G'day Folks,

It's 3AM in the Blue Mountains. Carol, Josie and Livinia are asleep and I am sitting in front of the internet... again. I always tell myself to beware of newsletters written at this time of the day and to be particularly wary of those written in the Autumn.

Alas to no avail. It is during this season,when the leaves spin crimson to gold across our darkened forest lawns, that the vagrant moon in the charred clouds sings a special song of solitary beauty to my high dormer window, It never fails to awake in me a peculiar sense of Autumnal melancholy which tends to make me more reflective and resigned than it is ever wise to be in public. Unfortunate but inevitable.

I had intended to spend the year after Ron's death a little more quietly but, as with most of my best laid plans, it didn't quite work out that way.

2004-2005 retaliated by becoming immensely busy instead. Tours to Melbourne, Perth, Tasmania, Rockhampton and of course Tamworth for the festival in January ensued. Lots of new photos at The Gallery

Looking back, the songroad stretches out in a strange looping journey that straggles behind me like a smoke trail viewed from a distance; lazy, drifting, dispersed and strangely dissconnected now, as if it all belonged to someone else.

There are fragments of bright memory, even succintness, that linger with me....writing lyrics in a garden cafe in Burnie in early January, a late afternoon concert in Cobargo with Karen laughing at my fumbling introduction to The Marilyn Monroe song... but so much of it seems dissipated now by the long languid summer that casually intervened. If there was ever any continuity, it can now only be inferred, rather than remembered.

As a consequence, my travel journal, too long neglected, regards me with a certain nagging insistance as the days pass. The voluntary nature of it's agenda gives it's accusations a certain moral indignation that I would more commonly associate with a dust covered bible than an overblown diary. Not that I've written much of anything this year. I haven't even written a newsletter for over 8 months, a fact for which I know I should apologise but can't quite raise the energy.

(Yep...that last bit was pretty damn melancholy and self indulgent. This is going to be a long night.....What would Norman Mailer do?.....more brandy perhaps........gets up....goes to decanter....returns with Waterford snifter suitably refilled with Dorville Brandy...sits at imac... taps tentatively at keyboard...pauses)

Partially such neglect is the result of the constraints of travelling at such a rapid rate and partially it is a result of my demotivated personal headspace since losing Ron.

In my defence, I have, however, immersed myself in recent weeks in finishing the Chess Set Theatre Script which forms part of a large and recently completed upgrade to that Project.

The amended, expanded Interactive, including the script and the Project overview as well asome fairly favourable recent rev iews is now on-line at http://www.patdrummond.net/thechessset/index.html and will be native to the Second Edition. Peter and I are now recording the entire script for online sound streaming later this year. Which means that it is finally finished. Thank heavens.

I should add that, thanks to your overwhelming support for what has been such an exhausting and unusual project, the first edition of The Chess Set has now completely sold out. The second Edition will be available in mid April.

"The Chess Set" certainly grabbed a fair bit attention in the Country and Folk Music Press. Major articles in Cap News , Country Update and Trad and Now sparked enough interest to launch three singles from The Age of Dissent with plans for a further two this year.

That, of course, means more touring. We will be presenting a limited number of Chess Set Theatre Shows in a number of centres around Australia this year including -: The Clarendon Katoomba, The Melbourne Trades Hall, The Yarrawarra Aboriginal Centre, Corindi (near Coffs Harbour) The Merry Muse Folk Club, Canberra in May, At The 'Hats Off Festival' In Tamworth and The Pioneer Valley Country Music Club in Brisbane in July, and at The Illawarra Folk Club In October; all of which will see me covering significant ground again.

I must admit the road has been a bit exhausting lately as the geographic leaps between the shows seem to grow more extreme.

At one level, I suppose that it has been exciting, even flattering, that the demand for the shows has become truly national in the past ten years. Whereas once, my shows were all Sydney based, now it's fairly standard to find myself in Melbourne, one weekend; Brisbane the next and Perth the week after.

Between April and August I will be on the road fairly constantly again and some of distances involved have meant that planes, rather than my truck, have become the standard mode of travel.

On another level, however, it has all come with a cost and a not unexpected one, at that. I always knew that the touring musician's existence was fairly incompatable with the demands of family life...which is why I avoided 'the road' for so long to begin with.

At home, Josie, our darling 'straggler' daughter is now ten and Livinia, our semi resident grandaughter is almost four.

Both of them were less than enthusiastic about my sudden disappearances for weeks on end this last year and I have been forced to reflect that our other three children Matthew (31), Peter (29) and Meghan (23) never had to put up with any extended abscences from me during their childhood.

The 70-80's were a time in which I never travelled at all. At one level I suppose never wanted to; and, at another, I never had to.

The Sydney Pub scene was thriving; the demand for original music was strong and, dare I say it, yes... I was younger and getting to bed after a 3AM lug out from a rock venue was not a problem.

And of course ...there was always Ron, Mal, Wayne, Brooksy, Fiona and the other friends/crew to help.

In the 90's, my natural market became the festivals and the concert circuit. The emphasis on my writing as a journal of my own (and by extension, my nation's) ethical and social life through that decade made for a much more solitary and gypsy existence.

It was a lifestyle that led me across the beauty of the Australia's National Parks and Coastline and through the lives of many extraordinary people but...well... after 15 years I must confess that 'the long and winding road' is wearing a little thin for my family and I.

This week I will finally make it into Southern Western Australia with shows in Albany, Perth and Margaret River, the last major region that I have not covered in my travels. In a way it will bring things to an eloquent conclusion and the desire to tour, at least in Australia is, for me, now somewhat diminished.

Losing Ron has, as you would expect, had a fairly profound effect on me; causing me to become less interested in the journeys and the work and to be more focused on my family and my home.

About this time last year, our 'little' family (Carol, Josie and I) moved to a far quieter location in the Mountains and, after living in the tourist resort of Leura, the long days at home at Medlow Bath in what is effectively a 'cabin in the forest' have surrounded me with a pervading serenity that makes it increasingly difficult to leave. Between the trees, the sky and the high mountain storms there is a harmony and timelessness from which I find it hard to tear myself.

The towering sandstone escarpments at Point Pilcher and the winding rainforest road down into The Megalong Valley where Josie rides each weekend has, at least for the moment, captured me. With the internet for connection and my six grandchildren descending from time to time it's social enough to be fulfilling and and quiet enough to be reflective.

When I am not touring, the activities of our Record Company and my domestic duties occupy my days while Carol and Josie are away at school and work. I'm learning to cook, albeit with a lot of recipes that involve red wine. I've mastered the dishwasher and the iron and I'm even approaching the washing machine with far less trepidation these days.

Carol, after her success at TAFE in recent years, has plunged into the challenges of her Degree and is currently the Director at the Centre at Lawson and she, too, makes no secret of the fact that she would like me to come home and settle down.

I suppose that even Sam Gamgee did that eventually.

She reminded me recently of the years that we struggled with two infant children to gain my Teaching Degree which has hung so long unused on the wall above my office desk.

And of the fact that on September 7th, next year (2006) it will have been 30 years since I walked out of the Classroom at Lidcombe Primary School and strapped on the Maton Messiah that would become both my muse and my taskmaster in those early years.

In what seems another in a series of closing circles that guitar, stolen in 1996 has come home also.

A phone call in the early morning last spring and a poignant meeting in Newcastle brought my old friend back to me. My grateful thanks to Geoffery Wormald who wanted nothing more than a few of the albums I had recorded with it for it's return. It was incredibly generous of him. He had found the page on my internet site that offered a reward for it's return all those years ago but wanted only to see it in my hands once again.

Well... The Brandy is gone . The sun is coming up and a 6 hr flight to The West coast awaits...'The road goes ever on....' at least for now.

Karen and I also have a new album in the works and the long awaited solo Children/Family album is on track for release later in the year.

I will be planning a special event to mark our thirtieth Anniversary next year so pop it in your diaries early.

Lastly I must tell you that The Fundraiser at The Harp Hotel, Tempe, run for Ron's family and the Leukemia Foundation who did so much to support him and his family during his last year was a resounding success. The Foundation has sent us a lovely letter thanking you all for your support

All The Best

Pat