growing up somewhere outside of Detroit.

  I loved Harlan’s stories, and I so wish he were still around so he could tell them to me a dozen times more. Or so my kids could gather at his feet and listen the way I got to so many times. Harlan passed away in 2002, but he left behind thousands of songs filled with characters who have gone on to teach countless people about life.

  Each one of them nothing more than . . . three chords and the truth.

  I Hold the Pen

  . . . but God writes the song.

  It’s true. At least when the song is great—when it’s special . . . it’s all Him. I’m just holding the pen. God’s doing the heavy lifting.

  A year or so after moving to Nashville, I had a songwriting appointment.

  I opened my spiral notebook and found a pencil as Austin Cunningham, the writer I was meeting with, reached into his bag and pulled out a beautiful leather-bound journal that seemed to magically open to the next empty page he was looking for. I pretended not to be paying any attention to it, but I watched as he wrote what I thought was going to be his name on the top right side of the page and then mine as the cowriter he was working with (pretty standard practice for writers), but that wasn’t what he wrote. Instead, the first name he put on the page was “God.” Then below that was his name. Then mine.

  Hmmm . . . , I thought. Wonder why he’s doing that? We spent the day working on a song together and had a wonderful time. I can’t remember what we wrote, but I do remember feeling that he was an anointed writer and man. Filled with the Spirit in a way that I was not. Born and raised Catholic, he was a kind, gentle person with an incredibly strong faith in God that showed in just about everything he did and said.

  I wasn’t there yet. I was still a few years away. But I was searching. Even if it was only in my time frame.

  The next writing appointment I had, I opened my spiral notebook the same way I always had, but this time . . . the first name and thing I wrote on the page was “Jesus.” I figured if Austin had God, then maybe Jesus was available for the claiming. And so from that moment on, until pretty much now, I had a cowriter that I brought to every writing appointment I’ve ever had. Whether my other cowriter knew it or not.

  Through the years Austin and I have become good friends. Joey and I recorded his song “Made to Last” on one of our albums a few years ago. But I don’t believe I’ve ever asked him about his notebook or God being in the top right-hand corner of the page. And in the same way no one has really ever asked me why Jesus is my cowriter. Actually, my daughter Heidi saw it on my lyric sheet years ago and asked me about it and has long since been aware that I believe that’s where some of the magic comes from. It has made a difference in my songwriting and in my musical career. Mostly because it is there as a reminder of where the songs come from. Where whatever gift I have has come from and where all the credit for anything I am part of making should go.

  To Him. The One who truly writes the songs.

  I have carried that concept on to pretty much every kind of story-telling that I do, whether it’s writing a book, like this one or my first one, This Life I Live, or a film we’re making or a blog post I’m writing. I am a part of the creative process, and I’ve done my homework. I know the craft of storytelling well. But He is the great storyteller, and all the great ideas and lines come from Him. Anything mediocre or so-so is definitely from me.

  The magic isn’t just in writing the words God or Jesus, though, it’s in believing that with His help anything is possible. That He can take average talent like ours and turn it into a piece of art that wins Grammy Awards and impacts millions of lives. He can do anything. It doesn’t mean that He will, but He could . . . and the belief and the hope in Him is where the magic lies.

  Though I have recently started trying to do some songwriting again, I’m a long way from being back in full swing. It’s been a few years for me since I’ve done any songwriting or even wanted to, and I’m just taking baby steps so far. But even that is exciting. Because I know what can come from a blank page. A blank page that is filled with His Spirit.

  Video Rewind

  Watching my kids when they were kids.

  Heidi and Hopie were about six and eight years old, and we were living in an apartment complex on the west side of Nashville. It was before my songwriting career had cranked up, and I was making a living by traveling back and forth to Texas playing shows. A neighbor and friend named Buffy Lawson offered to watch the kids one weekend while I had to be gone. But she did much, much more than just babysit my girls. She turned that weekend into a treasure.

  Buffy was a wonderful singer who had moved to Nashville in search of fame and fortune like a thousand other people in the early to mid ’90s, including me. She and I had written a few songs together, and she had become a sweet friend to me and to my girls. So her offer to watch them wasn’t just a blessing to me, it was exciting for the kids. She was fun and had lived in Las Vegas at one time and had a closetful of show clothes. Frilly things the kids could play dress-up in. I knew they were in good hands, so that Friday morning, I kissed them goodbye and headed to the airport.

  The weekend was pretty uneventful for me. I played an early show at Risky’s BBQ in Sundance Square in downtown Fort Worth on Friday evening and then a later show at the Red Goose—a historical old shoe store that had been converted into a restaurant and honky-tonk. I played another show there on Saturday night and the next morning caught the JetBlue flight home to Nashville.

  When I got to Buffy’s apartment, the kids were grinning ear to ear. Sitting on the couch with their stuff in grocery bags, so excited to see me. But before we left, Buffy said they had something to show me.

  Buffy walked over to the TV and popped a VHS tape into the player, and the kids hopped on my lap as she pushed play. And for the next fifteen minutes, my little ones came alive on the big screen. While songs from the soundtrack of The Lion King played, Hopie and Heidi paraded in and out of Buffy’s living room in different dresses and hats, all of them way too big for their little bodies. Dancing and sashaying to the music and laughing and giggling . . . Heidi always on the beat and Hopie doing exactly what her big sister was doing, only a second or two behind her. It was precious. And just when I thought it couldn’t be any cuter, the music and dancing ended and the girls came on screen and one by one said, “Dad, I just wanted to tell you I love you so much and am so thankful for you. You’re the best dad a kid could ever have!”

  I melted.

  Actually, that’s what Heidi said. When Hopie’s time on camera came, through her toothless grin, she said, “Dad . . . I just want to thank you for whatever it is that you did for me,” along with a bunch of other things that had not much to do with me at all. And then I hear Buffy and Heidi say,
“Cut,” then tell her to thank me for whatever it is that she wants to thank me for . . . and, again, she says the same thing. It was so darn cute.

  Fast-forward twenty-five years. And if I thought it was cute then, it’s magical now. I didn’t grow up in a world of video cameras, so there’s nothing of me on video as a child. And, unfortunately, there’s not much of my girls on video either. Not because there couldn’t have been but because I just didn’t think to buy a camera and capture those moments. I could have, but I just didn’t.

  But, thankfully, Buffy did. Hopie gets nervous whenever we pull out the VHS tape with faded “B-H-H” written in Sharpie on it. She’s embarrassed by what she said and how she said it. Her little six-year-old speech impediment turning all the r’s into w’s. But I don’t think she realizes yet how special it is. And how special she is. How very special both she and Heidi are.

  I still cross paths with Buffy every now and then in Nashville and am always quick to hug her and thank her again and again for the gift she gave us. She didn’t have to do that, but she did. She turned a weekend of watching my little girls into a lifetime of watching “my little girls.”

  Daddy, What If?

  Like father . . . like daughters.

  Heidi and Hopie grew up around music.

  It was either being played at our house or in the car on a cassette tape or the radio, or we were somewhere watching or listening to people play. Even more so, they grew up listening to their father play music. From time to time they were even part of it.

  When we lived in Texas, I played a thousand shows for dozens of people. At least that’s how it felt. Sometimes there would be almost no one in the room, and sometimes there would be a decent number of folks listening or dancing. It wasn’t something I enjoyed doing at the time, but I realized later how important it was. For those songs to get inside of me and affect the songwriter I would become. But those songs were also getting inside the girls. They are the soundtrack to their lives or at least a big chunk of their early lives.

  Neither Heidi nor Hopie listen to much country music on the radio today. They are not necessarily big fans of it. But both of them know just about everything about the songs and artists and country music from the 1990s.

  When we moved to Nashville, I played songwriters’ nights all around town. At the Bluebird Cafe, the Boardwalk, Broken Spoke, and a dozen other places. A lot of the time there weren’t many more people in those rooms either. But the people who were in the room changed everything. Many of them became close friends and cowriters; some of them I’ve even written hit songs with through the years. A handful became famous singers themselves.

  And somewhere in the back of the room, or next to me inside a guitar case, would be Hopie sleeping. She was still small enough to fit inside, and she could drift off to sleep when she got tired. Heidi was drinking a Cherry Coke, soaking up every word and every line. She loved the music almost as much as I did. She does still in a lot of ways.

  But in the years before we moved to Nashville, the girls not only saw me on stage playing; from time to time they joined me. Especially Heidi. There were a few songs we would sing together, like “Don’t Cry Joni” by Conway Twitty and his daughter, and “Pretty Woman” (Hopie loved that one), but the one we loved to sing the most was “Daddy What If” by Bobby Bare and his son Bobby Bare Jr. Growing up as a little boy, I had heard that song on the radio and had sung it with my father, or at least tried, while sitting in the car next to him. It isn’t a song that my dad ever learned how to play, but I think he liked it, and I loved it. Even more so, I loved the idea of it.

  So when I had children of my own, they would sing it with me. On the wall in my office is a framed piece of paper with the lyrics for the song. I typed it out when Heidi was very small and with a crayon drew pictures of important lines . . . a “sun” for when she would sing about the sun shining, a “rain cloud” for when she would sing about the rain, and a “boat” for when she would sing about a boat. And so, before she could read, she learned to sing. She learned to sing with her father. And it wasn’t just cute . . . it was precious. And on top of that, it was a money maker.

  The most I would make in one evening playing for four hours was a hundred dollars. But I also got tips, and when Heidi and I would sing the song, even when she was only six or seven, the money would start rolling in. It wasn’t unusual for us to get three or four twenty-dollar bills in the tip jar after singing it. That made a big difference in our life.

  But the truth is, I didn’t have Heidi sing it because I wanted to make money; it was because I loved it so much. I loved what it said, and I loved singing with her and with Hopie. I’m sure Heidi still knows every single word even though she’s thirty-one years old now. And she remembers those times on stage with me and how people responded to her singing with me. I wish I had a video of those moments . . . just one of them.

  Something tells me that when little Indiana gets older, she, too, will be singing about the “sunshine” and the “rain” falling, but for her, it will probably be called “Papa What If.” And though there may not be tip jars, there will be people with their own “rain” falling from their eyes. Especially mine.

  Monday, Monday

  The start of a new week. A new everything.

  I love Mondays. Most people dread them. I’m always excited to see them come. It can be a Tuesday morning, and I’m already thinking about the coming Monday. It’s weird.

  But it’s because Monday is much more than just the start of another week for me. Mondays are the start of everything. They are the New Year’s Day of the seven-day week. When anything is possible. But you have to start then. You can’t start on a Wednesday or a Friday or even a Sunday. It has to be Monday. It’s the rule.

  But who made that rule? Where in the world did I get that idea and why has it stuck with me for so long? Monday is actually just another day. Maybe even a crappier one than many of the other days in the week. So why is it that I think it’s so special? Not sure. It just is.

  My kids are the same way, unfortunately. If you ever hear Heidi talk about starting a new diet or when she’s gonna make a change in her life . . . it’s gonna be on a Monday. Hopie is the same way, I think. Yep, they got it from me. And I got it from . . . well, I’m not sure where I got it from. It’s just one of those weird things that’s inside my head. Like how the number eight is better than other numbers. Or how white is my favorite color (even though people keep trying to tell me that white is not actually a color). Mondays are the day of fresh starts.

  I got a hunch that it’s a bunch of bullarkey. That it, of course, is just all in my head (and maybe a few million other people’s heads in the world), and any day of the week is, actually, just as good for changing. That what I’m really after is “a day”—a specified time to make a change. And not only to make it but believe it can happen, and, for some reason, I think Monday’s got magic in it. And because I think that . . . it has some. Big-time.

  I’ve changed lots of things on Mondays. Some have been small, like starting a workout program. And some tougher, like giving up coffee or alcohol. And, for some reason, if I start on a Monday . . . there’s about a gazillion times better chance that I’m gonna follow through. It’s ridiculous, I know. But the good kind of ridiculous. The kind that I think maybe I specialize in.

  Right now, it’s Wednesday in the late afternoon, and I’ve been trying to figure out a clear vision for a new project I’ve been working on for a couple of weeks. And though I’ve spent a good bit of time thinking ’bout it today and even making a few notes on my laptop . . . something inside is nudging me. Saying . . . You know better than this. You’re not going to find it this week. Gonna have to wait till Monday.

  Powerful little bugger, isn’t it? Somehow invades every part of my creativity and rains a lot of doubt on my parade. At least it does for six days a week, but come Monday, though, the confidence comes pouring out. And it works. Most of the time anyway. It’s crazy, I know. But the facts are the
facts.

  Recently, though, Mondays are starting to have their own little Monday requirements. It seems that starting something on a Monday is no longer good enough. Now, if I haven’t started it by about 7 a.m. on Monday morning, the day’s shot . . . and, subsequently, the whole week is shot with it. A couple of weeks ago I was gonna start a new routine for working out, and the plan was to start this past Monday. Well, when I got up on Monday morning, I made coffee and started folding laundry before the baby woke up and suddenly realized that it was a Monday. I looked at the clock and thought, Dang it. I blew it. It was almost 7 a.m. and too late on a Monday to start.

  And so it, too, will have to wait for next week. For Monday’s Monday. I better set a reminder on my phone so I don’t forget.

  Brilliant Limitations

  It’s our limitations that create our style.

  —Chuck Berry

  I am only a mediocre guitar player, and that is part of what makes me so good at what I do.

  When one area is weak, another area shines through. If I were an incredible player, my words would be less important. I think it is because of the weakness of some of my musical abilities that my lyrical abilities stand out. I am thankful for that.

  I’ve tried many times to learn to be a better guitar player. I bought some tutorial videos and even took a couple of lessons, but it didn’t help. My heart wasn’t in it.