1/21/2022,

Howdy y’all from Music City! Don’t let the above, tranquil picture of the downtown strip fool you. A lot of the tourists are huddled inside bars and restaurants today because of the cold. But Nashville is a raucous, rowdy town!

I’m limiting my time here to downtown and the Five Points neighborhood (there’s only so much one can do in a day-and-a-half), but I must say that it’s pretty eye-opening just how wild this place is. Even though the temperature was only in the low 20’s, tourists were already roving about everywhere first thing this morning. Bars were already packed by 11 am, and virtually all of the bars along the strip had live band after live band playing. I mean, they were already playing live sets all over the place by 11 am! The entire downtown presented a cacophony to the senses: the lights of the strip blazed neon, beckoning you to stop inside, and the sounds of laughter and music poured out into the many walkways that smelled of a bizarre mix of bbq, sweets, and spilt beer. You want to get boozed up and listen to live music at a Taco Bell? Go right ahead. This is a true party town.

Granted, I for one am not the type who starts drinking at 10 am, so my day so far has gone a bit different. First, as discussed in yesterday’s blog entry, I had to rove out of my hotel first thing this morning to find coffee, and found it at a nearby coffee shop. While there a strange phenomenon happened. In fact, it’s a phenomenon that I’ve been noticing all around Nashville when not on the main strip (the main strip is filled with packs of tourists and couples). The phenomenon is downright bizarre and may be just coincidence, but from what I’ve seen so far at least, the gender breakdown of the people actually living in Nashville is completely skewed. There appear to be far more women living here than men, to the point where when I walk into a place that is not on the main tourist strip, it’s almost kind of ridiculous. There are like 5-6 women to every guy inside. Like I said, I don’t know if it’s coincidence, if a bunch of women move here chasing dreams of becoming a music star, if women come here to go somewhere safer than the San Franciscos, New Yorks, and Seattles of the world, or some combination of all of the above, but it is definitely noticeable.

And you know what? These women are kind of aggressive! Desperate? I don’t know, but every local place I’ve gone to has had women (attractive women, mind you) attempting to strike up a meet cute conversation with me. Me! This is unheard of for me and really makes no sense when you think about it. Whether it’s a girl at the table next to me asking whether I really ordered a pizza to eat all alone at the restaurant, or several women at a coffee shop batting eyes at me and giving me cute smiles beckoning me to come say hello, the dynamics of the situation here in Nashville have been entirely altered from what I am used to in life. Anyone who knows me knows that I’m not exactly captain handsome. I’m shy, introverted, short, and women aren’t exactly picking me out of a room to strike up a conversation. No, the usual contractual progression for how things work between me and the opposite sex has been well set for decades in my life: stage 1 – she will literally feel nothing for me and find me short, ‘meh’ on the attractiveness scale, and above all, short; stage 2 – after spending a few weeks to a few months with me, something changes and she finds me endearing, funny, sweet, cute, or who knows what, and either really not that short or short but in a cute way (if a date is to happen with a girl, it happens during this second stage); and stage 3 – she changes her mind and decides no, I really am insufferably nerdy and kind of boring, and yes she could be doing so much more with other, taller guys. Those are the stages! That’s it. They were the George Costanza stages in Seinfeld, and they are the Rob Taylor stages. But here, the dynamics are completely different. From what I can tell, the only thing going through these fine Nashville ladies’ minds is stage 1 – well, he’s the only guy in this room full of women, and who knows maybe I can make something work for a while and get my mom to stop bugging me about my lack of having a boyfriend here in Nashville. Wow! What a stage for a guy like me! How refreshing! I’ll take it.

All kidding aside though, I’m having a good time in Nashville. I spent the late morning/early afternoon at the Country Music Hall of Fame, which was kind of exciting, and for exhibits had several of the original song lyric pages that country musicians had scribbled in their notebooks long before their song became a hit; and history and artifacts on tons of artists (Merle Haggard and George Strait most interested me – Merle because he had lived up in Shasta County, California where I am from and fun fact I had the honor of helping process the probate of his estate after he passed, during my time working as a research attorney at the Shasta County Superior Court (bet you didn’t know that piece of trivia about me); George because…well because he’s George). Oh, and the Taylor Swift Education Center was there, which I found really amusing because the doors to the place opened up to reveal a trashcan!

After visiting the Country Music Hall of Fame, I walked around, had a drink and listened to some live music at a very crowded bar on the strip, and then came back to my room to catch up with an old student on the phone about their career goals, write this blog entry, and recharge a bit before heading out for the evening. My time in the cities has been fun, but I’m also kind of glad it’s coming to an end. If you can’t tell, I don’t get much energy from cities and large crowds. I do my best to avoid the raucous and find something a bit more intimate and sentimental that speaks to me. In that spirit, tomorrow starts the next leg of this month long road trip (I’m already over a week in), and honestly it’s the part of the trip that I’m looking forward to most. It will be filled with many of the things that have meaning to me. There will be time spent hiking and in nature; time spent with former student siblings and their family; time spent with my sister and brother-in-law in Tampa; time spent with former friends from my UCSB college days; time spent going to Mass; and even time spent with my old high school locker mate. I’m hoping that though on the road in strange lands, the next leg of the journey brings me somewhere that looks and feels a bit more like I’ve come back home.

Until then though, there is like a 5 to 1 female to male ratio out there people!

I will write back soon.

Cheers,

-Rob