Midnight run across Texas for the Bohemian Cowboy and his dog, Baby

Baby, my son Raymond's dog, is among those in the header wishing you a 'doggone great Christmas'. My sister's granddaughter, Kate, took this picture which includes her own dog, McKye, I think his name is. He is the blond dog with green eyes. Baby is the young pup on his left who is a border collie mix. Connie made this last year, but I decided to post it because I was thinking about Baby and Raymond all last night, because I knew they were making a run across Texas coming back to Phoenix. Raymond started running low on funds in Austin, and might soon have had to sleep in his truck, as no job offers had yet materialized, so he decided to return to Phoenix where he knows many people, and a couple of people who might take him in, including his brother Gary. Raymond said his old pickup truck was leaking oil, too.
I reminded the family that Jack London went to the Yukon because of the unlikely prospect of panning for gold and making money, bankrolled by money borrowed from his older step sister. Instead the easy gold was gone and Jack got scurvy so bad he had to return and was not able to repay his sister until he really did strike gold writing about the frozen north in his books, Call of the Wild, and White Fang. So I hoped the family would not judge my adventuresome son too harshly. Not many people would go clear to Austin so they could play country western music with some of the best country musicians in the world. Raymond got to play with some of them this trip down and said it was great. He got to see a beautiful woman he met in Austin the first and only time he wintered there.
I even made up a country western song about my son's trip across Texas in an old white pickup truck, leaking oil, hoping it didn't quit and leave him and his dog Baby to walk across Texas in the rain. I put the $100 I offered him clear last summer when he was doing that play on top of Thompson's ledge in his bank account, because now is the time he might really need it, to get back home.
Home is Phoenix, where Raymond spent most of his early and working years.
When you are a guitar player, playwright, actor, singer, song writer, these times are going to be rough, but they are always rough for someone trying to make a living doing what they love to do, following their artistic dreams.
It is for good reason many put their dreams on hold, sometimes for years, so they can make a living working at something maybe a lot less exciting. They usually have kids to support as my son Gary did, who went to work in construction when he was very young and has hardly been out of work more than a week ever since. He works now 12 hours a day. That's too much at his age! That's why I worry about him, too. Gary's got a good singing voice, too. He was a big hit as a kid singing I Am A Child of God, but he said Mom, I think I would drink too much if I had to work in bars. I better stick with construction.
Raymond is doing very well with his commitment to sobriety, so I thought he and Gary could help each other, as Gary has always drank too much on the weekends along with his construction worker buddies. He just can't get to the point where he can decide he can't handle it and quits entirely. Alcoholics just can't drink some, because they always drink too much.
Raymond should be coming in tonight. I hope his girlfriend is not too sad down Texas way, but I didn't think there was anything else he could do. So he made a tough but quick decision to return.
Raymond never had a family to support, so he can afford to take higher risks. Have you ever known anybody to hit so many big cities in such a short time as he has doing his show, "Bohemian Cowboy" and playing music wherever he has gone if at all possible, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Austin, and Phoenix and of course beautiful Boulder, Utah where he and his cousins, Cheryl and Camille, have created the Boulder Heritage musical festival every July for three days, including history writing and book publishing, too. This is where Raymond did his plays, Bohemian Cowboy and Under the Desert on top of Thompson's ledge, supported by Boulder Heritage. A big windstorm came up and nearly blew them off the ledge when they were doing Under the Desert, so they had to close two nights, but people came back the extra days and watched, and the play was a success. An actor from LA and an actress from Phoenix will probably never forget that gig!
Raymond has always been a very interesting son!