"There is nobody I'd rather have with me in a beer hall brawl than my mother standing beside me with a broken beer bottle in her hand."

On our daily walks around my neighborhood my mother and I have been amazed by the exotic plant life and my mom wondered how it was possible that desert plants can survive and thrive next to plants that are predominantly in the North East of the United States. We stopped into the plant store on Beverly Blvd. to ask and the man who worked there said, "Plants here don't follow plant rules." I thought that was a funny image of our biker gang exotic flowers not following the rules of others.

In this episode my mom and I talk about the good things we have been putting into our brains in the form of the documentaries we have been watching and the books that we have read. We talk about the BBC's 'The Adventure Of English', all about the history of the English language and we learn the mind blowing story of Squanto, the Native American who spoke English and kept the Mayflower pilgrims from perishing during the first winter they spent in this new land. We talk about PBS Ken Burns' Mark Twain documentary and the book 'The Bohemians' by Ben Tarnoff, about Mark Twain's time in San Francisco and we learn that Artemus Ward was the first stand up comedian in America before Mark Twain. Then we talk about the PBS Ken Burns documentary 'Country Music.' From this we talk about how Bonnie and Clyde had to have the latest Jimmie Rodgers records, the powerful story of when Sarah Carter dedicated 'I'm Thinking Tonight of My Blues' on national radio to the man she loved and upon hearing it drove to Mexico to find her. We talk about Hank Williams and how his mother went with him to his rough early gigs and would fight beside him whenever bar room brawls broke out. "There is nobody I'd rather have with me in a beer hall brawl than my mother standing beside me with a broken beer bottle in her hand." We tell the best stories we just learned about Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, Willie Nelson, Loretta Lynn, Charlie Pride, Roger Miller and Dolly Parton.

Then we talk about the two books my mom read this past week, 'My Israel Trail' by Aryeh Green and 'When I Am An Old Woman I Shall Wear Purple.' During this global pandemic lock down my mother has often said: "Sometimes you've got to call people and cheer them up."

I'm honored and privileged to have all of this uninterrupted time with my mom and this episode is a happy stroll through the best stories we learned this week delivered with love just for you. Joy be upon you!