Notes from Twin Valley Ranch

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

I put the dogs outside this morning and, for whatever reason, found myself thinking about something I learned from a relationship a long time ago.

I’m a data guy. I notice patterns. I notice when things don’t add up.

Somebody can tell you they love you. They can tell you that you can trust them. But trust and love are in the showin’ up, not just the tellin’. It’s being honest. It’s doing what you said you’d do. It’s letting your actions agree with your words.

I learned a long time ago that I don’t need to catch somebody in a lie to know something’s wrong. There doesn’t have to be one big betrayal. Sometimes it’s just enough little inconsistencies that eventually the math ain’t mathin’.

And when the math ain’t mathin’, I tend to lose interest. I think that’s more about self-preservation than love failing.

I don’t need proof that somebody’s deceiving me. I only need enough inconsistency to stop risking my heart on them.

I don’t know what brought all that back this mornin’. That lesson must’ve made a pretty good impact on me back then for it to come wandering through my head all these years later.

Just goes to show, good or bad, we all make an impact on each other’s lives. Sometimes that impact travels a long way through time. People leave things in us. We leave things in them. Maybe nothing ever really leaves.

And apparently all of that is what goes through my head while I’m standing on the porch, peein’ off the edge with the dogs while they finish their morning business.

Some folks wake up thinking about breakfast.

I wake up doing relationship math.

Now I’m gonna go sit in the porch swing, pick my guitar and drink my coffee. Lord only knows what I’ll be thinking about by lunchtime.

Lane

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

This morning I’m sitting in the porch swing, pickin’ on the guitar, sippin’ my coffee, and watchin’ the sun come up. That sunrise was brilliant and beautiful. With the humidity down, the view has a crispness to it I can’t quite explain. Maybe I don’t need to. I can just sit here and enjoy it.

They say it’s supposed to get back into the mid-90s today, but if it’s like yesterday, it won’t feel that hot. After the heavy humidity, that change in the air feels like a gift. I’m not asking the day for much more than this.

A little coffee, some time with the guitar, and a morning sitting still in the porch swing. The lower humidity is blessing enough for today.

Lane

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

That brilliant harvest moon was something to see. I don’t have a grand thought to attach to it this morning. Sometimes a beautiful thing can just be beautiful. You notice it, take it in, and feel grateful you got to see it.

It feels like fall now, and the leaves will soon start to change colors. We don’t usually get the brilliant display they see in eastern Tennessee and the Carolinas here. A lot of times, rain knocks the leaves off before they have a chance to show us those true colors. I can’t say what this season will bring, and I’m learning not to expect the land to follow my wishes and just let it show me.

There’s rain in the forecast this weekend, and I ain’t complaining. Around these parts, we need it to replenish the water supply, especially after drought touched Sumner. I’m hopeful we’ll get what we need, and grateful for every bit that comes. If the rain does a number on the leaves, so be it. Water matters more than a pretty show. Kinda like life I guess huh?

For now, I’ll be thankful for the feeling of fall and hopeful for the rain.

Lane

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

The dogs had to go outside this morning, and they were persistent about making sure I knew it. So I took them out. That was how the day began here, with no big plan or grand announcement. They had a need, they made it clear, and I answered.

There’s something honest about that kind of insistence. They don’t dress it up or pretend the need can wait. They let you know, and if you love them, you pay attention.

A ranch morning can start with a song in your head or a list of things to do. This one started with the dogs coming with me to pee off the porch and watch the first glimmers of light grow over the ridge to the east. Maybe that’s a good reminder: life often asks for our attention in plain, ordinary ways. Sometimes the next right thing is simple. It’s noticing who needs you and showing up.

Lane

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

When I woke up this morning, I had these words in my head:

‘All this livin’s gonna kill me
Dyin’ ain’t no way to live.’

I grabbed my phone off the nightstand and wrote it, well, thumbed it 😂, before I even got vertical. And no, not because I’m trying to die. Quite the opposite. I’m trying to live every moment of whatever time I have left as fully as I possibly can.

Do everything you think to do. Try everything you think might add something to your experience on this rock. Go places, love people, make mistakes, laugh hard, learn something, change your mind, take the chance, eat the damn dessert. Learn to be humble. Learn to be kind, to everyone, not just the ones you choose. Because we all get out of here only one way anyway.

I’ve spent enough years worrying about tomorrow, preparing for trouble, and surviving things that hadn’t even happened yet. I don’t want to spend what’s left of my life doing that. I want all of it. The good, the bad, the funny, the painful, the beautiful, the ridiculous. Whatever life still has left to hand me.

Not because I’m trying to become somebody new, but because I want everything I still get to live through to keep shaping the man I’ll eventually hand back to my Maker.

All This Livin’s Gonna Kill Me.

I really love this one, and I can’t wait to sit down with my guitar and turn what I woke up hearing in my head into something I can actually hear out loud. ❤️

Lane

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

My music and the work required to put out an album have kept me largely away from everything else this past week. Somebody asked what one of the animals had done lately that made me smile, and I couldn’t come up with an answer. I’ve been that wrapped up in getting these songs ready to go out into the world.

It’s work I’m willing to do every once in a while. These songs matter to me, and I want to give them the attention they deserve. But I’m looking forward to being outside all day again. Working with the animals. Watching the seasons change instead of letting another week slip past while I’m busy inside.

Mostly, I’m ready to soak up some sunshine that doesn’t feel like I’m sitting directly on the gates of hell, temperature wise.

I love making music. I also miss having more of my day available for the life that gives me something to write about.

Lane

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

Now this is a proper ranch mornin’. ☕️🐦

Coffee on the porch, hummingbirds buzzing and darting in for their breakfast, their little wings humming through the quiet while that green Tennessee hillside stretches out beyond them. The morning is still, the coffee is hot, and for a few minutes there ain’t much in the world that needs tending to.

Feels like Twin Valley Ranch is saying, “You’re exactly where you need to be this morning.”

Hard to beat this kind of company. ❤️

Listen alongside this story → Before the World Wakes Up

Lane

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

One of my rescued dogs did something that might not sound like much to anybody else. After two years, she came down the dark hallway leading to my studio just so she could be by my side.

She was dumped out here in the country. I don’t know what happened to her before she came to us, but the fear she carried makes me believe somebody gave her reason to be afraid. She has always been uneasy letting me out of her sight. But tight places scared her even more.

For two years, that hallway stood between where she felt safe and where she wanted to be. This time, she made it through.

I keep thinking about how small that distance must look to somebody who doesn’t know her. Just a hallway. A few steps. But when you know what it took for her to walk it, you see something else entirely.

I can’t undo whatever happened before she got here. But I can be here on the other side of that hallway.

Lane

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

Hope in Public

The world doesn’t need more quiet hope. It needs hope on shirts. Hope in public. Hope in checkout lines, gyms, truck stops, grocery stores, ballgames and walking down the street. Hope passing by somebody who is doing everything they can just to make it through another day.

September is Suicide Prevention Awareness Month, but hope shouldn’t need a designated month. Wear it. Say it. Write it. Sing it. Share it. Live it. Spread hope in as many ways as possible, because you never know who is barely hanging on. You never know who needs one small reminder that somebody gives a damn. You never know when a few words from a complete stranger might become one more reason to stay.

And if you’re the one struggling today, call or text 988. Please stay. There is still more of your story to be written.

Lane Alan Dumser

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

Forgiveness Is a Beautiful Thing

Sometimes in our lives, the way we chose to deal with something had an impact on another person that we never intended.

Yesterday, I got a very special phone call from a woman I caused deep emotional pain when we were young, completely unintentionally and unknowingly, while I was trying to figure out my own life.

That struggle doesn’t excuse the way I handled things back then. I know now that while I was trying to understand myself, I hurt people who meant a great deal to me. Many people, actually.

She had looked me up after more than 40 years, and yesterday we finally had time to talk. I was given the gift of hearing that I was forgiven.

It’s odd how life looks after six decades on this old rock. You look back through older eyes and see things you were completely blind to back then.

There are some things you carry for a very long time without realizing how heavy they have become until somebody helps you set them down.

We can spend years understanding our own pain before we fully see the pain we caused while trying to survive it. Sometimes life gives us the rare chance to acknowledge that, ask forgiveness, and hear it granted.

Forgiveness is a beautiful thing.

Lane

Listen alongside this story → Where The Quiet Meets My Soul

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

Yesterday, I turned on the porch light at a new home for my music in the digital world. This morning, I stepped outside and the ranch didn’t feel any different. Truth is, it never does.

This long Tennessee summer has overstayed its welcome. The heat is expected back in the nineties today, but they say later this week may finally feel different. I’m ready for a cooler morning and the first hint that fall hasn’t forgotten us.

I think of this place as my own Number Three Beekman Place. I take great joy in knowing that no matter how much thought I put into livin’ here, I’ll never do anything that changes its bones. The window dressin’ may look different over time. Things get moved, added, taken away, worn down and made new again. But the calm underneath it all stays the same.

Maybe that’s part of why I love this land. I don’t have to improve its soul. I only get to live alongside it for a while, pay attention, and try not to disturb what was already whole before I arrived.

A new website went live. A porch light came on somewhere beyond the ranch. But here at home, the same old peace was waiting for me this morning.

Lane

Up on Twin Valley Ranch

Well, it’s been a quiet week up on Twin Valley Ranch, where I write among the rolling hills of Middle Tennessee.

When I stepped outside for my morning pee off the porch, I immediately noticed the cooler-than-usual air and the extra humidity. I was surprised I was even up that early. For the third night in a row, I had been working past two in the morning.

For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been building a new website to replace the current LaneAlanDumser.com. I’ve come to think of the site as more than a music website. It is my front porch and my home out there in the world.

The current site does its job, but it feels like a stoic, static list of songs. I wanted the new one to feel alive. A place where people can settle in, look around, discover a story and listen for a while. Something interactive, but still quiet enough to feel like me.

It is almost ready. There will not be a big grand opening. Just a soft opening, probably sometime in the next day or three. A front porch does not need a ribbon cutting. You leave the light on, make a place to sit and let folks know they are welcome.

Lane