Hubbard Glacier, Alaska


 Hubbard Glacier is 76 miles long and 6 miles wide where it meets the water.  It is one of the few glaciers in the world that is gaining mass rather than melting at a rapid rate.  If you enlarge the photograph, you will see a large 2400 passenger cruise ship in the lower right corner.  This ship is four times the capacity of our ship and gives perspective to the massive height and width of Hubbard Glacier.


The magnificent mountains of Alaska are glorious with the clean water and crisp fresh air offering a new beginning to each day.  As Kristin Hannah wrote in The Great Alone, "Alaska isn't about who you were when you headed this way.  It's about who you become."

Dead end is where I was headed when a girl saved me.  I was enrolled in the College of Music at Ohio State when I decided to quit school and go on the road with a rock n roll band at the age of nineteen.  Our band owned a school bus converted to a Fun Bus with bunk beds, a table and room to haul our gear.  The bus was fueled by diesel but the band was fueled by drugs and alcohol.  I was on the outer edge and falling into more heavy use when I finally figured out we were on the road to nowhere. 

1973

During this time, Ruth Ann and I married.  It didn't take long for me to discern that I was either going to be a musician or I was going to be a husband but I couldn't be both.  After quitting this band, I have been a drummer in bands for more than fifty years as a hobby rather than a profession. 

I am who I have become because a young woman saved me 52 years ago. 

Love of My Life is one of my all time favorite love songs released in 1997 and sung by Sammy Kershaw.  It speaks to me.

You are the love of my lifeAnd you are the reason I'm aliveAnd baby baby babyWhen I think of how you saved meI go crazy
I've never known love like thisAnd it fills me with a new tendernessAnd I know I know I knowYou're in my heart you're in my soulYou're all I can't resist
And I need to tell youThe first time I held youI knew you are the love of my life
I spent a lifetime waitingAlways hesitating until youI was lost so deep inside my shell'Til you came and saved me from myselfNow all I really knowIs I need you
And you are the love of my lifeAll the joy and tears that I cryAnd baby baby babyYou don't have to say a wordI see it in your eyes
As we stand togetherI promise forever'Til the day that I dieYou are the love of my life
You are the love of my life
You are the reason I'm alive 

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