Terry has chosen to immerse himself in the local community and estimates 75% of his friends are Thai, and many of them are musicians like himself. Terry has had a lifelong love affair with music, both playing and writing, but in the last year the bodily impacts of degenerative disease have caused him to reluctantly vacate the performance limelight. Terry’s intellect is suffering much less than his body, and the advent of technology and social media has provided him the ideal way to continue contributing to the local community, regardless. He is a staunch supporter of live music in Hua Hin, to the point that he has been personally responsible for other expats joining the local community. Bill Paige, a friend and compatriot, chose Hua Hin, sight unseen, on Terry’s recommendation, and Terry had Bill onstage playing music at Ray’s Place within 30 minutes of hitting town.

Looking back, Terry sees that this self-sufficiency at such an early age was not necessarily a bad thing. Growing up in the 1950s and 1960s was a time of great freedom for young Terry, with a tight neighbourhood-full of children with whom to play, get muddy and explore. Terry fondly recalls spending considerable amounts of time at his grandparent’s home after his mother returned to work. He had a particularly close relationship with his grandmother, who died of cancer when he was just 16. Cancer is a curse which has taken a number of Terry’s family members at a young age, this sad circumstance perhaps the cause of Terry’s seeing getting to the age of 72 as his greatest achievement so far, despite the fact that he has not always maintained the healthy vegetarian lifestyle he now enjoys, eschewing alcohol and mind-altering substances as a practicing Buddhist.

Terry’s childhood home was filled with music of many genres. His paternal grandparents were Texas Swing musicians and Terry loved to sit in their basement while they rehearsed. His parents ran the local teen dances, the “sock hops” so although Terry was too young to formally attend, he couldn’t be left home alone either, and consequently found himself exposed to a wide variety of music including soul, pop and R&B. Terry’s involvement with music waned throughout his teen years because he was busily involved in four sports but by the 1970s, having left college, he was re-immersed in the music scene. One of his earliest jobs saw him looking after jazz musicians, organising their laundry and ensuring all of the items on their riders were on hand. He then worked for MS Distributors, who distributed dozens of record labels. A chance encounter at Chicago’s first punk rock disco with the Sex Pistols led to Terry becoming the facilitator of a meet and greet session with The Stranglers, and then the obligatory after-party. Terry managed bars as well and in the early 1980s had a 50% partnership in a nightclub which he relinquished at a financial loss when pressured to participate in illegal, unethical and immoral activities.

It is important to Terry that he live an honest and honorable life, and that his friends can count on him. He chooses to live in a compassionate and empathetic fashion and prefers to steer clear of tension and discord.  As Terry put it, he’d “rather be happy than right”, and has been complimented as an honest, stand-up guy. However, Terry is also quite introspective and is the first to admit he is a flawed human being. (Aren’t we all, if we are honest with ourselves?) Terry has to monitor and temper his natural impatience and intolerance to ensure he doesn’t come across as judgemental. Terry pinpoints Paul Rodgers, a British/Canadian singer and songwriter, as the living person he most admires. Paul has been a major influence on Terry since his late teens, not only because of his musical success but also his ability to navigate life as an acclaimed musician without succumbing to drugs, alcohol or scandal, maintaining a happy marriage and surviving two strokes.

Terry has been married four times. He married his first wife at just 19-years-old, his childhood sweetheart, swept away by his first experience of love. Terry describes the families being like the Montagues and Capulets from Romeo and Juliet in their disdain for each other, with the couple calling it quits after 2 years for the sake of tranquility. Terry’s second marriage lasted 15 years, but only that long because of his compassion. His wife was clinically depressed, had bipolar disorder and was difficult to be around. When the marriage eventually ended, Terry was single for a long time before he met his third wife, a Thai, when she was working in a restaurant in Chicago and it was with her that Terry moved to Thailand.  That marriage too ended, as she did not want to live again in Thailand. Terry met and befriended his current wife Nam, also Thai, during the Covid pandemic. Nam is a qualified nurse who developed PTSD as a result of the pressures of the pandemic.  She quit her hospital job to undertake in-home care, and was working in Cha-Am, far from her home province Sisaket in the Issan region of northeastern Thailand.

Since coming to Hua Hin, music has continued to be a pivotal part of Terry’s life since it creates an interpersonal relationship between the musician and the audience, whether at a live venue or though other forms of music consumption. Terry even gave up a well-paying job to take a sales position at Sounds Good record store in Chicago because he needed the direct interaction with the buyers of great music. Terry has been a member or founder of numerous bands across his career, being both a singer and guitar player, as well as a writer of original material. One particular band, CLOX, formed in 1977, was a band that refused to be pigeon-holed or classified by the social movements and music trends of the times. CLOX caught the eye of a particular music critic and writer, one Bill Paige, whose enthusiastic review of CLOX resulted in a huge increase in popularity for the band and the beginning of a strong friendship for Terry and Bill. Vendooza was another band with whom Terry performed in Chicago, all the while working a full-time day job. In 1984, Terry began working for FedEx. It was the beginning of what he describes as a meteoric career, with a solid wage, great bonuses and amazing privileges including free air travel, that lasted 20 years and allowed him to take early retirement at the age of only 50.

While he was glad to leave the chill of Chicago behind, there was no way Terry could forsake performing in a band. Early in his time in Hua Hin, Terry was instrumental in the formation of the band Bamboo Heart, which was a regular at ThaiWai’i, a music venue originally in Paknampran then in Khao Tao. The owner was keen on instigating jam sessions, using Western musicians to attract Western patrons, a big plus being that foreigners were technically not to be employed. Terry became the de-facto jam coordinator, but understandably, local Thai musicians were annoyed that Westerners were providing their services freely, doing their Thai counterparts out of paid gigs. Bamboo Heart won the respect of their Thai counterparts by refusing to play without payment of at least 4000 baht, thereby levelling the playing field, and performed together regularly for seven and a half years, with Terry using the stage name Sandy Beach. Of course, that was a long time ago now, under the rule of a former Chief of Police, who interpreted the laws somewhat differently.

One significant factor that has as yet received scant mention is Terry’s diagnosis with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) at the age of 42, some 30 years ago. RA is a chronic autoimmune disease that causes bodily inflammation and commonly first presents as pain in the joints. It happens when the immune system attacks its own body’s tissue by mistake. Although there have been breakthroughs in management and treatment, there is no cure and the condition is degenerative over time. In Terry’s case, RA has led to a degree of deformity in his dominant left hand and has impacted his ability to use it effectively, a cruel sentence for a guitarist. Terry has had to come to terms with the fact that his performance schedule has met its final curtain, a transition he has acknowledged by divesting himself of all his gear. His best rock guitar, a 1974 Les Paul Goldtop Deluxe is on indefinite loan to his Thai friend Tor and his most valuable guitar, a 1988 Fender Stratocaster (Limited edition), is soon set to return to the US to be sold.

Rather than wallow in the situation he has been dealt, Terry Fox has chosen a new musical path and challenge for himself. In his alter-ego of Sandy Beach, he has created a niche but crucial role for himself in ensuring those seeking live music have accurate information about where and precisely when they can find it.  The initial inspiration was seeing Facebook posts bemoaning the demise of live music in Hua Hin post-Covid, when Terry knew its heart was beating strongly.

Using social media and technology, both of which he acknowledges can be double-edged swords, Terry has positioned himself as the ultimate authority and curator of live music information in Hua Hin. If you want to know what is happening 24/7 on Hua Hin’s music scene, across venues and genres, following Sandy Beach on Facebook is a must, as many locals will attest. However, fewer will be aware that Sandy Beach also has an encyclopaedic knowledge of local restaurants, across cuisines and price-points, as well as local attractions. And by local, Sandy is dealing with an area spanning from Cha-Am in the north to Sam Roi Yot to the south. It is ironic that Sandy has received criticism and derision when sharing this knowledge from trolls who take their self-worth from being naysayers. Little do they understand the resilience and adaptability Terry is showing in inventing a way for himself to continue serving the community, and indeed maintaining his sense of self-worth, in the face of a disorder that may ultimately take his life. And he does it willingly, freely, with a smile on his face, because he loves his community. Knowing RA is consuming him, Terry could be excused for allowing himself to become a couch potato but instead he makes the daily choice to continue making a positive contribution, demonstrating that he cares. Sandy is the "Man on the street...man on the beat, dedicated to bringing the people to the music".

As Terry has aged, any vestiges of his former hedonism have vanished. He is determined to remain teachable and still has items to tick off his bucket-list. Nam has a wish to see snow, either in Japan or Switzerland, that Terry is prepared to indulge, despite his abhorrence of the cold. He has a fervent hope that in the short-term people will come to see that humanity’s best possibility for the future lies in strength through unity. Terry hopes that people perceive his thoughts and actions working together in synthesis, that they are aware that he cares. Terry is learning to indulge himself. An enthusiast of many cuisines, his favourite remains Mexican: cheese enchiladas, refried beans, rice and guacamole, followed by a Thai dessert of dairy-free coconut icecream. Terry makes sure that every day he appreciates all the simple things in life: riding his Honda Rebel 500, (helmet on, of course), quality time spent in his garden with his 3 poodles, family members across three generations and his preferred beach, Suan Son, which he visits at least once a week. For Terry Fox, life is a Sandy Beach.