Reflecting on The Passing of An Extraordinary Teacher

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I can't figure that out after a couple decades, hey way. But maybe I better get a job know that there is something about the longevity of this that does drive home the point. And speaking of drive home the point here is you know you love them is John Butler.

The count of my disco John how you feeling I am just peachy. How about yourself.

This is a little warm here in Montana. We had 90+ degree weather here and it is here now. You cannot I find a better tomorrow night.

Yeah, well, did you know was good.

What about when it what's it like in Dallas today 90 here in Dallas is just hot that's just hot. We'll have the humidity, but tomorrow night is done. The 19 oh wow that's cluttered. It's the no really it is coming to fall here in Tennessee so it's like 68, 72, which had some some storms come through couple days ago. It's really like this. The first oh wow, it's not oppressive day and time.

We had some nice weather that also to just get we just get this heat way.

We got a lot of fires appear to open both the bridge or bridges over on fire over there and it's real smoky, but hopefully the rain is coming tomorrow. We can get a little bit top of this, but it's sought but it but doing okay. It's that I had tried I wasn't going to miss this the more I thought about it just right for the show. If you'll indulge me for a moment, I lost a teacher this this week. Someone who I was incredibly fond of. He was my advisor in college and my composition professor at Belmont University in Nashville's name is Bill Purcell and Bill was 94 years old and still had tremendous mental acuity and piano dexterity. In fact his daughter posted something on social media recently just just yesterday is just I like for five days ago and it was the last time he played the piano was just a month ago and he was playing the piano edit at a get together and he was playing the thing from Laura that movie back in the 40s written by at the David Raskin composed by that and unbelievable.

And I'm good enough at the piano to appreciate how great he is. That's about what I could do and how can I I know enough about the piano to know how bad I really am and I watch you play and it's just you know I it's an order of magnitude or more beyond my capabilities and then I also know that there are people out there that you look at it the same way.

This is this guy, he could think in Cliff's and in all types of clusters he would score stuffer symphonies and orchestras and so forth, calling for his 94th birthday and we talked for a while and in these of a PI guy got ago I got things to do, but he was good to get to the studio but he caught the coronavirus and it took and quickly and very said judges you have a favorite teacher. I I well I don't know about favorite.

But there are definitely two or three that that stick out at me and I feel like everybody had a high school or junior high English teacher that change their life. Somehow, and that's that that's a good way of putting it. I think that maybe not an English teacher for everybody but that you go through and there definitely were teachers that I look back on and made they changed something in me that I still carry with me to this day, and I think that's all we've got traffic. That's all we can really ask for as people in general is to maybe change summary for the better by side teachers to think they get an outsized portion of that and that's that's a good thing I will say I will make the statement. Not all teachers are heroes, but all my heroes are teachers and I have found that to be consistent in my life I have it so I would ask also have to listen this podcast. If you have a favorite teacher or somebody made an impact on your life.

That was you be beyond and above if they're still alive, give them a call and if they're not still out seek out their family and just let them know how much that teacher meant to you. Allow this. This man meant a great I am so grateful that I had this last phone call with them this summer and my PL professor at Belmont and I talked pretty regularly and that he's in his 80s. Now we we talked very regularly and I really cherish these these relationships because these are people that had a profound impact on my life and if you indulge me for just a moment, one of the things that Bill Purcell help me see as a musician was to develop sequences and motifs and not just randomly throw something out there but to really develop it in mind now let me let me change gears and show why that has cross applications. I was listening to a a a an interview with Jeff Foxworthy, who's been on the show.

It is just been a great friend for many years and he was taught about comedy in the same context because he said a lot of comedians will come up with a joke in a punchline. And then they'll even go to another joke and another punchline he said, but the real nuances of comity can be to mind that St. Joe he said there's more there and too many comedians leave more jokes on the table than the yeah you follow the good way of putting it. Yeah yeah yeah well like it like a like a Mitch Hedberg style or something like that where he's doing one-liners about or I who's the Stephen right yeah yeah it ladled in the one-liners is a bit like the same way doing it. Yeah Seinfeld genealogically help take yet they loved the call back and solicit sequence of that motif and that you're doing this okay him to go to the deeper, but that's what my Prof. Bill Purcell taught me in music was to mind that a little bit more. Don't just settle for a nice little ego due to the piano really mind it may turn on the keyboard here to give you a given illustration of this, but but one of the things that I admire about that is how that translate other parts of my life and I found myself, I found I found myself in a for myself doing that as a writer not a songwriter but as a writer in my books in my commentaries and things such as done and I thought this guy is still living rent-free in my head you know teaching me he still teaching me and he retired years and and so you know I just I wanted to just give it just a let you all know his body is there people that I stand on the shoulders of tremendous people who have been a source of great encouragement and wisdom and so forth with me over the years and I just kept melancholy because he is mind were still there. He was still able to play better than on my best day he still playing like that better than me on my best day at 94 and I'm thinking where to hang and and we spent a lot of time on the show, talking about and and rightly so.

I might out we we we talk about your mistakes being excellent teachers and experience being excellent an excellent teacher and probably one of the best, but there are there are people out there that won't just like what kind of goal of this show is is to prevent people from having to make those kinds of mistakes you have now met Haley don't successful you know will, don't go down there to the teacher but this guy was it hey why did you go down there had a teacher and okay I really like that this little outside so but that it someone I would write a theme. Okay, that's really nice and I could go, but it would decrease me this is pleasing you know you going for it and that's the things that I just, you know, and I thought about as a writer and as is for this show you not do that. We okay let's go deeper. Let's go deeper. Why not go down there exactly and that's it. While it's know it's it's a little bit. It's the opposite of what sometimes we do, which is liquid going to explore this so you don't have to make those down this path, we don't discuss some of the past. The caregivers deal with and didn't really unfortunate ways and if we can prevent that.

Then some of those lessons. While there are some lessons you don't come back from. Unfortunately, if you experience them first hand. But now that's the up but I do appreciate going into what teaching means more education means especially to our special to a caregiver now will and I think one of the things I've modeled about this show is the approachability that we want to have in it.

II heard this from my of the radio broadcast which goes out on Saturday that's live on a couple hundred stations and and I do this podcast here with you. John like this because I feel it gives us a chance to can open up the dialogue but but but I get a lot of callers and I was listen. One of the guys the call screeners and he said you're like no other show that I've ever screen calls for is it what he said will you are you not in a hurry to get rid of the caller and I said will is everyone else had enough he's oh yeah they would get back on so they could hear themselves talking and you want to hear them talking and I and I got a throw that back to my teachers because they were so approachable they let me come in and express how I felt about it in and in and they they took the time with me and it really meant a lot to me. Yeah, yeah, and to be well in this seminar was want to get into later, but they were able to effectively manage your emotions in such a way that you felt comfortable doing that as opposed to just having to sit there and listen to a lecture or whatever, yet they never they never did that. If you have a question they wanted to you to engage and I think that's what I like about just to is that you both about both my composition, Prof. Emma, Pam, Prof. at the same philosophy. If you hit a wrong note, you're always 1/2 step away from her right. Note and and oh yeah, I think that my love yeah Prof. what even further and he said look, if you hit a wrong note, go to the right note in the next time you circle back in the song to it hit it again so they'll think he did it on purpose.

I will yeah no I you told me that years ago and that when really did stick with me especially like in my playing. As I just do I buy noodle around an awful lot of Mike. Okay, ma'am. I'll learn something and asked again.

My quiver talk not really explore it and just see what I can.

What I can learn from this particular chord progression or you know out maybe a little bit more about theory in the course of this and the metaphor of of playing music is really I think really good because the playing music is unlike caregiving on pretty low risk operation tell, unless you just page that is high risk of the audience is usually arguing she must not be named.

I think that's what you think she is 877-655-6755 877-655-6755 if you want to be a part of the show if you want to call in and share what's on your heart. I just had to indulge a little bit. It was it was a it's been a reflective week when you lose somebody who loomed large in your life, such as a teacher that I had and Bill Purcell was a extraordinary human being is an amazing talent and gifted teacher, and he left the big mark of this world, this hopefully caregiver Peter Rosenberger 877-655-6755 will be right. Have you ever struggled to trust God when lousy things happen to you. I'm gracing Rosenberger in 1983 I experienced a horrific car accident, leading to 80 surgeries in both legs and became I questioned why God allowed something so brutal to happen to me. But over time the questions changed and I discovered courage to trust God that understanding along with an appreciation for quality prosthetic limbs led me to establish standing without more than a dozen years we been working with the government of Ghana and West Africa, equipping and training local workers to build and maintain quality prosthetic limbs for their own people on a regular basis. We purchased ship equipment and supplies and with the help of inmates in a Tennessee prison.

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I Rosenberger eight 765-5672 577-655-6755 you will be part of the show. This gracing must have all right to wrap all this up. John and here's the point of all is that as I looked at my professor will end up with what I started with 90 removes all back.

Everybody loves ago but it 94 years old. He's at the piano, looking almost the same way he did in college when I was there all those years and he had the same whimsical this and he at 140 Philip thumbs up you ever select dyslexics. Note that he never missed a beat and his philosophy that he took care of his wife.

She had Alzheimer's and you know his philosophy exuded from him that not dying can't be the goal. The goal is simple is not to just not die. The goal has to be to live and and and living is is not the same as not dying and this man lived.

He lived. You know zestful fully. He just he he just lift and and I thought that he was a caregiver to and he lived in his talent. It seemed to just deeper and deeper. He kept learning to get plumbing. I was talking about piano professor who told me when he was at the he was about 75. He said I just now feel like I'm start to get into the pocket of the group and I thought the guys playing on gig after gig Kelly. He is the real deal and he's just out of that, what hope is there for hiss of this get there but but I understood the concept was you never stop learning never stop exploring and growing into it and nothing in your has to has to infringe on you so much that you can explore the beauty and the joy that surrounds you. That's the life lesson.

That's the lesson I've learned from both of these men and and it is an important one. To learn for me personally and I hope it is for. For those of you watching and listening that you will see that you do not have to wait for your loved one passed away to get better. Whatever else for you to continue to health into the beauty and the joy that's available to you right now. To me that's the overarching overarching principle of the show and everything else is that how we going to live today. I don't want to just get through today and not die. I wanted to do something that had vibrancy and life in it and I can't do it on a level may be that I would've liked to do that. I love it. Helen Keller said she said we'd all love to do great and noble things she said but I can't and I'm going to do small things as if they were great and noble is a pretty good quote. Please say so that's a good thoughts on that. John yeah that's that's a lot to digest their butts out the idea of the idea of really actively living as opposed to being passive and just getting through the day and some that this is not to say that there are some days that you're really just gonna feel like you gotta get through it you know is we've all been there and that is going to happen, but that to read. This is tied to talent retention try to live with lately when I get it every day.

We are intensely starting to make these decisions.

And that's a good thing yeah yeah and two are yet to really decide who okay yeah this this this unfortunate running up against the back yard can get this, but there is a lot that we can just decide we can decide to not be miserable sometimes and people really don't like that concept because it means that they can about what they feel like it, saying that their sadness is somehow their fault and that is not the case at all. Sadness can come unbidden and we talked about this before but misery is is a choice and you can decide to not be miserable and you can decide to approach life even if it is eight really going on the circumstances of your life are all really unfortunate, especially in the moment something and said there are some wives out there that are just there there tragic and there there very very sad and those situations are really really rough and there is still this ability. This wonderful ability in humans to to still we still all have our own mind and our own agency and we have a wonderful amount of control over some of the things that people like like misery that are these long-term decisions that that we make and it's it's a it's a rough concept, but you know anything right every time.

Yeah yeah oh yeah I was an idiot and and at and I hope that my my fellow caregivers will will will respond to this deposit that what we were not to get this right of return, which is not, but if we start making intentional decisions and move it to be moving the ball forward and in and in baseball terms, if you put the bat on the ball.

3/10 times ago put you in the Hall of Fame. Yeah so you have the go stuff to get it perfect. The goal is just to make progress and to keep learning, and when I when I hear my 75-year-old piano professor said I just now feel I can get into the pocket of the group. That's a lifetime of practice and of playing in of getting it wrong and keep doing it to the point where he seen such magnificence in the music and when I see my 94-year-old professor playing with such expression and such beauty and such joy, it is it is that's a lifetime that's a lifetime and and and in the end both of those men would be the first to tell you that they made uncounted mistakes. Sometimes you don't Agree to give you would like to the piano, you have some trouble sometimes you like the view that you have that they have of the piano. Sometimes you don't get a really great view without a long hard climb gracing I found that out. We went up to Granite Lake couple weeks ago when her son was adhering to exhibit. It was a hard trip and it's hard for her to ride ATVs of something like that and and some of is pretty scary to Parker had to help her. At one point he had to get up, get her off of that and I did have a help rider up there because the rocks are so big that you could tilt over pretty easily and then the best view though ahead of the whole trip. This view would just get up there were way of the top about this magnificent lake is just is just extraordinary. What were seeing, but the best view was when we were coming down we went on this one part of the trail that was pretty gnarly and Gracie did it. She did very slow and she was too slow scared but gracious tough she she likes to feed us to push yourself and I looked at her, go to this one spot and Parker was in the front and he looked back in the smile on his face, looking at his mother doing this after all that she's been through. You know I mean he's young. He's 32 years old. He's watched you go through all the surgeries both of her legs gone most of and she did it and that to me was the best view of all doesn't have to end she was going extremely slow. We were we work hotdog or anything else doesn't have to be. You don't have to throw like Peyton Manning in order to throw the football with the kids. You can just enjoy the journey as it is with whatever limitations you may or may not have. That's the lesson.

My teachers taught me explore the music didn't just just keep delving into the music and I hope that's been helpful to you all today is character healthy caregivers make better caregiver supporting healthy is deciding what have to be miserable that hopefully caregiver.com John, thank my thank you, will see you next week. Spiros Berger caregiver.com