All of a sudden it is December 2022. Scary how fast time goes, as we get older. To Bas Bass it seems time was going slow until his 40th birthday, after which each year seemed to be shorter then the previous one.
Much has happened in this year. During January, Bas got messages from his family that his father was not doing so good. But, since his first stroke in 1999 this was always the same message. Dad always confirmed with me that although he had an irregular heart, the doctor told him it was allright. This time, it wasn't. My younger brother called me at the end of the month, and told me to book a ticket, since Dad had to go to hospice. He was dying, now for real. I got my ticket, and Ilene brought me to the airport, after we had taken our vaccines. We found out that also in this terrain there are villains, dressed as doctors, with an official looking office and staff, taking people's money while the Biden government offers free jabs. These people must be trump voters: uninformed, throwing money at problems instead of informing themselves, and letting crooks get away with it. If you are or were a trump voter, we hope you have learned that he is NOT the solution to our problems; he IS the swamp he was shouting about. He IS casino mafia. It all comes out now, so we are not afraid of any court cases from the trump organization, nor the hitler jugend.
Anyway, Bas went to the hospice just in time to hold his dad's hand. Dad looked really really old, his breathing was rough, he didn't eat or drink, and the nurses, who were very nice by the way, told us he'd had no water in days, refused it. It was hard to look at Dad this way, and I had to smoke, after which we got in the car and drove back home. The next day, we got a call around noon. Dad had passed over to the next phase. Bas and his family had to organize the funeral. At this stage, the family decided that it was good if Ilene came over too, for the funeral.
Although a professional undertaker was hired for this job, who made sure all necessary phone calls were made, and that there were enough cards, envelopes and post stamps to write invitations for the funeral mass and coffee table, it still was a lot of work: not forgetting important friends, or family feuds, which we luckily don't have. Organizing the church mass, choosing a coffin, a spot for the grave, text for the grave, what kind of stone, all of these things we push away while we don't have to deal with it. Finding songs Dad really liked, and going through family photo albums to make a dia-show outlining Dad's life, it all took a busy week, after which we got to watch light hearted movies with mom 'I am a widow now' or going to visit old friends.
In August, we decided that we needed to take the bottom work on our 59 year old wooden ship serious. We found the last person who still did this work, Ramon from Diablo Boat Works in Bethel Island, and after three months of hard work, we could splash her, and feel more secure about waking up dry.
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| Galt Music Exchange, where we teach |
About the Covid shit, and gigs: in 2019 it was getting clear that the more stages closed, the more bands were cut throat, the previous year a band connected to the sacramento blues society already stole one of our regular gigs. The gigs we did in 2019 and early 2020 were fun, but our drummer problem wasn't solved, as Eric moved to San Diego, and our other regular drummer chose to play with other bands he used to sit in with. There are about six other acts with a woman singing the blues, and they all want 100% of the attention, some even need thirty internet radio stations for this, we're glad we can be happy with no internet radio at all.
Ilene now works with an orchestra and Bas has his own band and other projects, they teach at home and in a music school. Bas likes to work as a gardener as well, and plans to give sailing lessons in the summer of '23. Computer programming and web development courses also are in the pipeline.
The Freewheelers wish you all a Very Happy Christmas and New Year!
