Runnin' Out of Memory

The Company We Keep,

Well, I think we just disagreed on some things, ... And, you know, I do have seniority.

You know, I used to listen to Bill Monroe on the Grand Ole Opry, ... But what got me was when my oldest brother got a Flatt and Scruggs record. I was about 11 at the time and, boy, when I heard Earl Scruggs, that was it. That turned a big old light bulb on upstairs. That's when I said, 'That's what I want to do.'

This kind of situation is something most people don't expect, ... I know I didn't expect it back when I was young. I just played because I enjoyed it. And when my sons were little, it never dawned on me that they would want to play music, too. I always had lots of cousins that wanted me to show them things on the guitar to play. But a week later, they would always be into something else. They forgot about the music. I thought that's how my sons would be. But they found the interest to stay in there with it.

Memory is all we are. Moments and feelings, captured in amber, strung on filaments of reason. Take a man’s memories and you take all of him. Chip away a memory at a time and you destroy him as surely as if you hammered nail after nail through his skull.