Another quote.............

Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.
---Samuel Butler

God, isn't that the truth? How many times have I felt like that? It reminds me of those dreams about sitting in a classroom taking an exam and realizing you're naked. Or any of those dreams where one finds themselves in a public situation, unrobed!
I don't know who Samuel Butler is (or was) but I sure did like this quote. I think he hit the proverbial nail right on its proverbial head!

Quotes of the month

Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness. Maya Angelou

You will know that forgiveness has begun when you recall those who hurt you and feel the power to wish them well. Lewis B. Smedes

I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free. Michelangelo

I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love. Mother Teresa

You're only given a little spark of madness. You mustn't lose it. Robin Williams

Tuesday night musings (waitin' on another little one)

I was on call this past weekend and had one of the hardest calls I can remember to date. I delivered seven babies during the course of the weekend and labored an eighth that had to come out by the alternative route. And several of those births were absolutely beautiful - the kind of births that midwives live for - calm, peaceful, holy.

I think it was the timing of things and the amount of physical energy the weekend demanded in combination with the sleep deprivation it also required. I was struggling through some tough emotional stuff, too, and caught in a conflict I can't seem to resolve. So my brain and my heart were both churning away. It was exhausting.

I was so tired yesterday afternoon that I, literally, could not think straight! I went to the gas station because my gas warning light was on (and had been on for several days!) and I couldn't remember how to get the gas tank open. Then I couldn't get the card reader thingy to work on the gas pump. I went home to try to nap before Monday night Bible study. I never did nap. I picked up my guitar instead and started working on a song that is somewhere between the synapses of my brain and the sound hole on my guitar. I wanted to hear it in the room instead of in my head! It has been going in my head for the past week, doing all its working in there, being born. It, too, was keeping my already-overloaded brain from getting any rest. But it also gave me a tremendous amount of solace as well.

The pastor at my church commissioned me to write a song for Lent. A song that would go along with the series of sermons that he's doing. He gave me a list of the sermon titles, the scripture readings for each, and a general overview of the theme of the series. I haven't ever been commissioned to write a song before (well, once - for a fiftieth wedding anniversary party for two people I'd never met before - and that didn't go very well!) and, most certainly have never been commissioned to write a song for church. It's been more than a "challenge". In fact, challenge isn't anything like what it's been. It's been a trip inside of my own spirit, an exploration into the feathery network of my spirituality. It's been very powerful. It's been very revealing. And it's been humbling.

And that's just been the reading, the thinking, the praying, and the lyrics!! I hadn't even picked up the guitar until yesterday!! It is coming together. And, for me, it will be a beautiful song. I don't know as I'll ever share it with anyone other than Alex (my pastor), my friend Bobbi, maybe my mom. Singing in church scares me to death! And when I think about singing this...... well....... I don't know. Guess I'll just wait and see if the Spirit moves me in that direction.

And I imagine the Spirit will. I think that is part of the whole point!

Wish me luck. Light a candle and say a prayer for me.

Peace.

Surviving the Winter.....

The whole crew was here last weekend for the annual "Surviving the Winter" party. We had such fun. And it's such an affirmation for me as a songwriter, singer, person - to be with these people and share that space of time. It does so much for my soul, my spirit, my life. The dark of winter leaves for the space of two or three days. There is nothing but warmth and light and music in my home. It is magic. It is something I cannot create by myself. It is something that is created by this community of songwriters, who have all become dear friends.

My boys have joined the community, too, and sit in the circle with beaming and smiling faces. Sometimes playing along, sometimes only smiling and listening. My best friends are there, Bobbi and Steve, listening and laughing, too. Now there are new friends from my new home in Virginia who also join the circle, either to play along or to soak in the magic and take a little of it home with them.

I am reminded again of how truly blessed I am. I sat in the living room on Saturday night, into the wee hours of Sunday morning, looking around the room at my circle of friends, my community of songwriters, my inspiration, the folks who care for my muse and shield her from any harm. Sometimes she goes off to other places - maybe to the Bahamas or South America to get warm - and I miss her so much when she is gone from me. My friends - each one - Karl, Tim, Lorna, JC, Bruce, Mary Gordon, Chip, Jon Elion,Steve, Phyllis, Jon Zachary, Daniel, Jacob, Eric, Sam, Bobbi and Steve, Tom, Scott, Karen, Emily and Malaika - they have brought her back home to me.

That is how I survive the winter.
Life is good. God is great.
Peace.

Malaika's poem for Heath Ledger

Heath Ledger

Of course I did not know him,
His was just a face;
That I fancied in my daydreams,
In some enchanted place.

And yet it broke my heart to learn, that he had died so young
With all he had accomplished, still his life had just begun.
So many things unfinished, his young daughter left behind
His race is run, but he’s not won—and now there is no time.
No time left for wisdom, accrued through all the years, to share his gift with friends, to comfort someone’s fears.
No gray hairs, each silver strand, hard earned along the way, and with it pride for all t’was learned and tested day by day
No chance to see the daughter grown, to nurture through the years, to be the father that she needs to see her through her tears.

Some claim we have no say, in when our time is come
And yet was maybe a mistake that made his day undone
Who knows if we shall ever know, the truth of his demise
Still it makes me sad, that one so young has died.

Of course I did not know him,
His was just a face;
That I fancied in my daydreams,
In some enchanted place.

From my friend Malaika

If I knew how to write music, below would be the lyrics to my "love song" to Lisa's crew.


Lisa’s Crew
Friends around the circle, healing, healing
Friends around the circle, healing.

You know that they are special, cause they sing right to your soul
Words that are like magic, the love that they unfold
Sometimes in stories that are sad, sometimes in stories that are fun,
to oft in stories so damned true, that all of left undone.

You know that they are special, cause of how they laugh and joke,
a wondrous family, though they come from many different folks
Their words to each other, of encouragement and praise,
warms the spirit like the sunlight on a winter’s day.

You would know that Lisa’s special; you would know that from the start
Because the light she is, shines right through to your heart
And so it is, with her friends, around the circle too
Their lights shine through their words, their music, and their laughter,
The banter, the hugs, in everything they do.
Friends around the circle, Lisa’s crew.

Friends around the circle, healing, healing
Friends around the circle, healing.

Hell hath no fury.....

....like a woman.

Period.

Scorned or not.

Women are something. I've been watching and listening to a woman who is pissed off - I mean really pissed off - and it's something.

Glad I'm not the one she's pissed off at.

Escaping your own mind

Another long day at the big house. And it's going to be another long night. The baby is on his way, but he's certainly taking his good sweet time! (I think he's going to be a big one!). My mind is going in a hundred different directions and I wish there was a way to escape from it. Escape from all the thought processes going on in there at the same time. Maybe that's what the "ooohmms" are good for (though I have a hard time being successful with the ohms because I generally start daydreaming about something and then making grocery lists and to-do lists and ........ well!!?? some women do that when they're engaged in other activities, ya know?! I just do it when I'm trying to meditate!!).

I've been thinking about how much we get in our own way. I've been thinking about how to get more oil in my oil tank so that I can run the furnace when I have company if it's cold. I've been thinking about my dad and my kids and my friend Bobbi and my friend Browne and about how to play "Arkansas Traveller" on the banjo and did I forget it? and about how God sometimes calls my name when I'm thinking I'm completely lost and how work is sometimes so hard so no wonder they call it work and about how friendships can save your life and lovers can break your heart and how badly they need to replace the faucets in the maternity ward and if Pete the cat is picking on Buster the cat who lives in the tree and and and....... see how I get in my own way? No wonder peace and contentment seem like such distant things!! I can't get my mind to shut up for even five minutes!!

I want to be happy. I get in my own way that way sometimes. Maybe I'm like a lot of people who have some inner thing going on that constantly pokes a stick at sore and sad places and whispers, "you don't deserve it". I don't know. I don't seem that way to me. I have been happy before. I'll be happy again. This too shall pass.

I was telling a friend just the other day that sometimes the only thing you can do is say to yourself - over and over and over again - "it will get better, it always does." I'm thinking of requesting that as my epitath (did I spell that right?). Maybe somebody could make a little plaque with that on it and put it out on the edge of Linville Gorge in my honor.

It'll get better - it always does.

Spring is only 10 weeks away!! 10!! Just 10! And it's only 20 more weeks until the annual Family Night at the Opera! and then we'll be swimming in the Bay before we know it!

Peace. That's what I want. Peace to ya.

OUCH!

It's so hard.

But I'll be alright after awhile.

This I know to be true.

The boy is home.....

Back from Colorado, all in one piece and the car's still going strong! My silent, prayerful vigil can now stop and I can go back to worrying about simple things like how to stay warm and how to pay the car insurance and the car payment and the rent all out of one check and still have money left over for the upcoming annual festivities at the Home Place!

I'm so glad he's back!!

Sometimes we're given a glimpse of what our parents went through - either by our own children or by watching our friends with their children and all the stuff that goes on where kids are involved!! Lord, I think about how much I must have worried my parents!! My boys are great kids! They really are. And this one wasn't doing anything out of the ordinary or over the edge. He just made a blitz trip to Colorado with a carful of his closest friends. It was all the other folks on the highways that made me worry!

He said they had a great time. They camped out on New Year's Eve in 8 inches of snow (oh to be that young and hardy again!!). I would have loved to have just seen them all together. Great group of kids! Gives me such great optimism about the future!

I was thinking about all the trips I took when I was his age. A bunch of them (thank God!) my parents didn't even know about. Many roads were travelled just by using my thumb and a smile - back in the day. Back in the time when you could do such things and, for the most part, nobody troubled you. The world's not so kind nowadays.

I hitchhiked across the North Carolina mountains once during a week of incredibly beautiful fall weather. I met some hippies - my first real encounter with hippies - and had a great adventure. Ah, but I digress. That's a whole 'nother story.

Tomorrow night, I'll celebrate Jacob's safe return to Chapel Hill. Maybe have a couple of Newcastle to celebrate (I'm on call tonight - so tonight I'm celebrating by lighting the candles and by turning on the furnace for a little while to take the chill from the house). Less than two weeks, and I'll have the boys here for the weekend! Another reason, all in itself, to celebrate!

Peace.

Hope Will Survive

I've been walking down a solitary road.

Lookin' for some open door, some comfort from this cold.

And I have been afraid I'd lose my hope.

But now I know that hope will survive.

And I've been searchin' for a heart that is like mine.

A little taste of peacefulness is all I'd hoped to find.

So I looked into the eyes of my child

And when he smiled, I could see it shine.

I do believe the dawn will follow the nightfall.

And I will not have to walk this road alone.

In the voices of my friends I hear a light call

And the sweetness of that sound will lead me home.

Love is waiting there for me - it's in the pictures on my walls.

I hear it in my grandpa's clock tickin' down my hall.

And it's underneath the quilt my grammy sewed

And the sweet songs that I've known since I was a child.

I do believe that joy will come to find me.

And I'll know again how that pleasure feels.

And the scars that I bear are here to remind me

That I may love and lose - but I will heal.

I may love and lose but I will heal.

-----Yours truly, Hope Will Survive

Bedtime stories

I've been listening to Harry Potter books on tape. I listened to the fifth book as I was knitting before Christmas and the sixth book as I travelled home for the holidays (nine hours in the car is a long time in the car!!). I've just started the last book, which was a Christmas present from my boys. I'd read and listened to all the other books before, but this is a new one (I've read it but haven't heard it). Books on tape are quite addicting! And better than TV or movies because they still require you to use your imagination. I've got a great imagination!! And I like to keep it in good shape. A good imagination can save one from making not-so-good choices (but that's a whole 'nother subject!!!).

Jim Dale reads all of the Harry Potter books and he does GREAT voices! It's like the greatest bedtime story ever! I love it. I decided to take a few days off from knitting (carpal tunnel syndrome!). And so I just sit in my rocker in the kitchen, with my candles lit, and the kerosene heater going, all the lights out save one small one, and the dog and the cats stretched out nearby. I rock and I listen. And I sometimes sit forward in my chair, leaning toward the boom box, full of the thrill of the story. Sometimes, I lean back with my eyes closed and play the story out in my mind's eye as I listen. I picture the Harry Potter in the pictures in the book (not the Harry Potter in the movies). This must be what it was like before TV - when radio was the only way to go! I would have loved that!

It's another one of those kid-like things that is simple and uncomplicated. A bedtime story unfolding. It's peaceful and quiet in my kitchen but for the sound of Jim Dale's voice. Someone once said that it's the simple things in life that are the best. I can feel the truth of that when I'm rocking in the rocker.

There are a lot of complicated things in my world. Fortunately, my kitchen is not one of them.

Peace.

Faith and friendship....... (revised)

"Faith is the substance of things hoped for." Hebrews 11:1


I have hoped for so many things: peace, contentment, love...... those things that have proven to be so elusive to me sometimes. And yet, I continue to hope. Hope for you, hope for me. I had so many hopes. And, as those hopes diminished, I kept wanting to hold on, to hold out, to reach out, to keep hoping hoping hoping.


I have faith. I tried to speak one night about faith and about the internal struggles I have with different aspects of my life and my spirit and how my faith can get so weak sometimes. I was trying to talk about being troubled in my spirit. I believe that troubles of the spirit are directly and proportionately related to depression. Depression is, I believe, in fact, an illness of the spirit.
And something inside of me cracked or broke away or changed. I cannot find my way back to it.

My faith is strong. I hoped that it would be strong enough for all of us, for the whole world, for whatever life sends. That I am naive is evident. That I want more than I can have is evident, too. My faith is mine.

I lost faith. In me. In my own ability to be a good person. In my own ability to love God and life and the world, regardless of any opinion of me.

"Faith is the substance of things hoped for". I hope I find my way home. I am praying a lot these days. I have a lot of hope. My faith is strong.

New Year's Resolutions.....

Back home, back at work, back to life in the real world. It's a new year. That time of year to make the annual resolutions again. I've got a list of them this year! I thought, "Well, might as well give it another go!". (I did have one year that I did very very well on my new year's resolution - the only year that I only made one resolution and the only year that I kept the resolution - and that was to eat more chocolate!). So I have the usuals - drink more water, exercise more, eat a healthier diet. And then some new ones - visit my mom and dad more often, eat less cheese and more fruit, and - here's a cool one!! walk ten to twenty minutes every day and smile while I'm doing it!

The big resolution for the year, though, is this: Avoid the "D's". Avoid Dating, by which I can avoid being Dumped and therefore avoid Depression.

Yes, I am jaded. Yes, I'm still aching. No, I'm not worried about having a year in which I don't date (or even two or three years!!). I've been longer than that before! I am not running from anything or anyone. I just want to steer clear of that thing that bruises my self-esteem and makes me feel incapable of managing myself in the world. In my brain, I know that it's not that I can't manage myself in the world - I just can't manage a relationship. But in my heart, I again feel like a failure, like it will never ever happen for me, like it will never ever work out, like I'm stupid and crazy for even trying, like I don't deserve to be loved just like I am. That's my heart speaking there. And my heart speaks a lot louder to my spirit than my head does. And then......... well, anyway.

So New Year's resolution number seven is a big one. I'm thinking I might need to pick a number eight - something like drink four Newcastles (or two Guiness mixed with two domestics -black and tans) once a week and dance until I'm breathless or maybe just eat a Hershey's Bar with Almonds once a week - I'm thinking number eight might just soften number seven and make it a little easier to live with!

I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Wish me luck!

And Happy New Year to you! Peace.