Chapter Seven
The Big Red Binder
One night, Garrett and Jay invited me over. We got to talking about music, about songs, about the idea of Garrett maybe recording an album, and before long we were sitting there flipping through my “big red binder.”
That binder held years of my life—songs I’d written, lyrics scribbled down, ideas that had come and gone. Some were finished, some were half-done, and some I hadn’t looked at in years.
We stayed up late that night talking, reading, and playing a few things here and there, and somewhere in the middle of all that, something shifted.
At first, the conversation was about Garrett recording a full album of my songs. That was the idea—let him take them, shape them, and bring them to life. And there was something good about that.
But as we kept going through that binder, I started to feel something I hadn’t felt in a long time. Those weren’t just songs on paper. They were pieces of me.
And for the first time, I realized I didn’t just want someone else to record them. I wanted to do it myself.
That thought didn’t come with a big announcement or a grand moment, just a quiet understanding that settled in. I was sixty years old, and most folks at that stage aren’t starting something new, but something in me said it wasn’t too late.
Garrett had the connections, the experience, and the talent as a producer, so I asked him if he’d be willing to produce an album for me. He didn’t hesitate. He said yes.
That one decision changed everything.
What started as one album turned into four, and along the way Garrett introduced me to a whole new group of musicians—people who became not just collaborators, but friends.
The dream I’d carried since I was eight years old, standing in a yard on Wood Street, singing a song by Hank Williams with my daddy’s band, finally came full circle. Not the way I might have imagined it back then, but in a way that was real, and in a way that was mine.
Looking back now, I can see it wasn’t about timing. It wasn’t about getting there early, and it wasn’t about missing a chance. It was about staying with it long enough for the right time to find me.
Listen: “Lone Star Highway”