Jabs and jams, part 1.5

This time, it was a cosmic, serendipitous, path crossing of two Drumeos…

During an online conversation about drumming, fellow Drumeo member Shawna (aka Music Dragon) mentioned she was heading out on a road trip. I perked right up and asked about the trip. Numerous online conversations later, she mentioned that although she lives in North Carolina, Shawna was starting her road trip from her mom’s place in Florida. Florida? Where? Satellite Beach, about 5 miles from where my mom lives… And, she’d be in town for 2 weeks – overlapping with our stay. Gotta meet up!

Shawna joined us at our campground for dinner one evening, and, well, we ran out of evening. So, we decided to continue the conversation with another meet up at the campground, this time with a dress rehearsal for Shawna’s trip – yup, we were neighbors for a night while she tested her road trip gear.

• 

• 

Taking advantage of a break in her employment, Shawna’s heading out for 6 weeks to circumnavigate the US with Finn, her trusty co-pilot. They’re traveling in the Subaru Dragon Wagon that converts into the Dragon Covered Wagon at night, with all the creature comforts of a little RV. We really enjoyed hearing about her planned stops, while sprinkling in a bit of our color commentary and suggested sights.

• 

• 

Wow on Shawna’s music background… She’s an amazing musician having been a gigging for 35 years, including lead guitarist and vocals in a punk band. She also plays bass and drums. And teaches, records and does sound engineering. And can recall lyrics to spice up any conversation.

Shawna was curious about my suitcase drum kit, and of course, I obliged. We tried to measure how long it would take to set it up and break it down. We never did figure it out because we kept getting distracted by story telling and forgetting to stop the clock. (If we hadn’t, it would clearly have been some sort of new world record, or at least beat Jared’s record by at least 1 second.) I shared a less than 1 minute jazz lesson with Shawna while Doug benefited from a real guitar lesson on alternative chord voicings from Shawna.

Through another online community – people who travel solo – Shawna met up with Genna who would also be in Melbourne. They decided to connect live and launch their respective trips from our campground, so one more delightful evening of fun conversation, trading stories and getting to know each other. We’re grateful that the universe helped us intersect at the right time and right place. We wish them well on their respective adventures!

So glad I was so friggin’ nosy!