Hello, dear reader.
In my last post, I told you how songs sometimes arrive fully formed, already composed, and ripe for the plucking from the ether.
This one? This one arrived like a car wreck.
But before we get to that…
It is a beautiful afternoon here in Scottsdale, Arizona. My wife is attending a conference for work, and I was fortunate enough to tag along. We are staying in a quaint little casita somewhere between Scottsdale and Paradise Valley, which just so happens to be one of my favorite places on earth.
The landscape is breathtaking in the way West Texas is breathtaking. Rugged, wide open skies, sun-washed, and quietly dramatic. And the food?
The food is absolutely exquisite.
Three years ago, two of our children attended GCU, Grand Canyon University. That was my first visit to Phoenix and my first real stop in Arizona. We stayed at a gorgeous Airbnb called The Brexley and spent three wonderful nights there. I had saved and saved for that trip, and when we finally got there, we splurged.
Boy, did we splurge.
It was not just them going to college. It was out-of-state, you’re-grown-now college. That made the sendoff bittersweet, to say the least. Tears were shed, memories were made, and somehow the Grand Canyon State left a permanent little mark on me.
That mark was pizza.
My wife and I love food shows, documentaries, and, of course, eating. A year before GCU was even a blip on the radar, we watched Chef’s Table: Pizza. Episode one was about Chris Bianco. I am passionate about pizza, passionate about eating it, mostly, and that episode, along with his restaurants, stayed with me.
So when we came to Phoenix the first time, one of the first places we went was Pizzeria Bianco.
I took one bite of the Rosa and had what can only be described as a spiritual experience.
Something about food changed that day for me. I would not say I was a picky eater, but an adventurous one? No. Pizza is my safe place. I would never desecrate a perfectly good pie with something as suspicious as pistachios.
At least, that is what I thought.
The Rosa is a wood-fired pizza with Parmigiano-Reggiano, thinly sliced red onions, Arizona pistachios, rosemary, and just a touch of olive oil on top.
It woke up my culinary senses.
I still think about it.
So when my wife told me her conference was in Phoenix, I immediately started mentally packing a bag and said, “We are getting the Rosa while we’re there.”
And we did.
My second time there was even better than the first, and when I have to leave this town, I will once again be taking the memory of that pizza with me.
Which brings me, in a roundabout way, to the story behind my song “Leave This Town.”
Because the first time I wanted to leave this town, emotionally speaking, it had nothing to do with Arizona, pizza, beautiful desert sunsets, or memories with my kids.
It had to do with a woman.
Years ago, I was playing a gig at a local restaurant called Dixie Street, a Cajun-inspired little bistro next door to where I worked. My friend Jim played bass and sang harmonies with me at the time.
It was a beautiful afternoon. The sun was peeking out from behind the clouds, the breeze was gentle and cool, and I was especially excited about who was coming to the show.
My wife.
Well, she was not my wife at the time.
Back then, she was just a beautiful woman I had been talking to for a few weeks and was, naturally, already madly in love with.
Everything was going great.
My voice was smooth and confident. Jim’s harmonies were on point. We were tight. It was one of those moments every musician hopes for, where you stop trying to play the music and the music starts playing you.
Except there was one problem.
She still wasn’t there.
An hour went by, and it was time for a change-up. In the middle of the set, Jim would usually take a break, and I would sit down at my piano to play a few Billy Joel songs. “Piano Man,” “New York State of Mind,” “Vienna,” and “I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues” by Elton John would usually sneak in there too.
And after that day, “I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues” made a whole lot more sense.
This is the moment everything went downhill.
I sat down at my piano, placed my phone on the music stand because it had my setlist on it, and started the intro to “New York State of Mind.”
I was just about to enter the first verse when a text message came across my phone.
From her.
“Hey. Sorry I won’t be able to make it tonight. My boyfriend is sick.”
Boyfriend?
What boyfriend?
I was devastated.
After weeks of talking, flirting, and connecting, that little detail had somehow never come up.
After reading those words, I suddenly forgot the song. The lyrics. The melody. Everything.
I fumbled so hard Jim could have run the piano in for a touchdown.
It was bad.
I tried to laugh it off and play another song, but I forgot that one too.
Was it an actual boyfriend? Or was it the fictitious kind used in moments like this to avoid someone?
All I could think was that it was the latter.
So I called Jim back up to the stage, hoping that switching back to guitar would jog whatever had been shaken loose inside my brain.
It did not.
Right as I picked up my guitar, pulled the strap over my head, and retrieved my pick, the wind picked up.
An almighty gust blew my speaker clean over.
It fell grill-side down, right on the patio.
I set my guitar back on the stand, and we got the speaker upright again. Something was rattling around inside.
It was not good.
I looked at Jim and said, “That’s it, man. I’m calling it.”
This day had gone from good to bad, and I wanted to leave before it went from bad to worse.
Which is cute to think about now.
Because it did, in fact, get worse.
We loaded up, packed up, and shoved off.
At the time, I still lived at home with my folks. The gig was in town, and my parents lived about twenty minutes outside of town. That drive home felt like an hour. I replayed every moment after that text came through.
All I wanted was to crawl into bed and mope like the sad sack I was.
But that was not going to happen.
I turned the corner to the hallway outside my room and found the majority of my room sitting in the hall.
Aghast, I politely asked what the hell was going on.
My mother, bless her heart, and yes, I mean that in the most southern way possible, had smelled something “stinky” in my room. In her attempt to discover the source, most of my belongings had been removed and placed in the hallway.
My bed, stripped of its sheets, sat naked in the corner.
The refuge I had longed for after my awful day lay violated and exposed, much like my emotions after that woman and her “boyfriend” had so graciously handed me my heart in a to-go box.
I do not recall much after seeing the contents of my room no longer in my room, but I should probably take this moment to apologize to my mother if I was rude.
For the record, the “smell” she was trying to find was my laundry.
I had been doing Insanity by Shaun T, an arduous workout program on DVD. Much like Richard Simmons, except this one was crazy.
The smell was coming from my sweaty shirts and undies, soaking in shame at the bottom of my laundry basket.
Had I possessed the sense to wash those clothes sooner, perhaps I would have also possessed the sense to notice if an attractive woman did, in fact, have a boyfriend.
Hindsight, am I right?
I went straight back to my car and drove to my best friend’s house. I called him on the way and said something to the effect of, “Brother, this day has been God-awful. Please make me a drink, and make it strong.”
I was never a big drinker back then, but the tone of my voice must have conveyed the sincerity of my plea.
It was probably the sound of me trying to swallow my heart back down into my chest.
You know.
Because of “feelings.”
Once I got there, I replayed the day’s events, my anguish, and all of my despair.
It was then that I took my first sip of Jack and Coke.
I do not like Jack and Coke. But the first time you have liquor tends to stay with you.
Unfortunately.
Half a glass later, I was apparently raving about this woman, this temptress, who had played upon my young and naive heart. The Jack and Coke hit a little harder than I expected, and from what I understand, I ranted for quite some time and quite vehemently.
Late that night, I returned home.
I did not want to go back inside.
So I grabbed my guitar, went out to my dad’s shop, and sat down to play my feelings out.
A quote on my music page is from What the Moon Saw, and that night, what the moon saw was exactly that:
“Where words fail, music speaks.”
Instinctively, I placed my capo on the second fret of my guitar, played a D chord in the C shape, and walked down into a B minor.
Then the words came.
“There’s not much left for me here.
A couple of drinks and a friend or two.”
It just poured out of me.
“It don’t take much to remind me.
A couple of drinks in and then there’s you.”
It did not stop.
I had plucked another fruit from the tree of ideas.
But this one did not arrive softly, like a dream.
This one came through a bad gig, a worse night, a wounded ego, a fallen speaker, a half glass of Jack and Coke, and the kind of heartbreak only a twenty-something man can turn into a full theatrical production.
Still, the song felt as if it was preordained to be mine.
I wrote it, or rather, discovered it, in about five minutes.
Five minutes, and there it was.
Kismet.
I was getting ready to leave for Los Angeles to record my first EP, and all the excitement of that trip had been overshadowed by the feeling that I had lost something amazing.
Her.
The following week, I would be flying to Nashville to record a music video for the title track of the EP, “Have You Seen Emylie.” From there, I would fly to Los Angeles to finish the record.
All I wanted to do was get on that plane, leave this town, and forget about her.
However, that was not going to happen.
The feelings I had so aggressively shared the night before were then taken, in part, by my dear friend, thank you, and relayed verbatim to the woman in question.
He was sticking up for me, but he was also poking the bear while attempting to play Cupid.
The next day, I received a scathing text from her.
And I mean scathing.
“If you have something to say, you can say it to my face.”
That was the most polite line I am allowed to regale you with.
Long story not so short, those events led to me finally sharing my feelings and telling her just how much I really liked her. Shortly after that, the previous boyfriend was mercifully removed from the plot, and our lives, and we had our first date a couple of days before I left for Nashville.
It was awkward, to say the least.
We went to see The Great Gatsby, which, let me tell you, is possibly the longest movie ever created for a first date.
Then, what seemed like five hours later, we went to Chili’s.
She had a margarita, and I asked for a Dos Equis. When the waitress asked if I wanted it dressed, I said, “No thank you, casual is fine.”
She laughed.
Out of pity, probably.
After an awkward dinner, I took her home. I walked her to the door of her apartment, said goodnight, and left.
I left.
After all that whining and bellyaching, I just left.
I did not even try to kiss her.
Like a dope, I got in my car and pulled out onto Main Street. I was halfway down the road when I made the decision that changed my life forever.
I whipped the car around and drove back to her apartment. I climbed the stairs two at a time and was about to knock on her door.
Then I hesitated.
I almost left again and lingered like a weirdo by the door. But I fought the nerves, grabbed my phone, and texted her.
“You still awake?”
Yes, idiot.
It had been five minutes. She answered right away. “Yes.”
So I knocked on her door.
As the door slowly opened, I could see the confusion on her face. My heart sank. She is not interested at all.
“What’s up?”
I did not know what to do, so I just told her my plan.
Brilliant.
“I was going to make a move.”
She smiled and said, “Go ahead.”
The relief I felt in that moment is beyond words. After all the nerves, the drama, and the waiting, it was all worth it. The first time I kissed my wife, I knew I had made the right decision.
After that first kiss, the connection between us was deeper than we could have known. Standing just outside her door, we hugged for almost an hour. I just held her as she leaned her head against my chest.
In that moment, I knew I had made the right decision. There are moments in life where things just click into place, and that moment was it for us. She felt like home. She felt like my person. She felt like the reason I had turned the car around.
We have now been married going on thirteen years.
The woman who sparked all that emotion, which then turned into song, has definitely managed to give me a few more good ones over the years.
Trust me, I love her. But that woman can still stir up a chorus when she wants to.
That is the story behind “Leave This Town,” a song born from heartache that led to true love.
So take chances. Have adventures. Risk it for love.
It may just change your life.
And if nothing else, it might just give you a good song.