Write It Down: My Time With L.T. I don't own the clothes I'm wearing, and the road goes on forever, and I've got one more silver dollar.

His perfectly rectangle fingernails, worn from years of playing honky tonk songs on a guitar, are pressed firmly against the fret board as the first chord rings out from the busted up instrument. The pure sound is quickly countered by a course voice that travels from behind his gnarly, crush n’ run beard. The troubadour’s hair is long and fading at his temples, it is usually covered by his tattered Confederate flag ball cap.

The man’s name is Lionel Timothy Titus Bowen, or as his friends call him, L.T. the Midnight Rider. Like his name, his story is long and his memory is tainted by years of hard living. Some things he cannot recall, but at least tries to remember as much as he can. Similar to the spread of the sawed-off shotgun he was once arrested with, the holes in his memory are wide. Thursday, Sept. 10 Meeting L.T. There is a bearded duo sitting on the bench a little ways down past the crosswalk. They both hold a guitar, plus a third that is on the ground. One man looks to be about 35. His glossy hair is pulled back into a ponytail. He holds a classical guitar. L.T. is much rougher. The first thing you notice is his beard, it’s home to miscellaneous items secured by rubber bands. He wears two belts and a backwards hat. At first glance, he looks like a crazy man. “Hell yea brother man, it ain’t got a high E string but you’re welcome to it!” L.T. says from behind his adorned beard, his words like gravel. We play a few songs. The younger beard and I switch off playing lead and rhythm. The older beard searches the neck and matches the chords. I’m sweating and my friends are back to grab me. Collin, the one with the mocca classical and I trade numbers. I doubt we will ever call one another. I shake the big mans hand. He tells me his name is ‘L.T. the Midnight Rider.’ He doesn’t look like he has held many silver dollars in his day. The brief trio returns to a country duo.



Friday, Sept. 18

It is 11:30pm as I leave Gringos for Buffingtons. There is a Southern rock group playing. The band, ‘Fall Line Rambler,’ is good and the attendance is poor. They’re covering ‘Can’t You See’ by Creedence Clearwater Revival. I order a beer and head to the restroom. Before I can make it to the hallway, L.T., the toothless, bearded old man stops me and gives me his phone. I tell him I remember him and he hands me his pay-as-you-go phone as he says,

“Put your number in it. Put the word ‘music’ behind it so I know why you’re calling me.”

L.T. and me go outside, he needs a cigarette and wants someone to hold his guitar. The back door of Buffingtons opens, cutting the lingering smoke. There are more people in the alley than in the bar. A tall blonde girl asks if she can play a song, pointing to his guitar. L.T. bums a light, tugs at his beard and hands the girl his cherished guitar. He is eager to see her play.

For the next twenty minutes we both watch her through the openings on the railing. She covers Fetty Wap’s ‘Trap Queen’ —flawlessly.

Back inside, L.T. tells me that the guitar being played by the old man on stage is a magic guitar. He feels no need to explain. I shake L.T.’s hand, tell him I will call him and hand him a few cigarettes as a show of goodwill. “I ain’t got nothing else to do but play guitar. I’ll call you tomorrow, I got your number,” he tells me as I walk to the door.



Tuesday, September 22th

I call L.T. at 4pm on a Tuesday to take him up on his offer. I tell him I am coming over to play guitar. “Come on over man, I been waiting on you all day,” L.T. says. “Hey uh,” he pauses. “Bring me a pack of Pall Malls will ya?” he finishes. I tell him no problem and swing by the gas station. A sorrow-eyed woman is blocking the steps to the apartment where L.T. lives. I say hello but she counters and tries to sell me $50 worth of food stamps for $25 cash.

L.T. lives in apartment number 6. He greets me at the door and welcomes me in. The apartment is very clean. There are two couches, a busted stereo, a stack of Kid Rock albums and a coffee table. There is a young black man sitting on a couch and a broken grandfather clock in the tope-colored corner. The coffee table is home to two open bibles and a plaster bowl used as an ashtray. The young man shakes L.T.’s hand and leaves.

“I’m a preacher you know? Well no not really. I am a priest,” L.T. says. “I’m a Levitican Priest. Means nobody ordained me. God ordained me when I was born.” He talks about his faith while be strum a few songs and listen to ‘Bawitaba’ by Kid Rock. He smokes a cigarette.

“I couldn’t even read till I got thrown in Jail. When I was in there they just gave me a Bible and I taught myself to read.” L.T. says.

“Who are those pictures of in the clock L.T.?” I ask him. “Those are all my kids,” he says standing up. He walks over to the clock, opens it and removes a watch. “Check this out, I made this for my son,” he says. The watch is cheap with no working parts. In place of a clock face there is a wallet cut picture of a child. “That is my daughter. She died not too long ago,” he says, matter-of-factly.

We play a few more songs; smoke a few more cigarettes then I head out. Why was this guy in jail? My mind races as I get in my car. I tell L.T. I’ll call him.



Wednesday, Sept. 30

“Hey man I’m down here in front of Blackbird with my guitar. You coming?” L.T. says over the phone. I tell him I am on my way. I bring two picks because I know L.T. won’t have one. The air is sticky and downtown is in a lull. He waves to me from across the street, wearing shorts over jeans and a silk kimono covered by a Bobcat tennis sweater vest. A rebel flag hat with “Country Boy” stamped across the front is on his head. “Swing man! You got a pick? Lot of people down here, we could make some money,” he says as he puts his arm around me. He calls me ‘Swing Man’ because he thinks I am the sultan of swing. Don’t ask me why. But if I am the sultan, then L.T. is Guitar George who can only afford a cheap guitar. I hand him a pick. We start to play until his strumming ceases and the words to “Simple Man” are abandoned mid-verse.

“I thought that might have been my daughter for a second,” L.T. said. “I guess she’d be about that age now.” His eyes look lonely above his beard, which is decorated with miscellaneous pieces of parking lot jewelry tied into it with rubber bands. He sounds weary.

It is so hot my guitar is sticking to my clothes. After a few songs its time for L.T.’s cigarette break and we go out the back of Blackbird. We leave the guitars unattended on the bench, his idea.

“Swing man, look down there,” he says pointing at a Black & Mild wrapper. “Go down there and grab that crayon. We can use that to write down all the songs we write,” he says. I tell him it’s just a wrapper, but he insists I pick it up for proof. Our next stop is Dodo’s, the antiquated pool hall that has a plywood façade where a sign would go for a normal business. The AC in Dodo’s is nearly as cold as their beer, which is a welcome change.

We sit toward the end of the bar near the door next to the hotdog rollers and started asking questions for my story.

“Lionel Timothy Titus Bowen,1-31-62. Write it down.” I order two beers. “Jared Allen Wesley Bowen, write it down” “Emily Elaine Anne Bowen, write it down” “Carly Jean Anne Bowen, write it down” This continues until I have the majority of his family tree. I stop him before he starts another branch or a sect of once removed cousins.

I learned, over time, he is from Clarkston, Georgia, the youngest of 10 children. His mother was a saint and an author. His father was an angry drunk.

“I coulda gone pro in pool when I was younger. But that was when fooseball came out. I was all about that hand-eye business,” L.T. says, eyeing the bartender. He continues to open up to me about his past.

“I was married in the eyes of the law, but never the eyes of God. We got a divorce. God says you’re married to that person forever. We ain’t together now so we were never really married,” he explains.

L.T. retired when he was diagnosed with manic depression and bi-polar disorder. His children live in Milledgeville. He had four children. One is dead. But he tells me that he has countless children. “Every time a kid was in need, we would bring them in and give them a home. I called all of em son and daughter. I’ve raised hundreds of kids,” he tells me. I continue with my prodding questions. He answers most with a gruff mumble. At the moment he is more interested in employing the ashtray. “My mother always said she wanted to come back after death as a butterfly,” he says, ashing his cigarette. “The day she died our house was surrounded by a whole mess of ‘em, everywhere.” he says. I look at the bartender as she turns her back towards us. It’s covered by two rows of butterflies that float over her shoulder blades. She also wears a butterfly pendant. “Hey, I sure do like your necklace! Love butterflies,” he says to the bartender, pointing to the pendant, suspended in her cleavage. “I know you do L.T.,” the twenty-something sarcastically reply’s through the rising smoke. She hands him another Miller Lite tallboy and draws a heart on the cap. L.T.’s eyes are gleaming. But then two more women walk through the door, one tall and blonde, the other short and tan with dark hair. “Look behind you brother, a Swede and a Cherokee. Which one you want?” he chuckles “Which one you want Swingman?”

L.T. pulls out his knife and asks me for a guitar pick. “Watch this. Women love this,” he says, carefully carving a guitar pick into a heart, which he gives to the bartender. She smiles whole-heartedly and admires his creation before stuffing it in her Daisy Duke shorts

We move from the bar to a table back by the jukebox. L.T. knows I need to ask some more questions. He tells me his father and uncles played guitar and taught him when he was a boy. He makes it sound like his father was Johnny Cash. I know his love of music is real, even if his other stories leave me with doubt.

“When I was in prison in Jacksonville, I was put in charge of the music room. Before me no one got to use it at all. Too many fights!” he exclaims. “Until me that is, no one would fight in there because if they did, they’d have to fight me first,” L.T. says.

“How’d you get thrown in jail?” I ask, unsure if this will be answered. He pushed dope and speed until he was 30. He only stopped because the cops kicked in the door, took away his sawed-off shotgun he swears was only used for shooting snakes and then took him to prison. Lionel did two years in Jacksonville with 13 years probation.

We head back to the bar and listen to L.T. as he talks to the baseball capped man on the other side of him. They start talking about guitars

“I teach it all man. Rhythm, chords, power chords, hammer on’s. You name it.” L.T. says to the man. I over hear L.T. tell him he has been playing guitar for couple years now.

