I was listening to NPR’s All Songs Considered and it reminded me of a particular summer and the music that came with it.  In 1986 I was a sophomore in college and took a job at Mo Ranch.  Which is past Hunt, Texas – which you might otherwise think was the last thing on Earth if you were driving off the end.

We had 16 or so summer staff living in one large cabin.  I was working maintenance, groundskeeping, and life guard.  The schedule was: wake up, eat breakfast, labor harder than i ever have (leaving me at 165 lbs.), lunch, half the time: labor in the afternoon, the other half life guard, dinner, kill 6 hours before midnight and bed time.  We had no chaperones or house rules, we were all college kids able to patrol ourselves.  Yes, I could write a whole book about that summer, pre WWW, pre cell phone.  But for now, just the music.

I often spent time in a truck with one of the regular maintenance workers, i forget his name. [Edit: after chatting with a friend from that summer, we’ve decided: Richard.]  He also often spent time in the evenings at the low water crossings with us.  Almost every night included lots of beer, sometimes with a claw foot bath tub full of ice.  Usually with us hanging out in the water.  (We ran the water moccasins out the first week.)  Infrequently, I and one or two others would end up at his house.  He had a single cassette tape that had two albums on in, depending on mood it was on one side or the other. Continue reading →