Kathy Rowings just got off the phone with Jewel, the folksinger and poet, who now is aligning herself with National Homeless Youth Awareness Month (in November). When I heard that Jewel was becoming an advocate for the young homeless, I thought, "Well, that makes sense given that Jewel was homeless once herself." I asked Kathy to talk more with her about the homeless part of Jewel's life, because it is often quickly dismissed in any of the profiles written on her. First, full disclosure: Our Kathy is a longtime Jewel fan who recalls a time in high school when her saint of a mother drove her and five friends to a Jewel concert while the girls sang Pieces of You at the top of their lungs. On today's conversation, Kathy says:
"Youth homelessness is an issue that's deeply personal to Jewel: She was homeless for about a year when she was in her teens. She says she was lucky that she never did drugs or alcohol, and that a record label discovered her, but before that she had a simple but great coping mechanism. 'I'd pretend I wasn't actually scared, that I was excited,' she told me. 'Fear feels like butterflies in your stomach. It seems like a really silly game, but it freed me up enough to look for something positive in my day instead of dreading what bad might happen.' In addition to acting as a spokeswoman for NHYAM, she's doing a few small, solo acoustic tour dates this fall, and she is working on a country album that she thinks will be released next summer."

(photo by Kurt Markus/courtesy jeweljk.com)