The past few months I have been daydreaming of sunny Cancun, Mexico during my hard workdays on the farm. I was fortunate to have a vacation planned with friends to a resort. This was a first to me, never had I been on a long beach vacation. As a farmer, it’s all work all the time and I feel guilty when I’m not. As vacation neared, I couldn’t help but think of the song, Some Beach by Blake Shelton. Now after coming back, I think about it even more. There really is “a big umbrella casting shade over an empty chair. Palm trees are growing and warm breezes blowing.”
Today even more so I went to the dentist to get some cavities fixed, I delayed it due to farm work of course. I sang the song to myself while in the dentist chair. While life isn’t perfect everyday, I was thankful to see a tropical paradise. I want to create a life I don’t need a vacation from, but I do love imagining myself in peaceful places around the world when the chaos at home is too much. Here are some pictures we took on the beach. This was a fun memory I will think about, especially on those not so fun days.
Country music artist, 
Young told a story about attending his first “Number One” party in Nashville. Country music is the only genre in which the performing rights organizations, the companies that make sure songwriters are paid for the usage of their music, regularly have parties to celebrate songwriters and their number one songs. In Nashville these parties happen almost weekly.
While at the party, Young heard a man tell a story of how he started in songwriting. Him and his wife were 18 years old with an 18 month old child. They didn’t have much money, but moved to Nashville so he could be a songwriter. Young went on to tell the story to the festival audience, “On that day he was telling that story, he was accepting an award for his 11th number one as a song writer. He gave her all the credit and called her his beautiful believer. When I heard that story I thought, I don’t know the rules in this town. I don’t know if I have to give him song writing credit for stealing his story and writing a song about it, but if we’re going to write a song about it we are going to tell the story exactly the way we heard it. This song is called Beautiful Believer.”
Young went on to share how it’s been 20 years now since the man started songwriting and he wrote a song about his wife. Young said to the audience, “Now men, if we’re being honest, we know we’re really bad at expressing our feelings. Here’s the thing, it’s not because we don’t want to say how we feel, we are wired very differently. The best way we’ve come up with to make our women feel sexy, unfortunately, is saying ‘Baby, you look so sexy.’ Cause we’re smooth like that (laughter). So I heard this song, and I knew their relationship. He found a way to tell her that everything she does all day, from putting her makeup on in the mirror to walking down the hallway is sexy to him.” Makin Me Say is the only song on Young’s record he didn’t write, but recorded for this reason.
Later at the concert we confirmed it was him at the restaurant. I saw him by the stage listening to his opening act and pointed out my “We can blame it on the wine” t-shirt. He smiled at me, but that was the extent of our connection. I was so mad at myself for not talking to him at the restaurant. As the night went on, despite the drunken college age people bumping into me, I came to realize I am still blessed to be here enjoying the night with Ryan. I am so thankful he came with me.
When I hear a song before I watch the music video the artist has made for it, I create my own music video in my mind. When I first heard “Dirt On My Boots” by Jon Pardi, I imagined myself working hard all day on the farm. Covered in dirt, dust and pig poop. Despite having a rough day, I rush into the house and get cleaned up then glammed up real quick so I can hit the town. I imagine dancing the night away in a honky tonk, having worked hard and ready to play hard.
When I watched Jon Pardi’s music video to the song, I found myself lost in trying to figure out the story. I expected him to show a guy working hard in the field, picking up a hot girl in his pickup truck and whisking her away to a honky tonk for some “dirty dancing and blue collar romancing.” Instead he showed himself getting cleaned up ready to sing to a rowdy crowd interchanging with a beautiful girl riding on her horse. 
I felt lost in the video trying to figure out the connection with the girl. It didn’t make sense to me until the end of the video when she got cleaned up and glammed up then made her way into the same scene as Jon. She walked away with him when he finished the song. It was a good twist to the story and now I will probably imagine this scene when I hear the song.
An artist should take their music videos seriously. They are powerful in storytelling and creating the scenes that play in a person’s imagination when they hear the song. There have been times, I like a song more after seeing the music video and times I don’t. Your imagination is a wonderful thing. It can take you away and show you a preview of life’s coming attractions if you choose to believe in it. Music can be an escape and while life isn’t always as glamours as a music video, you can find happiness being lost in your imagination and then experiencing the artist perform in real life.
“I grew up in a small town in Orange Grove, Texas in a farming family. In my small town a lot of people said things wouldn’t happen for me. When I joined FFA it became a family very quickly. My brother was a state officer in Texas. Watching him, seeing how everyone treated him and the way everyone came together was pretty inspiring. There’s very few things when your living out your teenage years that instill things in you that you feel are going to live with you the rest of your life.”
“Growing up, I thought FFA was strictly for the farmers. I learned very quickly that it wasn’t just about the farmer. It’s about instilling good things in kids. The people in FFA became some of my best friends and have stuck around with the longest. There’s a guy who works with the Texas FFA that taught me a lot of things and became one of my best friends. I learned a lot of lessons and learned people in the FFA stick together and is something that will follow you the rest of your life. I want you (FFA members) to be proud of what you’re doing and to be part of this organization. I promise you and tell you it (FFA) is one of the best organizations on the planet.”
“I grew up in a family of farmers and FFA taught me those people matter. Those people are the reason we have food on the table, the reason we get to live each day. Those people are out there busting their ass for me and you to put food on the table. Go around to all these booths (in the expo) and colleges and talk to the people. You will learn things here. I never got to go to the National FFA Convention; this is my first time. You will learn things that will live with you forever and you will learn exactly why you are apart of this organization. It’s about making friends that are going to live with you the rest of your life. This is the best organization you could be apart of so be proud of what you’re doing and spread it to your friends because you are cool being apart of this. Thanks for coming out to see us and to Dodge for letting us sing on this stage, a truck bed, how much cooler can it possibly get.”
“About six years ago I moved up to be a song writer and an artist. I started writing for a company owned by Roy Orbison. There was a big band in Nashville that cut ten of my songs on a record. I went into write one day and I thought I’m just going to stay home and not write a song today. I was two months from living in my car. I bought way too much because I thought I was going to become and instant millionaire. That did not happen, all those songs got cut. But this one-day a buddy threw an idea out to me, so I grabbed a cup of coffee and walked out on the loading dock and started thinking about things. In about five to ten minutes I had written this chorus, ‘Take it on back, take it on back, take it on back to where the grass is greener.’”