Ranford Almond - Where Have All the Average People Gone? [Tosco Music Pa...

This is for Margaret. But also for anybody else who might happen along and take an interest. I have songs posted on a ReverbNation page. Kind of like My Space but less confusing. You can find it at www.reverbnation.com/lisastevens. If you'd like, you can hear some songs there. I think I'm a much better songwriter than poet. But then, I guess the difference between the two is a thin veil. There is a song that I wrote for my son Jacob already posted, and I'll post a song I wrote for my Daniel this evening.

I haven't forgotten to write. I've just been hanging on. Sometimes my "hanging on" gets fouled up in my body and most I can manage is getting to work and getting home and the rest of the time I am sitting still, wondering where my energy went. Winter is especially a "hanging on" time for me. Double whammy these days - winter and heart-sickness. But it will get better. It always does.

I have so much in my head.

Peace all.

I haven't written anything in a long time, though my brain has been very busy and I have lots of ideas and lots of things I want to write. In the coming weeks, I'll write more. I promise myself that. And I promise YOU, too! (All two of you!)

Life is good. I'm adjusting to a big change and loving it. I've been regrouping and reconnecting and reorganizing. I've been hanging on. I've been letting go. I've been singing aloud. I've been being quiet. I've been struggling to sleep. I've been greeting the dawn. (and those of you who know me know that greeting the dawn is NOT a common thing for a night owl like me!!).

I've been working at...... working at.......... hmmmmm......... I guess I've been working at living the life I thought was hanging in the upper branches and was too far out of reach. I've been stepping into a dream that I've had for more than fifteen years. I've been realizing that coming home is really and truly, and simply, stepping into the beautiful picture that you painted for yourself out of hope.

And I am here. And I am happy to be here. My husband joins me soon. His dream goes back even further than my own and is much more ethereal. I say a prayer every day that it will become solid so that it might hold him up and propel him forward into a world where he will thrive.

Peace all. I'll write soon, I promise.

Almost home...............

For every slow, soft lob that comes your way - the ones that you can spot, take aim, and over the back fence for a home run - for each one of those, there are hundreds of fast balls and curve balls and those bizarre, twisting knuckle balls that'll come right at you so fast, you won't know whether to swing or duck or bunt or run or just, by God, throw down the damn bat and walk away from the game.

It's that way in baseball. It's that way in life. I get tired sometimes of swinging at the hard ones, trying to make a connection. I get tired sometimes of ducking the ones that are just coming too fast, the ones that leave you out of breath and grateful that you were quick enough to dodge another. And I get tired sometimes of running the bases, only to get tagged out trying to make it to home. Just when I think I'm going to make it, I'm diving in, I'm almost there..........

Is it okay to just sit the next inning or two out? Please? Could I just do something simple, like carry water to others and carry the bats and the balls back to the field house? Would it be okay if I just had one little bitty breather?

Ah. I didn't think so.

Peace all.

The power of music.........

My new CD is finished. The recording, mixing, and mastering are done. Now on to the graphics and then, once I save the money, off it'll go to Oasis for duplication. I have listened to each song at least fifty times, probably more. Bruce Roberts, who produced the CD along with his wife Lorna, has been sending me the songs as mp3 files while they were in progress. I'd listen, make notes, send feedback, he'd make changes (or not) and send them back to me again. He sent me the final version last Monday, so I have listened and listened, making sure everything is just right, double listening for any errors, glitches, or otherwise. And I am happy and satisfied with the finished project.

And then I listened more. And I've continued to listen to it. Not because I want to hear myself, but because I want to hear the songs and hear their stories again, let them take me back to where they came from. Music is such an incredibly powerful thing. And for me, this music tells my own story - my thoughts, my feelings - it has the power to pick me up from where I am and transport me - setting me right down in the middle of all its history. I listen to this CD, its sixteen songs, and it takes me so many wonderful places and through so many different experiences and feelings: the edge of Linville Gorge in the early morning hours watching the sun rise; "the old house", Crystal's place up at the foot of Roan Mountain (where so many of the songs came to life); the windy coast of Ireland; the Mayan ruins of Guatemala; Russia and the orphanage there; the bedside of a praying, brave Guatemalan woman who changed my life; my father's hospital room; the backyard of the house I grew up in or at the kitchen table with my mom and dad; curled up in the big brown chair with my son, Jacob; sitting in the kitchen, listening to Daniel tell a story about Ashe County; Ashe County itself; Boone; a little cabin in the middle of the week in the middle of January at Smith Mountain Lake State Park (where I had the entire state park to myself and wrote two songs to keep from being spooked!!); the little back porch of my house in Morganton (probably the only house that will ever have been my own); sitting beside my friend Bobbi, with her expectant smile and her gentle way of coaxing a song out of me; gathered around Cindy's firepit............ it just goes on and on. Each one, with its story, its birth, its meaning inside my heart. I can't stop listening. They are my story. They are my heart.

My father always understood the power of music. He surrounded us with it as we were growing up. All kinds of music. And, just a few weeks before he died, when words befuddled him and he struggled to say what he meant, he found meaning and comfort in songs that he could hum, whistle, remember. In the hospital, he said to me, "I keep going back to the music. All those little notes and how they line up. There's a lot of love in those notes. You have to pay attention or those notes will just pass you by." I understood part of his message at the time, but not his whole message. Now I'm being to understand the whole of it. Because it isn't just the little notes that need our attention. And because it isn't just MY music that does that - all music does that. It holds love, sadness, joy, tenderness, fear, praise, thankfulness, happiness - you name it, and I'll bet you I can find you a song that holds it inside.

It is so powerful.

I miss my dad so much. He is with me; whenever I sing - ah! there he is! Oh but that I could sing all the day long.

I can't wait to share the CD with you.

Peace all.

The angel in the snow............

My Blue...........

My blue is back. I've been waiting for her, expecting her to show up on my door step. I'm a bit surprised she didn't show up weeks ago. But here she is, all decked out in her tears disguised as smiles and her weariness heavy as a wet winter coat. I am sad with her. And all I want to do is curl against her back and sleep until the chill is gone and the sun is too bright through the window pane.

Her company makes me homesick. I am so very homesick today. I am missing my North Carolina mountains and my North Carolina friends, and my North Carolina familiar. I want to go home. Home please. For so many years I was not sure where home was, but I know now. I understand where, and more accurately, who my home is. And I want my home to be all in one place. And I want to BE home. Blue's company makes me long for home because she sometimes can keep me from it.

I don't imagine this makes much sense to anyone who doesn't know Blue. Who hasn't kept her company, especially in the winter. I wrote in one of my songs about that. It's one of my favorite songs at this time of year. It goes:

"I know you'll find no reason in all I do and say.
Blame it on the winter - this need to sail away............"

Blame it on the winter is the name of the song. I guess I blame a lot on the winter. Poor Old Man, he's just doing his job. But Old Man Winter, he's the one that brought Blue a-callin'. He brings her to my house most every year.

I miss my home - my children, my mom, Bobbi and Steve, Cindy and Hannah and Dylan, the familiar road heading out of town with the view of Table Rock or the other with the view of Grandfather, the feeling of belonging.

Peace y'all. Keep the back porch light on and a fire in the stove. I'll be home before too much longer. Until then, my friend Blue will keep me company. And Scott will do his best to keep me warm.