The KANSAS KIDS episode! Morgan is from Wichita, Kansas and when she was 23-years-old she moved away from the only place and people she ever knew to chase a dream in Nashville. Her own dream chasing inspired this episode with fellow Kansans, songwriter Nicolle Galyon and country artist Logan Mize. Nicolle and Logan also moved away from Kansas to chase dreams in Nashville. They opened up about their experiences from being judged for moving away, how they handled the transition, if the move was ever not worth it to how Nashville AND Kansas played significant roles in each of their lives.
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Personality with Morgan Juelsman at Astra per Aspera. This means to the stars through hardships. Now, this is the state motto of Kansas, and I have grown up loving this phrase, maybe because it's I'm from Kansas, or maybe because I love what it means. I love that it stands for dreamers and chasing your dreams and doing things in this life despite the hard things that are.
Going to come.
I'm sharing this not just because I love the phrase, but because this is the Kansas Kids episode. I brought on Nicole Gallion and Logan Miz, both fellow Kansas like myself, so we could talk about chasing our dreams and moving away from the state of Kansas to Nashville, Tennessee, and just moving away from your hometown in general. I wanted to do an episode on this because I often get asked in my DMS was it worth it to move away from.
Anything and everyone you knew? Would you do it again?
Are you glad you're still there? What does this all look like?
So?
Who better to answer these questions than fellow dream chasers and people who moved away from home and who both moved back.
So my wonderful sunflowers.
Let's talk chasing dreams, moving away and what that all looks like. This is the Kansas Kids episode, and I have got Nicole Gallion on here. Nicole and I have become friends in recent years, especially over our loved connection of Kansas.
Nicole, how are you wonderful?
Good to see you?
Good to see you? Now, most people are going to know you because you're in.
Fabulous, fabulous songwriter, and you're really well known in town. But I genuinely have be come to know you as Nicole from Kansas.
I That's how I want to be known.
So I want to talk about not just kansas Is in general, but really the purpose of this episode is people who have moved away from their home state when it was kind of.
Unheard of and not something that a lot of people did, and chase their dreams.
So before we get into that, though, like tell me kind of your origin story when you started writing and wanting to chase the dream of music, and when you were first starting to think, Okay, I don't think I can live here and do what I want to do.
So I went to this thing when I was in junior high with my mom called at the time as Fanfair, which did cmafest. I'm sure all of your followers know what CMA Fest is. But back when I was in middle school, my mom and I went to CMA Fest like Fanfare, three or four years in a row, and it was my first time on an airplane to go anywhere. So we came to Nashville and I just learned about this place called Belmont, and I remember like just knowing like, oh, I have to go there. I have to be there now. Granted I had never been to like any other city, but it was totally like grand design that I came to Nashville first and fell in love with it. So I always at that time like I just knew that I needed to be in Nashville. I didn't really know the why. I just was for sure that I needed to get here, and that is really the way it worked out. I got here, went to Belmont, and then I learned about songwriting. It was so weird because I like, I have a job that I didn't know existed when I was growing up in Kansas. And I'm sure you're in the same boat where you're like, I have a job that I didn't know I could have, you know, I mean did you think you were gonna win a CMA.
Or you know it's like now in social media, no working in social media side of that, yeah.
No, yeah, a hundred percent. So I guess like Nashville is the thing that like spoke to me more than songwriting. And then I got here in that songwriters and I was like, I think I'm a songwriter because I was always a writer, Like wrote in every way that I possibly could, you know, and whatever my hometown had to offer me, like your book, or I wrote for our small town newspapers in the summer, Like as a journalist, I'd go to the city commission meetings and like write the copy for the newspaper. I just loved writing, very creative. So it makes sense now in hindsight. By the time I didn't really know, but I love going. I actually just spoke to high school in Kansas last week, and I like saying yes to those things because I feel like when they learn about my job, the lesson is there are jobs that exist outside of the box that you don't realize, especially when you're like in a rural area and you're not quite as connected. That's kind of where it started, and I ended up getting some cool gigs along the way, Like I was a personal assistant in college for a booking agent okay at Willie Morris. I did that job for four years.
Did you interact with a lot of people that you're like, what is my life right now?
Yeah? And I got that job when I was eighteen.
Wow, so you very much for what is my life?
I was like, wait a minute, A year ago, I was the church pianist in Sterling, Kansas. And now I'm like throwing like parties at this big, fancy house for all of these artists that I grew up listening to on the radio, and those you know, those those moments actually really like propelled me forward because I got to observe like so many guitar polls at my boss's house, and all these artists would come in and just sit around the piano and sing or the guitar, and I'd be like I started to feel that like ache of oh I want that in my life, and I think I can do that. Yeah. You just never know, Like it's not just like a to B like, oh, go to school, get this degree that turns out to be your job. It's like, who would have thought that my job? Most of my job was taking care of my boss's dog and driving him around. And somehow without that job, I don't know that I would be a songwriter.
Yeah, it was.
Like all the different courses in life led you to where you are right now. When you were considering, when you're like, Okay, I know I want to be in Nashville. When you're kind of having that conversation and that's starting to happen and you're about to move from this place, the only place you've ever known home, what was it feeling like for you And what was the experience you were having with other people as they heard you were choosing to move.
That's such a good question. And things that come to mind were like, I remember my high school like guidance counselor you know, like your like junior year and your meeting and like she had never heard of Beaumont and kind of I didn't have any judgment over it, but it was just like you know, you when you go in and you like get accepted to a school and you're like, tell you know, and you've done well in school and you've worked really hard, you have good GPA and your act and all that, and you want to be like and I got accepted here and you're excited, You're excited about it. There was just kind of like this blank of like, well, we don't know what that is. I remember just having to learn just put blinders on and do my own thing. And it wasn't that hard for me. I've kind of always been a tunnel vision in a good way. I've been like locked in.
Yeah, I get like I know what I want and I'm going to go for it.
Yeah, I love to execute so not people, but yeah, okay, And so that was And I do remember years later my mom told me that she was probably the biggest champion for me, like going and taking the risk, and you know, I mean, we couldn't afford for me to go to Belmont. You know, it didn't make sense on paper, and I'm getting a degree in music business, Like whoever makes it in that. You know. I never knew it at the time, but I think my dad was really scared. And years later my mom came back and she's like, you know, I had to really like champion you behind the scenes, like with your dad and with your grandpa, because like your grandpa, I was a volleyball player and your grandma's just like your grandpa loved watching you play sports, like he was so sad that you weren't going to go to college and play sports. My mom just had my back in that way, and I never knew. And like, I'm glad that I didn't know that other people had doubts, because I may have taken that on a little bit myself.
If you would have known at the time that your dad had felt that way, do you think it might.
Have pulled you back a little bit.
Or questioned yourself or were you still so tunnelvision it wouldn't matter.
No, I probably would have I'm pretty headstrong. Probably probably would have made me like challenge it even more and maybe even want to move here more. Not despite him, but because it would have made me. We're like all people are like mirrors, you know, and we're like constantly pinging off of each other our thoughts and when somebody says something, you're trying it on of like does that make sense for me? Do I feel the same way? Does that resonate? And I think if anyone would have said that's stupid, and I'm sure people in my class thought it or something, a few of them were like, what if she did I don't know that it would I would have absorbed it.
That's a good quality trait.
Do you realize that now too, Like, oh, that's a really good thing that I have that ability to kind of block this noise out and just do what I feel is best for me.
Yes, it's yes, And I think that I'm like, I don't I can't take credit for being that way, but I know that I am that way. In fact, my best friend we were just on audio message a few days ago and she was like, I was trying to make a decision of like do I commit to this or not commit? It was like a thing and it was something around travel, and she just said, well, one thing that I know about you is all my friends, you have like the most sovereignty over your life, where you do what is right for you. And maybe I do that even to a fault where I'm just like, maybe I disappoint other people sometimes, but I always tell my daughter this too, I'm like, somebody's gonna get disappointed. Just make sure that it's not you disappointing yourself.
That compliment from your friend is amazing.
I bet hearing that you were so thankful that not only do you feel that way, but somebody feels that way over your life.
Yeah.
And then also that you can now teach that to your daughter and she gets that lesson very very early instead of later on in life.
Yeah.
And everybody's wired differently, you know. And I as long as it's not hurting someone else, you doing the right thing for yourself just causes like a ripple effect of other people around you. I can't tell you the amount of friends that have like gone into the studio and made records later in life and stuff. I think because I they were like, oh wait, that doesn't seem as scary on that.
Level of like you helping your daughter with her experiences in life. What's some advice you would have for somebody who's considering the big move from everything they've done and they want to chase their dreams but they're so afraid to. What's something you would tell them. Well, I don't know.
If it's advice, but it would be just sharing that I was homesick for years. I've seen like my little brother moved here from Kansas. He's seventeen years younger than me, and I remember telling him I was like, just FYI, this place didn't start to feel like home for like five years. And I think that that it's not advice, but I think it's helpful information because I think when people do make a big move somewhere, even if it's just to go to college, it always appears like everyone else has found their place and you haven't. But really everybody else is not everybody, but most people are feeling that ache of oh, I don't fully I haven't fully planted myself here, you know. I don't feel established. I don't feel like I belong, you know. And so I think just knowing that that's a common theme for people that have gone before you will keep you from power sucking yourself out of doing what is right for you, because I do think that loneliness can like just take you out and feel like, you know, I think that's just part of it. It's like the rebuilding your identity and all of that, and you kind of have to start a square one.
Yeah, And you know, something I wish people would have told me is, yes, you can always travel back home, but you will miss things. There are times you will miss things back in your hometown, whether it be with your family or experiences because you just can't make it back. Whether it's travel, work, whatever related, And those were probably the hardest, most homesick moments.
For me one hundred percent.
Same because you and I both are super family oriented and we love being very close with our family, and missing out on those things, I felt like I was missing out on experiences, so I often had to kind of have internal conversations where it's like, yes, but you are chasing this dream and this is important right now. Yeah, and you make the time when it matters and you will always find a way to make up for this.
So it's almost like I also had to have this backbone.
For myself of you deserve to chase this, yeah, and it's going to be okay, even if it feels like you're maybe not making the right choice family wise or whatever it might feel in that moment.
Did you have that too? One hundred percent Because I think it comes back to values. If family is something that you value a lot, like you want to show up and invest in that, but also then you have to ask yourself, like what do I value with myself? And I think everything comes with a cost. It's just like you kind of just and there's no right or wrong to it. You just kind of have to look at it and go, Okay, no matter what I choose, I'm going to sacrifice something. And I think it's also important to remember in those moments, Like for me, I there's one of my friends, I missed her wedding. I think it was when I was on the voice actually.
Which is a very good reason, and it's a wedding I want to miss one.
It was kind of an unexpected reason. But and then years later she was like pregnant or something and had to miss my wedding. So you think, oh, maybe you don't want to talk yourself into one thing fills off, so you throw the whole thing away. Most journeys are like peppered with moments of like things that aren't comfortable. Just because it's not comfortable to miss something doesn't mean that that your life is necessarily going in the wrong direction. Yeah, and there's seasons. I mean then there's like now I'm in a season where I'm missing things in Nashville a lot, and those missing things back home and like just staying on my staying the course I think kind of prepared me for this season where it's like, no, that's not for you right now.
What made you decide to make that call because you guys were living in Nashville for so long and I know you still love it here, but you did move back to your hometown and now you kind of split your time between both, which is definitely a big balance that you have to do. So what made you decide to make that call at this point in your career?
A lot of things. It just felt right, and I think in hindsight, it's something that I always wanted to do. But you have the opportunity because so many things have to line up logistically, you know, I mean full transparency, just like finances have to you know, you have to have the means to be able to to split time between two cities and to be able to turn down opportunity and all that stuff. And so we've been incredibly blessed first and foremost to be able to do it. I like the version of me that I am the most when I'm there, When I when I think about the fact that, like, you know, we all turn into our mom you know what.
I mean, we do we do.
So I started to go, like, what version of me what I want my kids to turn into? And also like a lot of it comes back to motherhood because I think the greatest gift that I can give my kids is for me to like get my anxiety and my nervous system, like get it right and to get it calm, and to bring that into our home. And I, you know, for so many years and I stand by, like as hard as I worked, and all the things that I have taken on and all the things I'm still doing, but I had a life that was like a lot of pressure, and I just kind of got to a point where I was like I cannot stick my finger up and say hold on a second, like one more time while I'm on the phone to my kids, be like hold on, hold on. I just felt like something just hit me where I was like, I'm about halfway through their childhoods how have we done this first half of the game? Go into the locker room at the halftime and go, okay, what are we going to do second half? You know, what are we going to change on like the offense of our family? And I was like, Okay, I've missed being a missing things. I mean, I've missed a lot of school pickups, I've missed some I've been there for most of it. But I was kind of like I think that's I think that we can have that here, you know. And I just drew this like big geographical boundary between me and all the temptation to work all the time, and I just I don't know that I ever wanted to leave. It was just what was true for my story. Yeah, you know, and I'm so glad that I did, because Nashville has been like I feel like Dorothy, you know, I came to oz and like the world turned to color in a lot of ways, and I learned so much here and I still am. But I think taking that home and like taking all of that stuff that I've learned and experiences that I have, I love giving like feet, like taking that energy almost like I collected like all of these little jewels. Yeah, and I took them back, like Doroth, you know, to like my hometown, and now I'm kind of like sharing them there. Yeah.
It's like for you, Nashville had to be a big important role in your life to be who you are in this space now back in your hometown. And that's really special because not only that you I think hearing that now back to what you had said at the very beginning, was you know.
I just knew I wanted to be in Nashville. I didn't know why, I didn't know what.
It looked like, but there was just this huge part of you that felt an importance to the city, this place, and I think there's people out there that feel that often. I remember so so well. I had posted a picture in college with one of my friends and it was I'm sad to say bye, but like, I'll see you in Nashville. Sometimes I wasn't moving to Nashville. I didn't have any goals of I knew I loved the city, had never been here, but I knew it.
For some reason, I loved the city.
I knew I loved country music, and that was it. But for some reason, I kept saying I'm going to live in Nashville, and even still I got out of college, you got a job back in my hometown, and I was like, Okay, you know, maybe that's just.
Not for me.
And then somehow somewhere it was like job opening, Oh you're going down, Oh you're getting the job. This is all happening very quickly, and I felt so compelled that I knew it before, almost like the universe was ready to give it to me. You know what, I mean, and that kind of feels like you too.
Yeah, I think the older that I get and maybe you feel a switch too, But you look back and you're like, I knew more than I knew that I knew. Yeah, my friend Betsy always says, my feelings aren't in English, hit, I can't put them words yet, and I love that. I think I had a knowing similar to you. It was a sense. I think I can sense things in my heart and my gut that my head can't quite understand yet, but I trust that. And it's the same thing with moving back. It was like even when people would ask me why, I would have answers, but I just knew that I had a knowing that that was the right thing or the next thing for us as a family and for me. Ask me in ten years, and I'll be able to actually, in hindsight tell you, oh, well, I didn't quite know this yet, but I knew enough to get myself there and to live my way into it and to see all the whyse like, I'll tell you the whys later, you know.
Yeh, yes, that's so good. I'm going to use that.
Now.
What did she say, my feelings aren't an English yet feelings.
I need that more often than not. It's kind of related, unrelated.
I do want to talk to you.
A little bit about your husband too, if you're comfortable with that, because you guys also have.
A unique love story.
I remember you saying at one point, again, we've been around each other so many times, We're like, I just never expected this one. So was it a similar kind of situation with him where something about you knew understood but maybe your brain was like there's no way.
Okay, Well, this is kind of on both themes of like Rodney and my husband, and also Kansas and small town Rodney's also for those of you that don't know him, he's from a very small town in Texas, even smaller than Sterling, like Sterling's twenty five hundred. Groover, Texas is fifteen hundred. And I remember growing up having like at a very like preteenage and you start to think about boyfriend or like, you know whatever, and I remember being panicked that I would never meet somebody that would like where I was from, Like that was a thing for me, Like I must have known that I was going to leave and go somewhere that was like more of a metro area. But I knew that it wasn't gonna work if he couldn't, like if if I couldn't bring him home, or he looked his nose down on my little small town.
You know.
Now I'm married to somebody who, like he would call Sterling maybe not his hometown, but it might as well be because he loves it. There's so much and maybe the lesson in all of that is like we all know ourselves so much more than we realize. You know, I was too young to connect all those dots, but yeah, I mean, Roddy's older than me. He you know, had had another marriage and kids before, and so like on paper, you know, it wasn't like that was like what I thought was going to be my future. But I remember that one of the very first conversations I ever had with him, and he said something about we're talking about like small town or something, and he said something about the Fellowship Paul, which the Fellowship Paul. I don't know if you had that way. I grew up in a Methodist church, and the Fellowship Paul is kind of like the gathering area that like isn't the sanctuary, but it's like where they would have a kitchen and they would put out folding tables and like people if they got married in the church, they would.
Have Okay, know what you're talking about now. I just didn't realize it had a name, but that's what it was like.
And he said fellowship. Paul, and I had lived here long enough to like really be in that like lonely of like nobody really understands where I come from. And I felt like when I talked to him, I was like, you are my people, you know, I don't know it's my person, yeah, but I knew.
There's something in my life I'm just not sure where.
Yeah. And he was honestly just kind of like a really good friend for a long time and somebody that I think and then through my job that I referenced before, we ended up in the same like social circles all the time. So we didn't really have like we had a lot of overlap in like seeing each other at a lot of stuff, but honestly, like we emailed a lot, Like I would email him like, hey, so I got this job and my boss says, we're going here tomorrow and we're going to see these people, Like what do you know about these people?
And he was like a good friend.
He was a really good friend, and he had done a very similar like thing where he was splitting time between his hometown and Groover, Texas and coming here to write, which here we are like full circle, and that he understood like the perspective that I had, like as a new to Nashville person and especially like coming from just the culture in the Midwest. And I remember one time I told him what I was going to be doing, and I was like, what do you think? He was like, just remember you don't have to see things the same way as other people. You know, you can have different beliefs in them and not judge them for it. Because I think I was like such a like conservative small town kid, that things were a lot more black and white and right and wrong, and I hadn't quite leaned into that gray area of life yet that I think we all eventually get to and then we really embraced that. And he was, you know, I was like probably a self righteous, little like golden girl from hometown, thought I'd never done anything wrong, and he would call me out on my shit and it'd be like, you'd get over yourself, Like people have different beliefs than you, and you know, and if you're going to be in this business, and you're going to you're going to be around a lot of other people. You can be around things that are not right for you without taking on. And so those were kind of some of our early conversation. At the time, he was still farming with his dad, so it was almost comforting for me, Like I'd send him an email and be like, oh, I was on the tractor and I'd be like, oh, that reminds me of home. So like we just had so many if we were like a Venn diagram, we just had so much overlap that it you know, I guess.
It was kind of like it was faded before even though it was coming. Yeah, at what point because it was such a good friendship where you like, oh, crap, this is.
More than I thought this is gonna Well.
I remember realizing that I would call him. He was the first person I would call when something really great happened or when something really bad happened. Sometimes that's like your best friend as a girlfriend, or sometimes that's your mom, like and I felt like I had gotten to a point where he was that person and I was like, Okay, yeah, you're my person, and we weren't dating or anything. It was just like we might as well be because you're my person.
You know, who had that conversation first?
Who initiated that, because it's always that touchy thing because your friends, and you're not sure even.
Think it was a conversation. I think it was just like a moment and then you know, we're having some emotional conversation about something, and then I think I just said, well, because I love you and I'm telling you, and it just like came out so naturally, and then you kind of can't go back, and then you can't unhear ye that, and you can't unfeel how natural that was and how true it was, and it was just like a matter of fact.
I remember that although that you guys had such a natural connection, not just as people who wanted to be together, but like as a friendship, that then it just was so seamless into that next phase.
Yeah, he is my best friend in every way. I remember my mom told my mom had come out to visit me one time and she had met him in passing. And then a year year and a half later, I was like, hey, so I'm dating this guy. She's like, I knew when I met him that is the kind of she's like, I knew, at very least that's the kind of person that I know. You're my daughter, that's that's your kind of person.
And well, this is also why we become our mom is because they often know us better than we know ourselves.
Yes, they can see we're all like right here and at least have a more of like an aerial view of our life. And I can kind of see I can feel it with my daughter.
I was gonna say, do you feel like now you've kind of had that mom instinct and you're like, oh, now I get the bird's eye view all the time.
I never had this before.
Yeah, yeah I do. But my daughter is a lot more like Rodney. She's a little more mysterious. Okay I was. I was like so forthcoming and like a very open book.
Do you feel like your son might be more like you? Yes, so, at least in pictures. I can feel that more energy.
Fort and I like wear our excitement like when we want something, we wear it on our face, like if we're disappointed, if we're excited, if like we're very eager, very driven. Self starters like high energy have a lot to say, and Charlie is a lot is more like Rodney where she's kind of like you know, and it's so cool to me because I'm attracted to that personality type. So it's I'm like, good for you. It's gonna serve you well.
Oh Nicole, Well, I mean I loved talking with you so much. You for me kind of like Rodney was for you, not.
But like you're a piece of home for me that I send to you.
I just texted you the other day asking for a dermatologist recommendation in Wichita because I didn't grow up in Wichita and I don't really know many people there, but it's like my hub now for you know, it's where the Target and Whole Foods and Trader Joe's and you know.
You're driving to town. It's your little trip.
I call it Richitah because.
It was never rich Da I love there, don't.
Well. I call it Richitah because there's different levels of like what people feel like. You have you seen those memes of It's like you feel rich when you like get to a point where you like always buy like the guacan Queso, or you always let yourself do something you know you you know didn't do growing up. And I think for me, like getting to go to Wichita and just like go spend a lot of money at Target is like your meme of that. It is my playground of like Okay, I'm going to the big city. I'm going to Richitah, I'm gonna go spend a lot of money. Like there's not a lot of plays spend money around here, but I'm going to find a way.
Maybe your next venture is bringing some things to Sterling.
I actually it's definitely on my radar. I think it's a long play for me. Like I'm really just observing right now for a while. I just like want to live there and like find the best way to maximize like my gifts and my resources to be able to give back to Sterling and I do as much as I can. I'm going to speak to the fas Schneider's at sixth grade class on Monday. We're actually going to do the Saint Jude T shirt picture together on Monday. So like I just love doing, but I think there's some big things that I can do long term. But I just want to find what the right things are because I don't want to like spread myself too thin. I want to find like one or two really big ways to give back, you know. And Rodney's always like, you just need to like create what you want here, and I'm like, what, I really like a really good restaurant, but I don't know if I want to get in. But I don't know if I want to get in the food business. I'm a songwriter.
Maybe that's more of an investment than like the full you know, you being involved.
There's options to these things, yes.
I think like I've started to have people come out and write with us in Kansas, and at first that was like a little like honestly insecure because I love it there and I see it with these rose colored glasses, you know, like I look at a wheat field and its art to me, and it's home and it's comforting. But like other people might look at my little downtown and be like, what is this.
That's a childhood little wound that's in there that you felt all the time.
But every time I have someone out, they're like, I needed this. I love it here. There's something special about your town. And I do think that like certain places can kind of like have a spiritual like anointing to them I think places have memories, and I think there's like some kind of like aura in Sterling. That's but I.
Also feel like it is attributed to you as well. You have the aura of.
That small town.
Oh well, I know God put me on this planet to live in a small town because I can feel what happens to my spirit when I go to like in La. And I don't know, like if you thrive when you go, like my best friend she goes to La to come alive, I literally am so depleted when I go there, and like it's like when I can just see that water tower in my hometown in a distance and I'm like five miles away, I feel like I my heart expands and like I don't know, like I'm just taking in oxygen. It's so good for me. And so people feel that way about the ocean, and I don't expect anybody else to feel that way about where I come from. No, But it's.
Because I think I don't know that people understand well enough about energy of people. But when you're around somebody with an energy of a deep feeling of something, it doesn't necessarily even have to be of themselves, but like if they feel so deeply and so securely about a thing or whatever it may be.
You can feel that, and you pick up on that.
You're like, oh, I want to feel that too, and I think that has a connection to you in general, just like you're this string that ties it together.
Thank you.
Yeah.
I hope that I can, I guess, spread the gospel of the small town you are every time someone comes there like, oh I love it here, listen.
I'm so glad and I seriously I would keep you forever because we could talk about some flowers and we.
Feel all tame.
We really could, but we have to save that for another time. I'm really glad that you are here. I want to end on one thing. For someone who is in this position right now that you and I were in. Maybe they didn't have a soul calling, but maybe they're like, I have to move, this has to happen. What would you just kind of tell them, like, if they're contemplating everything, every life decision, and they're sitting here, maybe like this could be your daughter or your son one day and they're sitting here trying to decide if this is the decision to make.
What do you think you would tell.
Them that you already know what you want. I think if you're wrestling with it, you're fighting yourself, you're talking, you're trying, probably trying to talk yourself out of being you. I think usually you know, I mean, I think we all know what we really want, and I think more often than not we try to talk ourselves out of being us and just accept that that is something that you want, and you know what happens. If my second part of the answer'd be like, you know what happens if you don't, you don't know what happens if you do. And it's so true that curiosity is what you need to lean into of going what happens if I do try it.
I love that.
Well. Thank you Nicole for all of your wisdom and for coming on and being not only a great representative of the state of Kansas.
But also of small towns. Thank you Jesus forever.
The Kansas Kids episode continues. Logan Mice is joined with me right now. Logan, you have been part of my life as a friend, as an artist, as so.
Many different things. So it's really good to have you here.
How are you good? Thanks for having me on. Yeah, this is fun. I've met your dog She's awesome and she's now at my feet, so I feel like we're buddies.
She is.
It's kind of the therapy room with her. She likes to come in and make sure.
Everybody is like prepared for what's going to go down in here.
I don't love it.
I love it.
Well, thanks for coming on.
I want to talk to you about Kansas is kind of the focus of this episode because I have Nicole Gallion on also.
You and me are both from Kansas.
It's just a whole thing and we left Kansas and take our dreams and have done all these things.
You're from Maze, right, Yeah, from Maze. I'm in Maze all the time.
Sorry to interrupt, It's okay.
And you're from Andell, which is a much smaller town than Maze.
Yeah, I'm from Clearwater, which is where I grew up and went to school. But I mean, Andel's where my kids go to school, That's where I live. I got married there. It's kind of the hometown though.
Yeah, okay, So I want to break this down. At what point for you when you were growing up where you're like, Okay, I want to be an artist and I'm going to move away from here.
Well, it wasn't that much of it wasn't that clear of a decision. I was just like, I couldn't never stick with anything, like I was kind of a meandering idiot, honestly, but I and I wasn't like a great singer by any means that I had to like the work at that. But I loved music. I loved songs, and you know, I just a night out for me as a kid was like begging my parents to take me to Witch Talk so we could go to Blockbuster Music. And I don't know if you remember that.
Yeah, Blockbuster Music, Blockbuster Music.
I'm showing my age a little bit.
I know there's like Blockbuster for DVDs, but Blockbuster Music.
There was a Blockbuster Music. See that's how much older I am the new Okay, so thirty nine, full disclosure, that's only eight years.
That's not that much.
Okay, Well it must have closed down at some point. It was it was amazing. First of all, you would go into this big section and it was like the lighting was cool, and there was music posters everywhere, and there was rows and rows of CDs and you could go just you could find anything. And so I would beg my parents to take me. We'd go on a Friday night. I'd spend hours in there. And my parents like music too, so that was like what I loved. And I just I didn't know that I wanted to do music. I just that was where my heart was. But I couldn't stick with anything, you know, I couldn't stick with piano lessons. You know, I dropped out of three different colleges. I just was a mess. And that was the one thing that I always felt passionate enough about where like I can stick with that. I'm gonna go to Nashville. And I was writing songs and stuff. So when I just fell in love with it, That's that's how what got me here.
Okay, so you dropped out of college three times. Yeah, I did not know this.
Yes, why what happened?
I just couldn't pull it together. You know, I have a wandering I just can't squirrel, you know, everywhere, and I can. I love to read books if it's on my own terms. Like I love to walk into a library, pick something up, read it. But like if I'm sitting in a desk with fluorescent lights and somebody's talking and telling me what I have to read, and what I just can't. I couldn't even stay awake. I would fall asleep constantly. And that could be due to me being in my dorm room just playing guitar and trying to write songs all night, but I just yeah, yeah, And so I dropped out of a I went to hutch Community College. I was in the football team there, quit the football team, dropped out of school. Then went to Southern Illinois, dropped out of school, quit the football team there. And then I tried Wichita State for a little bit and made it two weeks, and I was just like, I'm not I can't do this. I'm not cut out for it.
Well just wasn't for you.
I couldn't do it. And so yeah, all I have is a high school degree. But that's when I was I was really good at like I loved outdoor jobs like I you know, I did construction and stuff. I could make a living doing that when I moved to Nashville until I was able to get my you know, songwriting going.
And what was it like for you when you first moved to Nashville where you're like, Okay, I'm going to move here and everything's just gonna work out or you're kind of hoping that and then it did or it didn't, Like, tell me a little bit about that.
I know a little bit about your backstory.
But yeah, gosh, I feel like we're talking about me a bunch right now because I interrupt about you. Okay, well, no it's not. That's the hard part I've had about being an artist. But we can jump into that later. No, well, okay, I didn't know. I just was enamored by the whole thing. I loved it. There was a community that wrote songs. I didn't really know what a publishing deal was. Honestly, I just knew there was songwriters here because I would read all the labels on the back of the CDs, you know.
And that was how you knew about songwriters.
Yeah, so I would be like, oh, this guy wrote this song, this guy produced it. So I felt like I knew all the names, not only country, like any genre that I was into. But I was in the middle of it and that was good enough for me, and so I got a job right away. The one good thing I did I got a CDL driver's license when I was in college. So it was like a two week course, and which.
I've heard is pretty tough to get.
Well, I'm good at that stuff. I'm not good at a lot of things, but I can drive anything. So it was like go through the CDL course, and I always had a truck driving job. I could get one pretty easy. So I worked for a construction company in Hendersonville driving a dump truck, and that's like what I did from seven to four every day. And then i'd get done with that and I would just come down and either Playwriter's Night or go check out other people play. I just loved the whole thing and I wanted to be successful at it, and I would dream about the day that my job was writing songs all day, which eventually happened, but at the time I didn't. It wasn't like an urgent feeling like I have to make this happen now. I'm just happy to be here. It felt free.
Yeah, you finally felt like you were doing something that mattered to you, or being forced into doing school and all these.
Things that didn't feel right right.
Yeah, I love your story because I think you have so much resilience in what you've done, and obviously Kansas loves you and your music has grown beyond that. But you got this huge start in Kansas. So you had come to Nashville, you did the songwriting, and you found your footing and what you wanted to do. When did you realize, like, oh, well, my kind of target demo is Kansas, and I got to work from there.
I was pretty aimless. I got a publishing deal early on, like a year and a half after being here. I got a publishing deal with a guy named Brett Jones. And there was tons of songwriters around. It was a houseover in Belmont and Dallas. Davidson had like the lower half of the house. So Jamie Johnson and Ben Hayes Slip and Red Akins and Billy Carrington and all these guys. Luke Bryant, these guys were around all the time. I got to know a lot of them, Bobby Pinson, Anthony Smith, and they were just coming in and out. And I was this twenty one year old kid like learning from people who were really good at it. I didn't have a clue what I was doing. I just loved it, and so I kind of got a really good crash course in songwriting from some of the best writers in town. But I didn't know what to do with any of it, and that publishing deal dried up after a year just to went sideways and I was immature, and so then it was like back to I think I was weed whacking ditches and smyrna. After that, you know, we're trying to find another publishing deal. And it wasn't until I met my wife Jill, three years after I moved here, and she's the one that actually said, well, why don't you just make a record? You know, you should just record some of this stuff. You have all these songs, which you would think that that would have occurred to me before, but it wasn't. It wasn't something that I was really you didn't.
Have an I'd come here just like I love music. This is something I think I might want to do. I'm not really sure. Yeah, you're just kind of fumbling your.
Way through, fumbling through totally fumbling my way through still him. But yeah, So she kind of was like, well, you could, you know, give away some of your publishing or your master rights or whatever and get some people. So I went through some family, her family whatever, got enough money to get in the studio and record ten songs and made a record. And you know, I learned on this you know, I still was brand new at singing in the studio. I didn't have my voice. I didn't know who I was as an artist. But I had these songs that I felt were decent enough to start with, and I just released it independently and there was a DJ in Wichita. I sent it to Rick Reagan. I don't know if you remember him, Rock Rock and Rick Man. Yeah, Okay, dude's the bomb. And there was this kick it or flick it like competition they had on Fridays, and he one of the songs on that album he put I think he shouldn't have done it because I'm just this unknown independent artist. He put it up against like a Brad Paisley song. And which song.
Was this that you had sent him or that he decided to play?
It was a song called Ride in the Middle off my very first independent album, Okay, which I cringed thinking about some of those. But anyway, when you're twenty one, you know, maybe don't put that record out.
Yet, you're busy.
Yeah, So he played it and like the whole town rallied behind me, and so then it was like, well, maybe I should go try and play in Wichita. You know, we have a song that's getting played on radio there now, and so we did and it sold out. So then we were able to go there and play shows, and before you know, after a couple of years, we could sell out the Katillion, which is you know, seventeen eighteen hundred people.
It's a really good venue in Wichita.
Yeah, we just kind of drew a circle. Randy Rogers band, they're the fiddle player Brady Black. I talked to him one night and he was like, man, draw a circle where you're where you can sell tickets, and and then little by little, just try to get your circle bigger and bigger. And I was like, oh, good idea. So I did that, and I was my own booking agent and slowly grew it. And it grew a lot to the north. You know, south is the Oklahoma red dirt Texas scene, and for whatever reason, you know, it felt saturated, and I was the Kansas guy, so and I was living in Nashville, so I would didn't really get into that scene. But it grew really well to the north and west and east. So it was like Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, Missouri, the Dakotas and it all just kind of next thing you know, we have an agent and it just grew by itself so well, not by itself, I had, you know.
Yeah, but from this one song and the song that you're embarrassed by now, but it was a song that started everything.
Yeah, there was a song on that album called Boys from Back Home and it didn't get played on radio, but it was kind of the organic grassroots song that kind of spread through little college towns and stuff like that.
I remember that one blowing up. I want to say, what year was that that you put that one out?
Two thousand and nine.
Yeah, I was in high school. I remember all of the guys in high school because it'd be like Friday night football, everything's happening, and you hear that song on repeat.
Yeah you know what I mean.
That was a song that I remember in college around football season. I remember that time literally in high school existing and this was the moment that I discovered you.
It was Boys from Back Home.
Wow. Mm hm, I can't do maths. Y.
Yeah, we got to stop looking at the numbers because it makes us will feel older.
But yeah, that was the that was that moment.
That's so crazy and was it hard for you?
Okay?
I really love this because I love Kansas. It's my home and it's cool being back here. But was it hard for you being the Kansas guy and like exploding from there? I imagine like I've had the privilege of talking with Randy Rogers and Josh Abbott band, who are very Texas guys and right there known as the Texas guys, and there's some there's pros and cons to that. Yeah, So what was that like for you? Like being that Do you wish that kind of didn't happen in that capacity?
No, I don't have any regrets as far as that goes. I just knew that I for me, I felt like just a wet dish rag that needed wrong out.
You know, you just conpared yourself to a wet dish well.
You know, I was an immature guy that just had a big dream and I didn't really have any idea how to get from A to B. I just needed the experience on stage. I just needed to figure out, like I needed to keep writing and keep recording and keep playing it. And there was no timeline of I need to get to this set point. By this time, it was just chipping away at the block and I'm still doing it. But yes, I became known as kind of the Kansas guy. But songs transcend that, and you know, if the right song happens and you connect with your fans and you're genuine, you know, you're authentic with them. No, no, that matters. I don't think which.
Song for you? Obviously Boys Back Coom was a big one, but which.
Song for you?
Were it kind of blew up and you were watching it happen and you were like, is this real?
Is this my life? What's happening here?
Yeah? The first one was Can't Get Away from It? Well, there was one called used Up was played on Serious XM the Highway, and that kind of led into there was like I'd been recording with my road band here in Nashville. I think Roundhill Music is where it's at now, but it used to be called Quadraphonic, and there was an SSL board in there that we loved how it sounded, and we'd go in there and just me and the road band, and I'd come in and be like, here's the songs we have this week. I'd book it like once every three weeks. So we had this group of songs. Used Up was one of them, and there was another one called Can't Get Away from a Good Time, and I took it to Serious XM. They started playing it and it was doing really well. Back when singles sold and we were selling close to I think I had to look back at the numbers, but we were somewhere in the realm of like the ten thousand a week sales, which there was a few songs that had hit that before. I think one of them was col Swindell's first single, and then one was Cruise Fuller Georgia Lyne. So it was tracking really well and it got me my first major label deal, and it was all pretty surreal. I might have gotten in my own way on that whole thing, but it was really cool to see something finally working and seeing the town kind of go okay, well there might be something here, because before it was just like another idiot kid trying to be an artist in town.
You know, why do you think you got in your own way like fear?
And I think it was I was signed with this massive record label, Sony Records. You know, I'd done dozens of showcases and been shut down, so failure didn't bother me. And getting rejected like you get thick skin, I don't care I think when it started to really take off and I knew it was going to go to country radio, I think that I lived in this perpetual fear that like, wait, they're pushing this artist, and when they opened the door, they're all they're going to see is I have like a couple of little independent albums behind this. I didn't really have anything to back it up. And I still don't know if I knew exactly who I was as an artist and what my trajectory was. And so I think, and the song was can't get away from a good time? Like am I going to be that can't get away from a good time guy?
When I'm forty, like you know, you like, I don't know that I can keep up with that one.
I have kids, you know, I'm trying to learn how to be a dad. I'm on the road constantly in a van. It was just I felt like I was drinking through a fire hose, and so I don't know that I put my best foot forward, and I you know, looking back, I'm glad that didn't explode. I'd be done by now, you know, I would have I would have self imploded.
You had mentioned the part of this where you're like, I don't like the fame side.
Is that what you're kind of referring to maybe.
A little bit. I don't. I don't have a problem with music connecting and I did, you know, obviously I want to sell tickets and I want people to for my music to be part of their life. I think the thing that really, when you get out there on the radio tour and you're part of a major label trying to launch an artist, it becomes more about them trying to sell the product, which is the artist, rather than a body of work or something. And that felt really weird to me. I felt like, Oh, I need to be back in the studio working on more songs and I'd be writing more and instead you're just going around showing your face and shaking hands. And I felt like, I don't know, I just felt really uncomfortable with it.
Yeah.
I don't think that's uncommon either, you know. I look at people like Christapleton, Sam Hunt. These are people that don't typically like the spotlight and the stuff that comes that. They just want to make music. Yeah, so there's an avenue for it, but it's certainly a difficult avenue because there is this you know, shake hands, kiss babies, and do the thing you're supposed to do.
Yeah, And it's nothing against anybody in the industry or the people I was meeting. I've not met very many bad people. It was just the uncomfortableness of, Hey, everybody look at me. That really really didn't sit well with me.
Does it sit well with you like now in a way or do you feel like that was just always a part of you and you were like when you were kind of coming up realize this was going to be part of it, you kind of like, I just wanted music.
I just wanted to do music. I didn't really know what that looked like.
Well, it's gotten a lot better the more music I put out and the more time I have to kind of figure out, you know, what it is I want to do. And you got to figure yourself out. You don't know when you're twenty something years old who you really are. At least I didn't. There's some people that do, and good for them. But yeah, it's I think it's I needed my ass kicked and I've got it handed to me a lot, and it's just it's been really good for me. You know. You kind of just take a couple of steps back and focus on actually what's important.
You know, mm hmm you did too, Like when you first moved away from Kansas, did you have people in your family or even anyone just kind of around you like what are you doing?
What's happening?
Yeah, And there's people that I could bring that up to now that would and have that would deny that now, you know. But there was some really there's some things said that I was like, Okay, I mean you remember it, and you want you want to say that you're not holding grudges and I'm not gonna let that stuff go. But it definitely doesn't give you the warm and fuzzies. It didn't make you want to run back and you know the feeling right you did you experience that?
Yeah, I mean I remember it being really hard because Kansas in general, the values are just like it's family. You're close to your family, and you stay close to your family.
And you don't leave.
So anybody who is thinking of leaving in any capacity, it was like, why are you leaving?
Why? This place is amazing?
And you're right, You're like, yeah it is, and I love it here, but like there's a whole life out there. For me that I'm wanting to see what, you know, what's out there, and that was just uncommon. It was uncommon that people were leaving in that capacity. So you just feel met with constant questioning. And you're already questioning things, right because you're like, I'm moving away from everything that I've ever known, and I already have questions myself, and now all you're doing is adding to it.
So now I have multiple questions. This is not good for me.
Yeah, do you feel that, like, yeah, like I'm already all the questions that you're asking me, I'm already asking myself, so now I have to answer them, you know what I mean. It's just then there were people that were encouraging, and you remember that forever that like people looking at you like you're sure about that? You know plenty of that.
I don't know if you feel this way now, but I'm so glad that it happened in the way that it did. I feel like everything panned out exactly how it was supposed to. Do you feel like that, even despite like the things that you went through and the failures and what came, do you feel like it did pan out in the way that it was supposed to do.
Absolutely. Yeah, I mean I feel really like at a good place now where I feel comfortable with myself and comfortable with what it is I want to do. Having kids young for me, And I don't think this is for everybody. I'm not saying it is. I really needed it, Like I was just so stupid.
That's a different perspective.
Good.
I know, it's like, don't have kids to fix things? Like it was.
Just really good for me to like have another responsibility, something else to worry about besides myself. Yeah, that perspective gave me perspective.
And I don't know this answer.
Were you and jil married before you guys have the kids or no?
Yeah, yeah, we got married we had kids shortly after.
Okay, so, but you had enough like around and about an understanding of your life to have asked her to marry you, like you weren't totally not put together.
Yeah. Well, I think in my head I went like, well, if this one gets.
Away, couldn't let her.
Yeah, I was like, God, bless her, She's probably a saint, you know. But yeah, I knew I always wanted to be a dad, and so I knew when I met her I was like, well, here's your opportunity. Don't blow it.
Yeah, yeah, and you got you guys are you guys are a bazy dealer and you guys sing together like, you guys are beyond just a couple parents, you're also a duo.
Yeah. That's how we met, was writing songs.
So it was in.
A writing room or like different scenario.
At her apartment. We would just she moved to town. And there was so many like weird near misses that we had when we lived in Kansas, and then we finally got linked up in Nashville, like we were in our first concert was the same concert. We were sitting in the same section, like we have pictures from the same angle, trying to think there was so many there were in pictures together and you guys.
Grew up in the same town or she was from So.
She's from Andale. So for those of you geographically not there's Wichita, which is in the south central part of the state, and up northwest of Wichita is Andale, nine hundred people, and then southwest of Wichita is clear Water, like two thousand people. But our schools played each other in sports and so like there's a picture of me on the football field taking a drink of water and like she's in the background in her dance uniform for the other team.
What.
Yeah, there's just all sorts of random things like that.
So you guys were gonna end up together one way or another, like the universe was literally trying to send signs.
Yeah, it felt like, Yeah, it felt like that. At one point, somebody gave me her number and I was framing houses in witch Talk for a little bit after I dropped out of Wichita State before I moved to Nashville. But somebody gave me her.
Number, like trying to set you guys up.
Yeah, they said it was some I was framing a house that was a friend of hers that she went to ultrasound school with, Hey, this girl girl's house for framing. I think she has a friend who's a singer. You should meet up there. Threw it away like yeah, but she got my number two in the same way, and she threw like it was we It wasn't anything that we ever pursued, but we got here, or she got here three years after I did, and I met her. It was fine. She definitely she told her mom, well, I asked her she wanted to write them a lawn.
More with me, stop it right now that that was your company.
In line was well, it was her birthday and I didn't know that. But I had a band. We lived out in whites Creek at this house that I got evicted from but before I.
Kicked out of a lot of things.
You know what, I'm not good. So I had a party. I had her number at this point. I'd met her once and invited her and her friend out. Hey, we're having like a party and our band is playing in my barn. And she came out and I had this like Briggs and Stratton riding lawnmower. I thought she was cute, you know. I didn't. I'm not good with the ladies. You know, It's just it's not been something that is part of my repertoire. It's like if it happens, great, if it doesn't, well, So.
I really liked that.
How you're setting this up too, like, nah, it's fine.
But I thought she was really cute, and I didn't have a line, you know. I just rode my lawnmower over by where she was standing by the fire, and I.
Was like, I'm sorry you were having a party.
You got on your lawnfower.
Well wait, there's a fire. And then the band was set up in the barn and people were kind of scattered through this big lawn at this house will be lived.
The lawn was kind of the golf cart situation.
Helping Yeah, well no, I wasn't helping anything. It was just the lawn mower was there, okay, and uh yeah, So I fired it up and drove over by where she was standing, asked her if she wanted to ride. I'm a lawnmower.
What did she say?
No? She said no, and then she told her mom that I was someone she would never date.
Interesting ever, yep, what was her reasoning?
Oh? Well, Morgan, well I had hair down to here first of all, when you had your long hair, yeah, I was just kind of a mess, you know.
The lawnmower wasn't Yeah.
Yeah, anyway, for whatever reason, she asked me, well, hey, do you want to write sometime? And I said yeah, And we met up and wrote. Me Her and her friend Shelley Frayley, who lived here too. She's from Burden, Kansas, but she lives in Augusta now met up. We wrote and I could tell that something like I don't know was the fact that i'd just kind of given up after she denied my lawnmower ride. But I could tell like, oh I think that maybe you know and uh yeah, next thing you knew we were married and had you know, one on the way.
But that's hilarious.
Also if that doesn't tell you anything, like like, what's meant for you is never going to pass you.
It's going to happen whether you like it or not.
It's just gonna run into you.
Yeah. And one of the things I really when I got once I got to know her initially, she didn't she doesn't let me get away with anything. You know. She definitely holds me to a standard that I'm still trying to get to. And I needed that, and I think deep down I knew I needed it. So yeah, it was a good pairing. And if you listen to our EP or that we did as a duo, you'll hear you know, it's there's a lot of this, but it's a good thing.
Yeah.
I mean, I feel like if you can have good tension, it's part of the fun.
Yeah, for sure.
You know, that's part of what keeps you guys on your toes and living through life because life comes with so many things that if you can keep each other on your toes, you're never gonna be surprised. You know, you're already already on your toe on.
You're right right, and you got to be able to laugh about it too.
And I do want to tell you your your recent song. I think it's one of your latest ones that you put out just keep breathing. Oh yes, that song like part of my rap in all the things, because I had played it on repeat after like a really hard time in my life. Yeah, so your songwriting on that one, Oh.
Yeah, thank you. I had that idea was my mom had just passed, and it was that's part of the reason we moved. But you know, so I lived here thirteen years and at one point my kid kids were getting to the while my son was starting kindergarten, and it was just I didn't And this is not a knock to anybody who raises their kids here, but when you grow up in a small town in Kansas, and you know how freeing that is to put them through school here, them knowing all their cousins and stuff were like back home in Kansas, it felt like we were robbing them of an opportunity that my mom got sick, and we were just like, you know, for me, it'd be great to stay in Nashville and keep doing this thing, but like, I'm kind of like making everybody else pay the price for it. And so we made this decision to move back home. And it was around the time my mom had passed. Shortly after we moved back, I was doing these whim Hoff breathing things. I got really deep into that.
Still am, but kind of like meditation or different.
No, it's pretty mechanical. There's not much well, I mean it can be, yeah, but it's it's like very just you're over oxygenating your blood and it's it's good for just decompressing. And anyway, I was doing the breathing techniques and I have the app and he talks to you while you're doing it, and he's like, just keep breathing, And in my head was like, yes, keepe breathe and you know this song and I and I had the idea and then finished it with somebody's here in town.
But wow, what a cool way to come up with a song.
I guess not the reason behind it. You know, I'm really sorry to hear about your mom. But cool that there was this breathing technique that was able to help you and then set the chorus to write a song about not only probably helped you heal a little bit, yeah, but it's helping other people heal.
Well. I'm glad Yeah when I saw that, because sometimes you write a song and you're like, no one's going to care. But when I saw that you had been listening to it and it was helping you, I was like, I mean, that's what it's all about. That's why you're doing it in the first place, you know.
Yeah, And you have a lot of songs that I feel like connect on different levels, but that one was just a little different for you. And it was funny because I didn't discover that one on my own. My sister had sent it to me. She's like, I needed this at one point in my life. I think you need it right now. So it was like one of those songs that went through waves of impact to get to me, you know what I mean.
She's she's about to.
Be thirty three, okay, similar age.
Yeah, so right around. But and we both love you. I mean, we grew up going to your concerts and stuff, so we've always shared your songs. But that was one of those where I was like, what's happening. Well, Logan's like telling me to breathe and I'm doing it. Okay, that was that moment.
Yeah, that's all.
Wow, you have so many, so many things, and I could sit here and talk to you forever, but I'm not going to make you there. Anything else you want to talk about before you leave.
We can talk about. Okay. So Maze, Yeah, like what part of Maze?
Oh okay, Well, so I lived in Wichita, Okay, but like I was in the district of me district really live live makes sense?
That makes sense?
Okay, I can't tell. I don't know if I explained that.
Well yeah, okay, Well Mays like I think of like Woodard's Mercantile.
Yeah, I didn't live in Mays, Okay, but I went to school May's.
High School Northwest Wichita, like New Market area.
Yeah, and some of my best friends were in Andel.
So funny enough.
When I went through like a really bad situation in high school, I had so this is so funny. One of my first like serious boyfriend had cheated on me and I made friends with the girl he cheated on me with, via Facebook. She lived on Andel and we like met up and it was a whole thing. And so she's still one of my best friends to this day.
And wait, wait, wait, the boyfriend cheated on you with this girl and you're like good friends with her.
Yeah wow, yeah, hey, yeah, listen, I'm not gonna blame it on her even know I existed, you know what I mean. So she wrote me just like I think we're taking the same guy on Facebook.
Oh it's one of those.
Oh yeah, for sure he is. And we didn't know, neither of us knew eachiller existed up until that kind of moment, and so we like met up and broke up with them together and then we're like, you know, right off into the sunset as our friendship. But she's my she was my first and del connection. So once I met her, then I started spending like my entire life out in Andel. Yeah, and I was parties and in fields getting drunk.
And I had no idea what was happening happens there.
I did, like there, there's so many pictures and stuff where I look back, I'm like, what was I even doing out there?
Like I was in the middle of nowhere.
Just drinking alcohol that tasted horrible, Yeah, and almost getting caught.
By cops multiple times. Never did, but that's what those are my memories of.
Andell, it's fun stuff.
Yeah yeah, and I loved it, So I'm with you on the it's worth moving back home for those experiences in that life.
For sure different than here. It is very different. But yeah, I just feel like it's good for the kids and and and you know, it's an easy Southwest flight. I drove this time gets shorter every time or longer. I can't tell.
I feel like it gets longer, but you just you get used to it is more.
Maybe that's what it is.
And it's because it's so flat. It's not a very exciting drive. No, Like you're through like the most dessert towns. Like there's one town.
I don't know if you've ever driven through it, and maybe we take the same route, but it's like it looks like a apocalypse hit it.
You take sixty like through southern Missouri. Yes, okay, yeah, there's there's a lot of those towns.
There is, but there's one in particular. Ru'm like, what happened here?
Like this actually looks like this was recently an apocalypse?
Like Backster Springs or something.
Yeah, maybe, but it like the businesses look new, but they're not.
Well, there's like old mining towns down in southeast Kansas that kind of like the mines cut, they dried up, And yeah.
I guess that's true.
I didn't even think about that.
You drive, hear a lot of them and you're like, there's like one store that's still open there. It makes me really sad because I was like, these are probably really awesome about their prime because they look really cool.
Yeah, they're cool. And my family, my dad said, the family's all from Baxter Springs, Galina area, and it is kind of sad when you drive down there because you know, at one point that was like a thriving and it's not that it's not. I mean it's still a cool town, but yeah, at one point when those minds were rocking, you know, it's probably different.
Well that gives me more background to those I would just drive to them thinking like, you know, some crazy virus hit and there was like zombies that one.
I went to the full extreme.
But Logan, thank you for joining me coming on.
Go check out his music.
It's so good.
I mean really, it's helped me through a lot of different periods in my life. But also hearing you and your wife singing together is also really cool too.
That's a cool experience.
So yeah, thanks check that out. But thanks for coming on, thanks for having me. That went so fast, I know.
And like I said, we could talk forever, and we could we could actually sit here and talk about Kansas forever in general. Yeah, but it was really the whole purpose of having both you and Nicoleon and talking about Kansas in general. It's just one Nobody ever talks about Kansas. It's like the middle the Flower State. Nobody cares about it, right, Yeah, but there's so many cool people there, and I think so many people cool people come from there, so I wanted to highlight that factor.
I told a guy when I first moved here. I lived in Hendersonville and there was a guy in my apartment complex the astros from and I told him I was from Kansas, and oh, I forgot that was even a state. So there, that's kind.
Of so, I know, real forgets about us.
And there's a fair level to that because you drive through its very flat, there's not a lot happening, but like there's so much going on in there, and there's really nice.
People there is and Nicole lives like half an hour north of me now, so that's so cool. And yeah, her her husband Rodney, who's great, came down and has been writing with me. They're cool people, see.
And Kansas people are always looking out for each other and they always end up connected.
It's like an automatic.
If somebody says they're from there, like cool friends, you don't have to tell me anything else.
We're just right, yeah, absolutely, yeah, all right.
Well, thank you again, logan to chat with you.
Yes, doing both of.
These interviews, I felt a little piece of home, which was so special for me because I do often get homesick. I miss my family, miss Kansas, and I miss everything that I grew up around.
But I also wouldn't.
Trade it because I get to do what I love and I'm chasing my dream and just like this podcast, getting to be here and talking to all of you guys through a microphone, it's always a catch twenty two when you're chasing those dreams. But I hope everybody who has the question of should I or shouldn't I, maybe it got answered this week. And I'm gonna leave you guys on one thing that Nicole always says, and I love Kansas forever.