Taylor Hicks Running into the Sun...

In March, the spring tour was ready to kick off, and Taylor Hicks tweeted:

@TaylorRHicks “Finally....................the BUS.”

Music blogger, Bob Lefsetz, had just blogged about Jackson Browne’s “Running on Empty” and taking chances. He wrote that we who didn’t take chances …went to college and settled.

That’s what I did—went to college and settled. I didn’t take chances.

I was a soccer mom.

“So we don't take those risks, the artists take them for us.”

And we are enthralled when we meet them as if there is still a little corner of us that is drawn irresistibly to the uncertain.

Sometimes we are reminded of the unsettled part. Jackson Browne’s “Running on Empty” struck a deep chord when Taylor suddenly tagged it at Epcot Center last October.

Jackson Browne was a risk taker before Taylor Hicks was born. He lived much of his life on the tour bus…with its thrills and pitfalls.

Do we need risk takers in our lives?

“Running on running on, running into the sun.”

Why do we follow Taylor Hicks?

Is it the music or is he taking the risks for us?

He dropped out of college. He hit the road in an old van. He paid his dues. Now, he steps onto a beautiful tour bus each summer.

“The BUS” is the signal that a touring musician is on the road. It’s his home, his success, his business of risk taking.

I don’t mean those of us who settled are unhappy. I mean, for whatever reasons, we just avoided risks and even dreams and they are buried until sometime, something reminds us of the untraveled roads. As a senior in college I thought I’d be going on tour with the college choir. But it didn’t happen. It was an involvement in music I think I still miss.

I was in college musicals, even the solo cameo in a small stage version of “New York, New York.” Yet, it was never my dream to be an artist. I was too practical. How could anyone make a living in the arts? I married someone who aspired to being an artist. But his mindset was the same. How could he support a family and be an artist? He never touched a canvas again.

Perhaps our need for risk takers might explain our connection to our artists—one deeper than the music and the show.

And why we flock to the risk takers.

I work and shop in a small town on I-40 where I see the highway stretch for miles in two directions…not as beautiful as California’s 101 where Jackson Browne “ran into the sun.” But I still see a way to somewhere …to a part of me where I can’t go. I’ve stared at it and thought, “I could just take off and go.” But I don’t.

“You can buy insurance. Go to graduate school. Start a profession. Or you can walk the tightrope without a net, which is scary, knowing there's no protection, nothing to save you, but it's much more thrilling.”And that's what life is supposed to be. A thrill.”

Perhaps that’s why I felt a little bit of a thrill when I read Taylor’s tweet:

“Finally…………the BUS.”

I’m taking off to California this week to see Taylor Hicks at The Canyon Club…

in Agoura Hills.

I was that soccer mom years ago… in California. I drove my son to soccer games down the road just a bit…

in Agoura Hills.

I still don’t take risks, but I know someone who does.

Who is your risk taker?

Taylor Hicks running into the sun on Telluride Gondola.

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Notes: Agoura Hills is located on the Ventura Freeway. This is also “the 101” of Jackson’s Browne’s “Running on Empty.”

Interestingly, in my mail this week was a letter from my alma mater inviting me to be a part of an Alumni Choir. No…that’s under the bridge.
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Taylor Hicks is in California this week. Check out his schedule to the right with a NEW Labor Day weekend gig at the historic Flora-Bama Lounge on the beach at the Alabama/Florida line!

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Quotes: Bob Lefsetz “Running on Empty”
http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2011/03/01/running-on-empty/

Photos: "Road101" Flickr; "Gondola" by Taylor Hicks via Twitter.