Kerry Brown
Ambassador of the Great Northern Bar Jams
March has been a nightmare. It started when my cat quit eating. Took her to the vet and we put her down that afternoon. One day she was fine, the next she was not. Then I a got got a phone call from the RCMP asking me if I was home and could they come and talk to me. They told me my brother had passed away. His car had been ticketed because it was parked on the street with no insurance. The constable that had written the ticket noticed that the ticket was still on his windows a couple of days later and knocked on his door. He lived in a basement suite. The landlord saw the police and said he hadn't seen my brother for a week. He opened the door and the constable went in. My brother was on the floor dead. He has struggled with diabetes for many years with many sudden trips to the hospital because of low blood sugar. This time it killed him. He was a life long bachelor and a bit of a loner. His place was not dirty but it was very messy. My wife and I were cleaning it up preparing to take his stuff to the garbage dump and local thrift store when my wife got an email that her brother had stage four lung cancer was going into the hospital. The next day he passed away. It was a really bad month. That's why I have been pretty quiet on here. I do have something good to look forward to though. My step daughter is pregnant with her second child and is due any day. Something good also came when cleaning out my brother's place. I found an old 1960's Yamaha guitar that my father bought new in 1968. I learned to play guitar on this guitar. My brother and one of my sisters also learned on it. My father and I took group lessons sharing the guitar, passing it back and forth during the lessons. The guitar still plays great. The tone is actually incredible. These old Yamaha's are surprisingly good guitars. I've been playing it a lot remembering my father and brother.
