The day I met a guitar hero...

In the past five years, today has become one of those days when most folks prepare to commemorate a national tragedy.

But September 10th is, for me, a reminder of something quite different.

September 10th is the day that I met one of my guitar heroes (twice).

Here's how it all happened:

In 1987, I was a college student with my first serious girlfriend and a passion to discover any and all kinds of new music. The Fabulous Thunderbirds had just had a couple of hits and my girlfriend liked them a lot. I did some digging and discovered that, not only was Stevie Ray Vaughan's big brother, Jimmie, a member of The Fabulous Thunderbirds, but the music that appeared on the radio only hinted at their ability and their blues roots.

By that fall, I had a small collection of T-Birds LP's and was trying to learn all of Jimmie's licks. I then heard that the Fabulous Thunderbirds were coming to Nashville, so I immediately went out and got tickets. I think I told girlfriend that it was for her birthday, but it was really just as much for me.

At any rate, we drove up to Nashville early on the afternoon of September 10th, 1987, to mess around in the big city. Ironically, we were in my 1980 Thunderbird. If you're familiar with the Ford vehicles of that era, you probably realize that the drive seemed much longer than it actually was.

But on the way to Nash-vegas, we heard on the local rock radio station that the T-Birds were appearing at a local record store for a meet & greet and an autograph session.

Yeah! We checked the clock and the mile marker and determined that we could make it right on time.

When we got there, a small crowd was already gathered. We went in, bought an extra copy of 'Butt Rockin' for the band to sign and got in line. After a short wait, we were face to face with The Fabulous Thunderbirds! I thrust our concert tickets and my new copy of 'BR' in front of them to sign and exclaimed 'Thunderbirds! We drove here in a Thunderbird!" To which Jimmie Vaughan replied, "I hope it was Fabulous."

The gf and I errupted in laughter at that point and the band 'got it' as they all laughed too.

Then, in an eyeblink, it was over. We were out the door with our autographed tickets and LP. Someone else was now engaging the band in witty banter.

Gf and I then got something to eat, milled around town for a while and spent an inordinate amount of time looking for a decent parking place.

As we walked the several blocks toward War Memorial Auditorium, we realized we would be at least an hour early for the 8:00 PM show. We neared WMA and walked down the long sidewalk in the rear. About halfway down the walk, we saw one of those 'exit only' doors open just a few feet ahead of us...

None other than Jimmie Vaughan walked out the door and took about two steps away from us before turning to head in the opposite direction (toward us!).

The two of us must have looked rather dumbfounded, but JV actually recognized us. He neared us, made eye contact and sort of gave a 'thumbs up' sign and said, "Hey, Thunderbirds! How you kids doing?"

We said something like, "Duhhhhhhhhh", as Jimmie continued on his way down the walk to who knows where.

We giggled our way to the auditorium and enjoyed one of the best blues-rock shows I have ever had the privedge to see - including an 'altar-call' encore that had to be seen to be believed.

Thankfully, I didn't keep the girlfriend, but I did keep the memory of that night.

And I kept the autographed ticket (JV in red) and the 'Butt Rockin'' LP: