\ The other day I was listening to Jamey Johnson’s song “In Color.”If you’ve ever really listened to it, you know it hits you deep.There’s something powerful about the way he sings about old black and white photographs, the kind where the smiles look faint but you can tell there’s a whole story behind those faces. […]

I remember that night clear as day in the early ’80s, cool air settling over the freshly turned dirt as I sat behind the wheel of a 9600 Ford tractor, working a field for David Stokes. The steady hum of that big diesel mixed with the sound of Solid Country Gold coming through the tractor’s

Today I was riding my four wheeler slowly across the rolling fields of my farm to check on the cattle. The air was crisp, and there was just a hint of fall colors beginning to show in the woods, a few orange leaves clinging to the maples and the faintest touch of gold spreading through

There is a song by Jennifer Nettles and Bon Jovi that always hits me square in the heart called “Who Says You Can’t Go Home.” Every time I hear it, I think about Todd County, Kentucky. That little patch of ground, those backroads, and the people who made me who I am. I was not born there.

Tonight I was watching a YouTube video of Johnny Paycheck singing, and my mind took me back to the mid-90s, I was working at the TV station when Johnny Paycheck came through Hopkinsville to play at the fair. He wasn’t the main attraction that year—he was tucked away in the big tent with the free

I read something the other day that’s been on my mind ever since. It said that in just a few generations, our names won’t even come up in family conversations. That’s a hard truth to accept. I think about it sometimes when I walk through Cedar Grove Cemetery. There are rows and rows of stones

Back in the mid-90s, I was working at a TV station, and every summer we got the chance to cover something in Nashville called Fan Fair. If you’ve never been, it was one of the biggest events in country music back then. For several days straight, all the stars came into town, and the fans lined

In the spring of 1980, I was back home in Todd County, Kentucky, spending my days in the corn and soybean fields, working for David Stokes. Life was simple—hot days on the tractor, the smell of fresh-turned dirt, and the steady rhythm of farming. Then one afternoon my cousin called from Texas. He was working

Growing up, I had two aunts on my mother’s side—Nancy and Carolyn. They were my mother’s sisters, but life worked out in a way that I spent much more time around Carolyn. Her son, my cousin Allen, was like a brother to me. I did see Nancy at family reunions and sometimes at Thanksgiving, but

Back in the early seventies, when we moved to Todd County, I found myself with a fascination most kids didn’t think twice about—box turtles. For those who don’t know, a box turtle is that special kind that can close itself up completely, drawing every bit of its body inside the shell until it looks like