There was lots of action on the Ocoee River this weekend. The river flows through the Southern Appalachian Mountains of the Southeastern United States. Whitewater competitions got underway this past Friday.
Hear the complete story below (5 Min and 45 Sec)....
He goes by the nickname of John John and lives in the small town of Shelbyville, TN. He was standing near the gas pumps when he approached me, “Sir, could you buy me a Coca-Cola?” I smiled and said, “Sure.” Then, “Could you buy me something to eat?” I laughed and responded, “Sure, pick out something here.”
The gas station clerk looked at the man and said, “John John, we are out of your favorite popcorn.” She told me, “He likes the cheddar popcorn, but we run out quick because he buys all of them when we get them in.” Apparently, the small filling station only gets five of the cheddar popcorn’s in as John John seems to be the only customer for them.
While paying, “Sir, could you take me to Burger King and get me a burger?” I chuckled, “How about this candy bar and chips?” He quietly said, “Okay, that is good.”
He then walked away into the darkness. He lives in a small trailer park in Shelbyville and hangs out at the filling station when not at work.
"What's fulfilling is being happy and being able to help other people. The simple things." - James Arthur, British singer-songwriter
“What’s fulfilling is being happy and being able to help other people. The simple things.”
The vintage sign read, “Eldorado Motel, Room Phones, Pool and TV.” The sign still stands today in between 28th Avenue and Clarksville Pike in Nashville. However, the only sign of the motel is the sign itself.
I spoke to the owner of the property who said that her father was one of the first black men in Tennessee to receive a bank loan to build a motel.
What makes the motel history stand out even more, is that it was one of the few places in Nashville that allowed for men and women of color to spend the night.
During the changing times of the 1960’s, musicians like BB King, The Temptations, and even James Brown stayed at the motel while visiting Music City.
In the 1960’s, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) booked two rooms at the property for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and musician Harry Belafonte. King was good friends with Belafonte who supported the SCLC financially. Belafonte was in town to play at the Ryman Auditorium, but became too ill to play. So, he recouped at the motel until he was well enough to travel home.
Learn more by listening to the short interview below with the daughter of the man who built the Eldorado Motel so many years ago.
I met with David Lane today.
Lane, his wife and four children lost everything they owned in a house fire that occurred on Peachtree Street in Murfreesboro, TN on November 30, 2017.
Lane told me that the home was the only house his children have ever known, which made the fire so much harder. The home held their memories inside the walls along with photographs, clothing and more.
To make matters harder on the family, they did not have renters insurance to cover their losses. However, thanks to a teacher at Mitchell Neilson School who teaches one the Lane children, word that the family of six needed help fast.
Mr. Lane said that the community came together and helped them in a major way. In fact, he said that despite the loss this past Christmas was the best Christmas the family has ever had.
“I will be stronger than my sadness.” ― Jasmine Warga, My Heart and Other Black Holes
A number of years ago, synthetic drugs sold under a variety of names at local gas stations were outlawed in Tennessee. Much of the push to outlaw such items that were labeled as “Incense” or “Bath Salts” came from Rutherford County State Representative Mike Sparks, who lives in Smyrna, Tennessee.
State Representative Sparks knows the problem exists better than most, which is one reason he is so tough of synthetics. Sparks opened up to multiple media outlets in 2012 confirming that synthetics have been a problem in his family noting that one of his sons, 19 at the time, started using synthetics and it almost ruined his sons life.
Despite his efforts to see the drugs outlawed, they are still widely available today. However, they are not openly sold in gas stations and convenient stores. Instead, they are sold on the streets or in some cases, behind the counter at certain stores.
Today, the synthetic drugs that are often called “Fake Weed” are much more dangerous and potent than they originally were.
A woman named Nikki who has been clean from synthetics for about 4 weeks said the drug is a tough habit to break (8 MIN and 45 SEC) below….
A former user of fake weed in Murfreesboro by the name of Michael said that some convenient stores in Nashville will let you trade a food stamp card for synthetics that are sold behind the counter. Listen to what he says (3 MIN and 8 SEC) below…
Unlike real marijuana, withdrawals from synthetic weed include not only the inability to control bodily functions, but also dehydration caused by sweating profusely with the users core body temperature increasing greatly which can lead to kidney and liver failure.
The National Institute on Drug Abuse claims that synthetic forms of marijuana are the second most widely used drugs among high school students. The number one most used drug is real marijuana.
There is something to be said about routine. It is often a good thing because it equals sustainability. However, routine is more of a chore when it comes to the same dreadful morning after morning. Add mental illness into the mix and it makes life even harder to face each day.
Hear what Cheryl had to say below (1 MIN and 30 SEC):
Imagine being a woman and waking up each day in a tent. Imagine not having the ability to put on make-up or perhaps take that relaxing nightly shower to wind down. You can’t do it.
The only way you will be taking a shower while camping is if you are inside a state park or staying in a fancy roadside KOA campground. Of course, both places have limits on how long you can stay and both are costly for someone with nothing.
For most homeless in Murfreesboro, a shower is taken weekly at The Journey Home on West Castle Street or perhaps the Pilot Truck Stop.
If you have ever seen homeless men or women at the Pilot Truck Stop or maybe The Flying J, they are not lingering in the parking lot to prostitute themselves, which is what many believe. While that may be the case in some areas, it is mostly a thing of the past as truck stop management attempt to self-police such behavior. So, there is not a reason to hurry the children back to the car.
The homeless are often at truck stops to receive the goodwill of truck drivers who are passing through cities. Many truck stops offer semi drivers a “FREE” shower token for every 1,000 gallons of fuel purchased. Those drivers often give those sower tokens to those in need, which helps in a major way.
Pictured is Cheryl who moved to Murfreesboro when she was about 2 or 3. Yes, like many in our area she is a transplant. Her parents moved her to teach, which both did. One parent taught at Middle Tennessee Christian School and the other at Riverdale. After the death of her mom and the aging of her father Cathy’s mental state became more deteriorated which meant her elderly father was not able to properly control some of her behaviors, all according to Cheryl.
Cheryl has the same routine daily, but she is not close to a shower. So, she routinely gets up dirty and goes to bed dirty. It is not exactly adventurous and it is tough on a woman or a man for that matter.
As for fear, she worries about her safety the most. She worries about being killed more than being dirty. She told me that she has been raped about 6 times. She also talked about how she has been beat up while living on the street.
“The rewards of the wild and the rewards of the survivor go to those who can dig deep, and, ultimately, to the guy who can stay alive.” - Bear Grylls
Two of the four rockabilly Outlaw Rituals in Chattanooga, TN.
“The music is not in the notes, but in the silence between.” ― -Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, widely recognized as one of the greatest composers in the history of Western music (1856-1791)
He sits in a wheelchair because of diabetes and he suffers from neuropathy of the legs and feet. He told me, “Doctors describe walking with neuropathy as walking on pins and needles, well they know nothing, it’s nothing like that and it’s pure pain!” As the 65 year old man continued, “I wasn’t always in a wheelchair, I used to work in the automotive industry.”
Gary Rupp is from Detroit, Michigan, but moved away about three months ago because the dying city got too expensive to call home. After a little research, Gary found one of the cheapest places to live was Chattanooga, Tennessee – so he made the move.
The costs of Living for Gary (Detroit Vs. Chattanooga):
Gary currently calls the ChattCity Motel on East 20th Street in Chattanooga his home. He has a room that he rents for about $300 monthly, which is cheaper than some of the dirtiest motels in Nashville, Memphis and even Murfreesboro.
In Detroit, utilities average about $115 per month in a small apartment and that small apartment in a middle class neighborhood costs about $530 per month. The small apartment is only 480 square feet in size, which is a studio apartment.
In Chattanooga, you can get the same apartment for $483 per month and utilities will cost you $94 per month or less.
While saving $68 monthly would not convince most people to move, when you start factoring in the cost of food in Tennessee verses Detroit, transportation costs, etc. – it actually makes sense for someone on a fixed income to make that move.
What happens with neuropathy of the legs?
Some of the things that neuropathy causes in the legs include: burning pain, freezing pain, jabbing feelings as if you are being stabbed, extreme sensitivity to touch, lack of coordination and muscle weakness or paralysis.
Laughter beats pain:
I feel it is important to say that Gary laughed three times as we talked. The first time when I handed him an ice cold bottle of water, the second when I handed him a package of Oreo cookies and the third as we joked at nothingness.
"Laughter is the tonic, the relief, the surcease for pain." - Charlie Chaplin, English comic actor, filmmaker, composer (1889-1977)
Life can throw us curve balls at times that we often don’t know how to cope with. At other times, life throws us fast pitches that are altogether too fast to catch and we feel as if everything is out of control. But not Sarah Baker, even though she is going through a lot, she seems to be taking it all in stride and with a smile.
Sarah, who lives in Smyrna, Tennessee, undergoes about four hours of dialysis three times per week. She has held onto that schedule for the past two years or longer. She needs a new kidney and she is on the list to receive one, but it takes time – a lot of it.
Listen to this 8 minute and 15 second interview of what it’s like to undergo dialysis treatment three times weekly as she waits for good news.
Of course, you could help her with that good news by calling the Vanderbilt Kidney Donation Center and volunteering to donate your kidney.
If you would like to learn how you can donate or to see if you are a match, CLICK HERE today. You can also call the Vanderbilt Kidney Transplant Center at 615-936-0695.
By the way, the costs for the donor are fully covered.
The wall around him: “I’m tired of all the ones who beg for money, I never ask for anything,” he said while talking about the old neighborhood where he grew up as a child. He continued, “They litter everywhere and trash it up – Not me, I collect cans [pointing at a bag of cans hanging from his bike handlebars].”
The 51 year old has lived in Chattanooga his entire life. “My mom was lenient,” he said with a smile. He then made the statement, “My dad… my dad was hard on me.” I asked if his father ever hit him or raised his hand to which he responded, “Some kids need that.”
And there he sits alone with his salad that a kind passerby gave him. If you stop to talk, he quietly screams in his head for more human interaction, but his wall is too high at times to see the outside world.
"Hey you, standing in the road
always doing what you're told,
Can you help me?
Hey you, out there beyond the wall,
Breaking bottles in the hall,
Can you help me?
Hey you, don't tell me there's no hope at all
Together we stand, divided we fall."
-Pink Floyd on The Wall album from 1979, Hey You
He was quietly sitting on the ground beneath the shadow of a closed business in Chattanooga, TN. Looking down, he refused to make eye contact with those passing by on a busy, but humid Saturday. The heat index was over 100 degrees. He wasn’t asking for money or help of any kind, just sitting in thought.
His name is William, “But my close friends call me peg leg,” he said with a laugh while holding up the prosthetic leg sitting by his right. He then said, “I was born with a clubfoot and they went ahead and removed it in 1966.” The foot was malformed from the start, so it was removed at birth.
“I usually have a good story for people when they ask what happened to my leg,” he told me with a smile. “Someday's I lost it in a shark attack, other times it was a ski boat accident,” he explained.
Today William is 51 years old. He was born in Chicago, Illinois, but later moved to Memphis where he lived a few years before heading to Chattanooga.
“I walk a lonely road
The only one that I have ever known
Don't know where it goes
But it's only me, and I walk alone
I walk this empty street
On the boulevard of broken dreams
Where the city sleeps
And I'm the only one, and I walk alone”
-Green Day, “I Walk Alone”
In year 1900 the Coleman Company was first introduced to the world after they incorporated, but not as a camping and sporting goods manufacture. Instead, the company opened under the name of the Hydro-Carbon Light Company, manufacturing lanterns that were later named after W.C. Coleman.
It wasn’t until 1909 that the first and famous Coleman Lantern was introduced. The company went on to manufacture everything from cooking stoves to canoes, like the one you see on this Jeep belonging to Brian Burgess.
Burgess, who is an archaeologist, totes his 1958 Coleman canoe with him on a regular basis. The day I ran into him, he was about to load it into the Tennessee River in Chattanooga.
Such canoes made out of aluminum were manufactured for the first time directly after World War II. Many outdoor enthusiast switched over from wood canoes to aluminum during that time period because they were so low maintenance and quite durable.
While digging for gold may sound more glorious, Burgess prefers to dig for history. He has searched the country far and wide for interesting finds. “Anywhere that there is high ground and walking distance to water, there has been man,” he told me while basically suggesting that history can be nearly anywhere.
Originally from the Lone Star State Burgess said that his grandfather, who is 100 years old today, sparked his search for treasures. He said that his grandfather took him exploring as a kid when he was only 4 or 5 years old. “We’re keepers of time,” he stated while talking about the importance of archaeologist.
“I also collect dinosaur bones,” he said while talking about how the bones will wash up along the banks of the Brazos River in Texas. The Brazos is the 11th longest river in the United States, which means it passes through lots of history. The Brazos was also where a scene from the battle between the Texas Navy and Mexican Navy during the Texas Revolution took place. It was also an important navigational voyage during the American Civil War. So, depending on where you are on the river, you may just be lucky enough to come across something interesting.
Not everything Burgess comes across is for keeps. In fact, he has given valuable artifacts to multiple museums. He suggested that history sometimes finds him, so he passes it along to allow others to share in the find.
“We’re keepers of time.” – Brian Burgess, Chattanooga, Tennessee
Terrence Heeney had a paralyzing stroke exactly three years ago in July of 2015 and thought he would never walk again or be able to properly sort his words. However, he has fought the negative thoughts and battled through rehabilitation and is now walking and talking as he did before.
Heeney is a man after my own heart. He has traveled all over the world visiting just about every country you can name while working for Ingram Content Group / Ingram International. “I’ve seen most of the world, it is really beautiful,” he told me with a smile.
Mr. Heeney told me, “I will not get depressed – no matter how this turns out, I will not allow myself to get depressed.” He went on to say, “When I wake up I say – The potential for another day.”
Doctors told him while in the hospital that he would need to re-learn all the basics like walking, chewing food, swallowing food, etc. After being released from the medical center, he underwent six solid months of rehabilitation at the Life Care Center of Hickory Woods on Murfreesboro Road. He eventually gained the strength to once again live and he decided to give back to those who helped him while encouraging others that the road to recovery does indeed get easier.
Today, Heeney visits the rehab center on a regular basis to share his story of hope with others. He smiled and told me about a 55 year old patient who recently had an intensive surgery to his lower legs. Heeney talked about how the man was not recovering at the speed he had aimed for and was in a lot of pain. I asked Heeney what he said to the man to ease his anxiety and he laughed a little while stating, “I said, you know, you’re a young man and this is only a piece of your life, not your whole life, so knock it off.” With a chuckle Heeney told me that the next day he visited the rehab center and the man’s wife told him that she now has a brand new husband. The 55-year old man walked out of the facility on his own a month later.
Heeney continues to help others with a new outlook on life. One of the many things that he enjoys includes teaching. “I teach English three times a week to elderly seniors who are from war-torn countries and I help them get their citizenship – so I step outside myself,” he stated.
In closing I asked the simple question, “What would you tell someone who maybe having a hard time or who is going through a struggle right now?” Again I saw his face light up, “You’ve got to train your mind to be positive and not allow yourself to get depressed. If you do, set the clock on your stove for 10 minutes and when that buzzer goes off – it’s over, stop thinking about yourself.” He also told me that after his time at the rehab center was over and he returned home, he knew the road to recovery was not yet over. So, he would deliberately buy only a small amount of groceries so that he would be forced to make a return trip to the store up to three times per week – in other words he forced himself to get out of the house.
“You know, you’re a young man and this is only a piece of your life, not your whole life, so knock it off.” - Terrence Heeney of Nashville, TN
Why do we judge what we see? Take this photo as an example… I snapped this several years ago in downtown Nashville. It was a Saturday night and this man was going from person to person asking for a mere fifty cents. Did anyone offer him the two quarters he wanted? The answer would be no. But, because I am slightly curious about everyone, I not only moved towards him while others moved away, I gave him fifty cents.
When we see people that we don’t know we intertwine their appearance with our own circumstances, our own past, our hurts and faults. After we take a look at that person, our perception becomes our reality, thanks to our minds creativity.
There was a lawyer who represented the United States in the infamous Iran hostage situation during the 1980’s whom I have always thought of as an interesting, powerful and extremely smart individual. If you saw him, you would assume he was an ambulance chaser.
Herb Cohen wears cheap brown or dark brown suits. His hair looks as if he gets it cut at the least expensive barber shop in the mall. His jokes are bad and he has a thick New Yorker accent. But, he is smart and he knows that his outward appearance is deceiving, which he likes.
Cohen is the prime negotiator who helped to get 52 American hostages out of Iran and to safety. For those who are curious about history, the hostage crisis arose during the Jimmy Carter administration and ended with the Ronald Regan administration, thanks to Cohen.
So what makes Cohen so different? I think for one it is his understanding of people and how he aims to treat everyone nice. He listens, he respects the opinion of others and he keeps his demeanor calm. He actually calls his demeanor “Calculated incompetence.” Sounds pretty simple actually.
Cohen has it figured out, not judging is not only good for everyday life, but also in business.
“You and I do not see things as they are. We see things as we are.” ― Herb Cohen
Shadow people, the ones that most of us turn the other way when we see out of fear of being asked for money, a favor or perhaps a ride… They are everywhere.
What would happen if you turned towards them instead of away? Maybe you could brighten their day? You could take them some lunch? You could listen to them tell you about their troubles for five minutes.
In this photo, a 38 year old man who lives with a family member in Middle Tennessee.
“What men call the shadow of the body is not the shadow of the body, but is the body of the soul.” ― Oscar Wilde, A House of Pomegranates
Memorial Day, a time to remember our fallen veterans.
Photo of headstone for US Army Vietnam Veteran James Albert Thornburg of Tennessee. He served under the 1st Infantry Division, Battalion 8 in the 6/15th Artillery Company, Deadly Alpha from April of 1967 until April of 1968.
Thornburg received the National Defense Medal, Vietnam Service Medal, Vietnam Campaign Medal, Bronze Star with V Device and Two Oak Leaf Clusters, Army Commendation Medal, Good Conduct Medal, Unit Citation, and the Presidential Citation.
He died at age 56 in year 2002.
He is holding up a silver chain explaining the difference of his jewelry verses the jewelry many tourist buy on the streets. “This is real, see the weight difference,” he said as he weighed the chain offered in his store and then weighed a chain that is sold on the street.
Visiting the small shops is always a pleasure in cities throughout Mexico as you can see the definition of family. In this case, he works with both his mother and father at the family run business. His daughter watched TV as he waited on customers in the store. This is true for many of the businesses there.
“I was ordained a minister the year after I graduated from high school by the Church of God Jesus Freaks,” he told me. “That was in 1971,” he said with a smile.
The things you find where you don't expect to find them.
“The things one seeks are not the things one finds.” ― Marty Rubin, publisher of only one book in 1987... The Boiled Frog Syndrome
A boy and a girl facing one another on an otherwise desolate wall outside of a closed down factory in Asheville, North Carolina.
The mural by Ian Brownlee is one of many painted on buildings in North Carolina. Ian’s words, “Don’t Stop Believing.”
Paintings on walls that guard the emptiness inside only go to make the emptiness more meaningful. Otherwise, the building would collapse in ugliness. Now, it can be overtaken by mother nature with a little dignity.
“We become aware of the void as we fill it.” ― Antonio Porchia, Poet (1885-1968)