Beep

From the inside of a downtown building, I can hear the hum and murmur of construction equipment hard at work. When they back up, you can hear the "beep beep beep"... and in the middle of all the sound and traffic and hazy afternoon it always sounds like the organ intro to Black Magic Woman.

Little Country Church

Spare me your motivational talks. Spare me your antibacterial soap. Spare me your tubs of ready-made supermarket macaroni salad, and just give me back my little country church, where we were so hokey that I really thought I was the cat's meow when cruising down the street on a tractor as a 10-year old, as old men drove by and saluted. Me and my sister looked forward all year to playing on the metal frames that my family set up for the game booths for the annual festival. We swung on them like a jungle gym for as long as we were allowed. And we were innocent and as real as the ground under your feet.

I remember my grandma peeling cucumbers in the church garage and I remember my dad being so happy about the way the organ music just filled you up on a summer Sunday afternoon as people processed out of Mass. And I remember times when we didn't have any music, and some woman up front would just start singing something a capella, not fancy, not flashy, not anything technically good, but it hits you deeper than where music normally goes.


Looking back now, that little mountain church house,
Has become my life's corner stone,
It was there in that little mountain church house,
I first heard the word I've based my life upon.

--Little Mountain Church House, Ricky Skaggs