Before my ashes to soot, dust to dirt moment, I can catch a ride in the comfort of Ron’s verse, back to a place on the far side of the wire to a free range of the mind. The past will be your constant companion, a shadow rider on the ridge that you couldn’t outrun, even if you pushed’er Hell-bent ‘til dawn. So it is with a hard-won honorary degree from my own school of barroom philosophy that I decree: It is Ron Wallace’s gift of the music of language that gets me through those nights that are so black I start prayin’ for the blues.