I'm Much Too Young to Feel This Damn Old: Feeling Old in a Boot Scootin' County Bar

Growing up in a small Wisconsin town, I developed an early aversion to country music bars. My aunt owns a cool bar now, but it is still in the part of Wisconsin that caters to a clientele that likes "both kinds of music -- Country and Western." Dan Aykroyd in his sagelike wisdom pointed this anomaly out in Blues Brothers. No one ever threw bottles at me, but they played a hell of a lot of Garth Brooks. So I guess many of those bars are County radio bars, but not the kind that play old school honkytonk, the kind that play Country with a drum machine.

Sitting in one of these bars, I commend them on sticking with the country theme. Personally,  I would rather drink my beer at a bar that plays real honkytonk. I'd take some Johnny Horton or Slim Whitman. Or give me some outlaw country. Ol' Waylon or Billy Joe Shaver would go down smoothly right now. I could kill for some Jason Isbell or John Moreland to be honest. I raise my glass to the real country heroes. I'm headed home.

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