We no longer have a name, or maybe we have a new name every few weeks, but for me, we are still Pony Ride. We are the same people playing the same instruments with one change, we write all our own songs.

Last fall everyone in the band read my blog, All Kisses Goodbye and boom! It worked. They called me up and we all decided that we did have a good thing; we came back together. Every Sunday morning we play music and love it. The change we made is that we write all our own songs. It is different to arrange a song that is new. There are no previous recordings or artists to mirror it against.

So last week we played on Pacific Ave. I don’t really know why we did this. I got all dressed up ready to entertain, and what a disappointment. Either we are not noticeable, or the sunburned boardwalk spillover wasn’t into our folky sound. Nonetheless, we opened the mandolin case and collected $1.26. Pretty funny from a bunch of software executives and a bakery owner. It wasn’t about the money, but there was some need for validation that the open case seemed to beg.

I had just read an article in the New Yorker about the song writing machine. It is all about putting cliches to catchy “hooks” or tunes. I shared my readings with the band (Pony Ride) and we all went crazy . Writing a song, using a cliche as the opening tool, is a lot easier than telling a truthful or hurtful story about something. We have three new songs, all great. Great in our world, I don’t think a label is going to pick any of them up; but one never knows.

My song is called Devil’s in the Details, a somewhat truthful song about something hurtful that happened to my daughter. It is still on the sad side, happy is harder to write. It is a straight forward country song, verse, chorus, verse. It needs the banjo to jazz it up.

We may never play to a real audience. We are so happy in the living rooms of each other’s homes making our music, imaging a crowd swaying to our tunes, hearing our thoughtful lyrics. Sunday night I went to Moe’s Alley a funny low ceilinged cell of a bar. John C. Reilly, the actor, had a band playing old country that night. I went with my friend Lynn and we were excited. The night wore on before his band appeared and the young crowd was fairly juiced by the time he got on stage. The crowd hooted and hollered , especially when he roared “Shake and Bake” from Talladega Nights. That was the best of it. His opening Irish ballad was lost to the din of the drinking. The high note singing siren was not even heard. He tried to calm the crowd with “You get what you give.” No one heard him. I turned to Lynn, “Want to leave?”, she nodded in agreement.

After I dropped Lynn off, I turned on my Ipod to my band, and listened to us playing our songs, with our little mistakes and new ideas pouring in and out of the tunes. We all have worked so hard to get the chords right, the lyrics memorized and pronounced with emphasis on the important messages. I felt so bad for John C. Reilly and his band; they were playing their hearts out tonight to a crowd of rowdy drunks who were looking for love and fun and a little back round music to fill in the gaps.

Pony Ride may not be ready for the bar crowd yet, we are pretty comfortable in the living rooms.

I was in a band called Pony Ride. It was one of the happiest places in my life. It was a band made up of a group of loose connections all in love with the same old time folk sound that was woven into the music of the seventies. We all have teenagers and we all got along splendidly.

Pony Ride was named one evening when we jokingly said maybe we could be hired to play at birthday parties, and Caroline quickly piped in “Like a Pony Ride.” We coined the name and have tested many variations on the theme, but ultimately we became The Ponies in emails and references.

The Ponies have all ridden away. I am left waiting for their return, but I fear that there are greener pastures elsewhere. Nothing went wrong. Two of the members live in Palo Alto and bad traffic seemed to command the conversation at each gathering. Mike started writing a plethora of songs that he needed to sing, they aren’t my story, so I guess my job has been replaced in his new band Troubledoors.

I crave to sing with the Ponies, I miss the casual confidences. I waited so long for this feeling and I must not have held on tight enough, now it is gone. I harmonize now with the Troubledoors, but I want my big voice out in front. I loved being the singer and having the Ponies as my back up. Maybe that is what we all are waiting for, the back up band to the story of our lives. We long to sing the songs that are the poetry of who we are and have been. I had it for a moment. I hope I didn’t squander it. I want you all to know how grateful I am to have been a part of Pony Ride.

Peter wrote this song after our first practice, how true it was to be.

All kisses goodbye, all kisses goodbye

All kisses goodbye, all kisses goodbye

They’re not the same

No, no, no they’re not the same

They’re not the same

Some say goodbye,some say hello

Some make you high, and some make you lay low

Some say goodbye, and some say please don’t go

Some are shy, some let they’re feelings show

Sometimes the sorrow’s so sweet so sweet so sweet you never let go

All kisses goodbye, all kisses goodbye!