How strange is it that on the same day I posted a blog entry about my father, titled Sentimental Journey, I attended an event in the evening that was also called a Sentimental Journey? The emphasis on the second SentiMENTAL Journey was on the word MENTAL. It was a benefit concert at the Floyd Country Store to raise money for mental health awareness, headed up by Tommy Edwards, former Virginia Tech star football player who was once known as “Touchdown Tommy.” In between musical sets, one of which was his, Edwards talked to the crowd about his own experience with mental illness. He started the Heart of Virginia Foundation in response to the Virginia Tech shootings last April. You can read more about The Heart of Virginia on their webpage HERE.

Bernie Coveney, who I recently wrote about in a story for The Floyd Press HERE, is the one who prompted my husband and me to attend. Bernie’s latest band, Bernie Coveney with Natural Selection, was some of the music featured. The Natural Selection of this evening included (from left to right) Mike Mitchell, Abe Gorsky, Bernie, and Martin Scudder. There was a bass player playing behind Mike whose name I didn’t catch. Here is a clip from the evening of them playing Bernie’s song, Cherry Wine. Other bands that played during the evening were No Strings Attached and Blue Mule.

Mike Mitchell performed two tear jerkers. One was John Prine’s song, Paradise, about the destruction of land by a coal mining company, which you can hear Mike sing HERE. The other was from his current CD, Thirteen Hours. Natural Selection also played a selection of songs from Bernie’s new CD, Whispering Pines. In between bands, raffle drawings, and silent auction prize giving, we had carrot cake and neighborly chats in the booths in the front of the store. I bought some penny candy but had to spit out the fireball because it was too hot.

~ Colleen Redman is a writer from Floyd who blogs daily at looseleafnotes.com. Her writer’s bio can be found HERE.