When life ain’t easy I seem to default to faith and music, and not necessarily in that order, to see me through. So here I sit with the Bride and several great friends listening to my favorite thing: Acoustic music live! Bluegrass to boot with every note and deflection sending me back to a time when life was hard but relatively simple.

Tonight, at a little Acoustic Cafe to honor those among us who have served,  currently are serving and those recently returned to us from the Iraq war and Afghanistan, music rules. I look around at the faces these men and women and their Families and think about sacrifice, honor and duty. I wonder if they think the sacrifice and losses were really worth it. I hope it was for them because only they have earned the right to decide one way or the other. As the music plays on with it’s simple cadence I start to think maybe life ain’t easy but maybe it is not really that hard.

In a corner of my mind this weeks news pounds at the door of my sanity and tries hard to overwhelm me. There are revolutions both violent and peaceful, global warming or not, tensions among enemies both old and new, leaders in denial or worse, a president that won’t lead, a congress that will not follow, presidential hopefuls that leave us with very little hope, an economy on the rocks searching for a life raft but the raft has already headed to the shore while the rest of us tread water. As the notes wash over my thoughts like a cool misty rain and I feel up lifted and a not as tired from the strain of having a thought in my head.

The band is wrapping up and I head out to the cold wind and starless night feeling I will make it till my next shot of mood lifting live acoustic music. Till then I hope the Bride keeps putting up with me, the coffee is always hot, the lights stay on and my ain’t so simple life, well stays not so simple, because it always makes the music sweeter.