MY DAD'S DESK

Hello neighbor. Glad you stopped by.

After my sister and I grew up and married we left the farm. After my Grandmother had passed away, Mom and Dad decided to sell the house that he built and move into the old farm house. When you went up the front steps, across the porch and entered the house, right there in the corner was my Dad's desk.  I have no idea where that desk came from or how old it is now, but it was just my Dad's desk.

Dad was still doing his musical stuff, a dance band, and sometimes playing in a church somewhere. But mostly he would be sitting there with a ball point pen in his hand. It is hard to believe that Dad wrote every note on every piece of sheet music  paper for every tune that the band played and the arrangement for every instrument that was in the band.

There were great big thick green note books in piles all around his desk. The note books could never be closed because there were so many sheets of music in each one you could not snap the rings closed to close the cover. But the guys always manged to be able to find the song they needed when Dad called out a song number at a dance somewhere.

Dad not only did all that writing for playing, but he also wrote a number of songs himself.  ''Taking my Time'' was the only song that he had published. I don't think he had any others copyrighted.  He wrote one called "Listen Little Fellow" but never got around to get it published. I have copies of it in his stuff that I have saved. He wrote a very nice song that I sang a number of times at churches. It is called "I've Got A Friend".

I don't know how many of you might be aware that the 23rd Psalm has been put to music by a number of writers. As far as I know none of them follow the words exactly as they are in the Book of Psalms.  Dad put it to music word for word just as it is in the King James Bible. Dad had a way of  using notes in unusual ways and sometimes his music is not as easy to play or sing. I have sung that one also in a number of churches.

Dad wrote a special song he dedicated to our son, Albert, for his wedding. It was called "Take My Hand". He wrote a cover for it that said, " To Al and Linda from Gramp with Love, Your very own wedding song." I sang that at their wedding.  That is a nice memory to share and keep.

His biggest song hit was one he wrote for the State of Maine Bicentennial celebration. It is called, "Maine Bicentennial March" original arrangement - Music and Lyrics by Foster Beach as rendered by the Bank of Maine Bicentennial singers and the University of Maine Bicentennial Band. I love the words to this song and have sung it a number of times. That song was played all over the state by various bands.

 I suppose there are others that I do not know about or have found. I just know that he was always sitting at his desk and with pen in hand writing notes, filling up pages and pages of sheet music papers.

That desk know sits in our daughter's office at Liberty University, Lynchburg, VA where she is a professor of 18th century English Literature. So the desk is still being used for good writing.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope you will again some time soon.

I'M KILLED!

Hello Neighbor, thanks for stopping by.

I was thinking back to my days on the farm and remembered something that happened many years ago.  A farm is a place where accidents could easily happen.  Looking back, I remember the time I got my arm caught in the ringer of the old washer machine.  It could have been more serious, but I ended up with a bulge on the inner side of my left arm. But things could have been worse.

Than there was the time that we kids were playing in the attic of the farm house and there is no floor there, just a few planks to walk  on.  Well, one of the boys stepped off the plank and his foot went through the ceiling into the kitchen below.  Thankfully, it didn't go all the way through or he would have landed with a thud on the kitchen floor. That would have probably been a more serious situation.

Then I remember a time when some of the kids down the road were up and we were playing in the hay loft of the barn.  Well, there is a beam that crosses the barn and it is very, very high. We were always walking across that beam. Again no one fell from up there,I don't think. But we did have a girl that slid somehow off the hay loft and landed on the barn floor.  I don't remember that she was hurt very much.

Then there was the time that my mother was milking and tending to the cows and one of them tossed her head up and caught Mom just above one eyebrow. She was lucky that it was not her eye.  Mom had to have a few stitches and had a few headaches for awhile.  Again, it could have been a whole lot worse.

But the thing that happened to my Dad could have been the worst of all.  Dad was in the field across the road with the tractor.  He had a kid helping him. He came from way across our woods and on the highway that went into the town of Wayne.  He was sitting in the driver's seat on the tractor.  Dad was standing just behind the front wheel showing this boy something.  I don't know what happened, but the tractor suddenly went forward, knocked my father down and the big wheel went across his chest and just missed my father's head.  The boy jumped off the tractor and took of pell mell through the woods and headed home.  My mother and I heard my father hollering, "I'm killed, I'm killed," as he came running from the field ,up the road and to the house. Obviously he was'n t killed with all the noise he was making.  Thankfully he was not hurt either. At least as far as we could tell. We believe that it was  because the ground there was very soft and Dad's body was cushioned by that. So we took off in the car to get to the kid's house so he wouldn't scare his mother to death.  So everything had turned out not so bad in all these situations.

I, of course, just know that God was sitting up there watching all these things that were just about to happen and he sent an angel to help it from getting too serious.
Well thanks for stopping by and hope you will again soon.

DANCING TALES

Hello neighbor, glad you stopped by.

 Dad put together a small dance band called” Foster Beach and the Dancemasters”.  He began playing at dance halls around the different towns.  These were real dance halls.   Some were quite elaborate, some were just a large building especially  made for dancing and some were real barns that were  fixed to be a dance hall. My sister and I got big enough so we could go along sometimes to join in the dancing. We would dance together and have a great time, waltzing? (trying) jitterbugging and whatever else the band would play. As we grew older we began to get asked to dance by fellows or relatives. These dance halls did not allow alcoholic beverages inside, but I am sure there was some out in the cars.  One of the best things at the dances were the hot dogs and cold drinks.  It seemed that hot dogs always tasted better at the dance.

There are some stories that go along with attending these dances. I will share a few that I can remember. After the dance is over, we had to wait around for the musicians to get  their instruments packed and Dad had all the music to  pack up, too. I remember one night as I was sitting along the bench around the wall of the room, that I noticed something shining under the bench across the room.  So I went to check it out. It was a diamond ring! I gave it to the people managing the hall. I think they knew the woman who had lost it. So I was glad that I found it.

One night as we were driving to the dance hall, the road to the town was flooded.  Of course there was no one with a cell phone in their pocket so we waited.  Dad figured someone from the hall would come once they learned that the road was flooded. Sure enough some people showed up with a boat or two to get us and the instruments and music across. Then we would have to be driven to the hall. And after the dance, the process was reversed.

Another night we were almost home when Dad saw something in the middle of the road. He stopped the car and got out to check it out.  It was a baby fox. We figure that the mother must have been killed. So he picked it up and we took it home.  In our house the stairs to go up to the bedrooms went up about four steps, then a platform, left,  and up the rest of the steps.  In that area under the platform, Mary and I used to use it as a play room. So we fixed that up for the fox. We kept it until it was big enough to take out into the woods and let it go.

I guess the one that takes the cake, this was after I grew up and had left home, Dad was having one of his bouts with tonsillitis. He never went to a doctor but this night he stopped at the local old fellow who had been doctoring in Winthrop for many years.  He needed something to help his throat because he had to blow the trombone all evening.  Well, the doctor handed Dad a few pills and told him to take these. Well, generally they mean a couple every few hours, but Dad took them all. The Doctor wasn’t sure what to do. When he asked Dad why he took them all, Dad said ,”You gave them to me and said to  take them, so I did.” Well, the doctor didn’t have a solution so Dad paid and left for the dance. Said he never had another bout of tonsillitis.

Well guess that tells the story about dance halls, good music and lots of dancing.

Hope you will stop by again for another little chat.