Everybody Needs an Uncle Paul
My Uncle Paul is what I consider a great man. He's kind, compassionate, and mostly understanding. Everyone has their flaws but Uncle Paul's good traits far outweigh any of his bad.
My Aunt Bonnie married Paul when I was in my late teens. He raced cars, dune buggies, played bluegrass music, and is a wonderful mechanic.
The reason for this post is to discuss his profound influence on my Dad and me but most importantly how he unselfishly brought my Dad and me closer together.
It had been years since my Dad had played bluegrass. He sat at home and occasionally would pick up the guitar and sing a little but nothing involved. He had always been approached but couldn't seem to get motivated to play with anyone again. My Dad tells this story about one of the last times he played in a bluegrass band when I was a kid. He said they (his bandmates) were all standing around at practice and one of the guys kept saying, " We're just not good enough. We'll never be good enough to make it big." So Dad used his logic and applied it to the previous statements. The bass player is good enough. The banjo player is good enough. The mandolin/fiddle player is good enough. Well, that just leaves one and that's me...I guess I'm holding them back so I'll just quit! And he did.
Years went on until Bonnie met Paul. Paul loves bluegrass music and plays all the time. Everybody loved Paul and therefore Dad was apprehensive and was reserved until he found out Paul too played Bluegrass. Well this was one of the best things that ever happened to my Dad and he and Paul soon became very close and eventually would travel to Suwanee, Florida twice a year for a Bluegrass Festival they would have there. Dad met many new friends there through Paul and on his own and eventually became a regular fixture there. They both would tell stories how they would play for 6-7 hours a night singing and playing and never once singing the same song twice. This amazed everyone down there because no one had any idea that Dad was such a song repository. Dad had an amazing voice but also an uncanny memory when it came to songs.
Through those years I never played Bluegrass, I sang some with Dad when I was a kid and when I realized it wasn't cool then I cut that out. Eventually I came to want to learn how to play guitar and maybe eventually play lead. One evening we stopped by Uncle Paul and Bonnie's and visited, I think Dad mentioned that I was wanting to learn and Paul called me over. He was playing a "Sigma Martin" guitar and looked me in the eyes and held out the guitar and said, "Here." That was it, he gave it to me and I learned how to play in no time and this is because... Paul was learning to play resonator guitar at that time through an accomplished musician named Will Parsons in Berea and he even payed for me to have guitar lessons when he went for his lessons.
Well, all that said I learned how to play lead guitar and then took up mandolin which I learned to play myself. I even played down in Florida with Dad a couple times and it was awesome. But there finally came a break that I think Dad and I both hoped would come...the chance to play in a band together. We played in a band call "The Blue Dawg" for a few years and it was great. Dad sang lead and played rhythm guitar and I sang tenor, played mandolin and some lead guitar. It was a great experience for both of us and we eventually went on to start our own band "Eddy Hopkins & Son."
We played together for years and I was playing with my Dad the night I met my wife. He was with me for so many special moments in my life but all the special moments before then were on my terms not his. The special moments were ones I generated but when it came to music we did produced them together.
Dad and I had a very significant wedge occur through religious differences and the one thing that held us together was our music. I say all this because I don't feel any of that would have been possible without the love of my Uncle Paul. He was instrumental in so many positive results in my life by being such a good person, being so unselfish and doing acts of kindness at the right moments and they produced years of joy for my whole family.
Anyone who has read my previous posts knows my Dad is no longer with me but we played music right until he couldn't play anymore. He left a legacy of music behind and I have hours of audio and video to prove it. My son knows his Papaw was a singer and is able to remember him through audio and video in ways that memories cannot. I hope to someday sing with my son the way my Dad sang with me.
And if I ever get turned aside from Bluegrass I pray my Uncle Paul will be there to put me straight.