It started my comedy
career a little over 14
years ago.
Out of college, I wrote
advertising copy for
nine miserable years and
hated it. I used to
look out my 4th
floor window thinking,
“would 4 floors kill me
or just break my
leg?” Then I thought,
it would probably just
break my leg and it
wouldn’t be a good break
either. I figured it
would be high on the leg
where I would have to
wear a body cast and a
catheter. But in all
seriousness, I wasn’t
happy. From
the time that I
graduated high school
till my 29th birthday, I
had three close buddies
all commit suicides
after they broke up with
a girl. And in 1996, I
was going through a
divorce of my own.
So instead of taking
option A, like my
buddies had picked, I
picked option B. And one
day I just sat down and
started writing and I
came up with an
unpublished book called,
Life Under the Neon Moon
Now that She's Gone and
Took the Dog with Her.
(Inspired in part by,
you guessed it,
Neon Moon by
Brooks and Dunn). It
was all about going out
to the dance halls and
the perils that guys had
to go through and it
read like stand-up.
But then as fate would
have it, the firm where
I worked was sold out
from under us and we all
got fired that day.
And I called everyone I
knew to let them know I
had just been canned and
you know I was amazed
with the number of
people who put me on
hold, except for my
grandmother. She told
me to go home and look
in the mirror and ask
myself, “Am I happy?”
She said, “Just start
out with that.” She
told me that I was
almost 30 years old,
and, “I never see you
smile.”
And I would like to say
that is what I did, but
I didn’t. I actually
went home and stayed in
the fetal position for 5
½ months. It would have
been 6 but unemployment
ran out in 5 ½.
And it’s a true story,
the UPS guy comes next
door and I go tell him
that I got fired. You
know when you are
throwing a pity party;
everyone is invited,
including the guy in the
ugly brown shorts.
I told him I was
fired. I was a single
dad. I didn’t know how
I was going to make ends
meet. And he looked at
me as if to say, “Good.
That’s one less box I
need to bring out here.”
So that afternoon I
went into the house and
turned off the phones,
the TV, all the
distractions and looked
into the mirror and ask
myself, “Am I happy?”
And the answer was no.
And then I said, “What
do I want out of life?”
I called my
grandmother, 4 hours
later and said, “The
only thing I’ve wanted
is to be on stage,
television, radio and
print.” And she said,
“Go for it.” I said,
“what if I lose the
house?”
She said, “Buy you
another one.” She told
me that, “I don’t want
you to spend your life
with the ‘coulda, woulda,
shoulda’." And this
was from a woman who had
just found out that she
had a tumor on her lung
about the size of my
fist and was dying of
lung cancer.
And that is what I
did. That was 1996.
And I have never looked
back.
I
did want to take the
time and thank Kix
Brooks and Ronnie Dunn
for that song and for
spurring on a comedy
career in a way I am
sure they never knew.
They both have no idea
that their song had an
integral part on
launching my career and
effectively saving my
life. It has been a
hell of a ride so far in
the last 14 years. I
have toured the world
and have got to meet and
work with likes of
George Strait, Brad
Paisley, Loretta Lynn
and Rascal Flatts. I
even got to do a show
with George Jones at the
Ryman with my daddy in
the audience.
I've made mistakes
along the way. But
I guess everyone does.
It eventually makes you
who you are going to be.
Not by the mistakes you
make but by the steps
you take to correct
them.
After all, country music
has always embraced
comedy. It's like my
friend, Jeff Foxworthy,
put it, “Country music
is the only form of
music that's always had
comedy associated with
it. You've got comedians
in the Country Music
Hall of Fame. And I
think it's because we're
both story tellers.
That's what country
music is, its story
telling. That's what
comedy is."
Would it have changed
the world? Probably
not. But then again,
who would have thought
"Neon Moon" would have
changed mine.
