Give it a listen!

Lafe Dutton: Am I Gone

Maybe I'm just biased because he's my first-cousin-once-removed, but I still think it's worth a listen, especially if you like folk music with an acoustic guitar.

You can listen to some samples of songs on his website, but I think singing along to the CD while driving down the road is a much better option.

Better yet, is singing together in my aunt's kitchen, watching my father's expression turn to pure joy and light as he claps to keep time.

Conversation with Mara

Mara: Can we get a bomb?
Us: A bomb? No, I don't think so.
Mara: Oh, I really wanted a bomb!
Us: What are you going to do with a bomb? What do you need to blow up?
Mara: The bad guys.
Us: Oh, no, Mara. You can't take care of the bad guys all by yourself. That's why we have police. We have to let them do their job.
Mara (Crying)
Us: Why are you crying? We're not mad at you.
Mara: I just wanted to help!
Us: It's good you want to help. Maybe one day, you can be a police officer and help. Until then, we just need to let the police know if we see any bad guys.
Mara: But what if there's some bad guy or monster that so big, even the police can't stop him.
Us: Mara, if a bad guy is too big for the police, can you stop him by yourself? The best thing is to help the police by telling them if we see any bad guys.
Mara: Okay.

****

All this, after an afternoon of watching Batfink reruns on Boomerang.