Hunter

Hunter. I always avoided those professional athletes--I mean the football players and track stars who needed a get-through course. But Hunter was different. We were over-full, he was an outside major, and somehow I'd found out that he was captain of the water-polo team, so I already had my suspicions. But the intense way Hunter pursued a place in the class--the multiple notes pinned to my door (he wasn't going to leave it to email--although there was one of those, too--long and compelling--in which he told me that music (read creativity) was his life... Plus he attached two songs that were being played on radio stations in San Diego!) Already more than one reason to be intrigued. Then he arrived, lanky, very tall, the blond hair of a waterman (surfing his true passion) and a remarkable, understated presence. He became a center in the class--not by claiming the space--Hunter was actually quite modest--but because of what he made. "I'm not trained as an artist"--he let me know--but the color-embellished longboard, or the full-sized pallet-assemblage he dragged in for Missisissippi John Hurt, or his touchingly authentic paintings (Ain't No More Cane on the Brazos)--they all come immediately to mind. And his songs, of course--sometimes one would start with Hunter crouched on the floor, back against the display wall, with words pouring out, quietly, from another time, another place (his long-ago clan in Eastern Tennessee) a lullaby, barely remembered, even by Hunter, but true in every note...

He told me his whole story--all the twists, the quandaries. The setbacks, too. But overall, a beautiful and happy man...
_____

And I learned from him, too--something about San Diego--or maybe from San Diego--a kind of astute acceptance of the way things simply are. Hunter would return to that, often... Also a center...


(Photo above by Nelli Astvatsatrian, from the Finale evening, VS 185X: Songs & Places: American Roots,  Fall 2016. The photo below is one Hunter sent me in the week he had to miss a class...)


 

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