Entry tags:
no matter what people say
Mark Miller's "Child of God," performed by my church choir (including me). Miller wrote the song during Methodist church battles over LGBT inclusion. The clip begins at 20:16.
Mark Miller's "Child of God," performed by my church choir (including me). Miller wrote the song during Methodist church battles over LGBT inclusion. The clip begins at 20:16.
Entry tags:
birds and flowers bringing
So, between allergies and scratches and figurative kicks in the teeth and waking up hung over (which seemed profoundly unfair because it was one flute of prosecco during a retirement-party Zoom and one flute of vermouth after dinner, but apparently that's one digestif too many for my metabolism these days) and nearly putting antibiotic ointment instead of toothpaste on my brush -- well. Hello, dregs of February.
But I slogged through this, that, and more, so some deliverables got delivered, some reportables got reported, the house is cleaner, and I pulled together a lemon-rosemary-olive-panko-parmesan-macaroni thing for dinner. It was mild enough today to walk to the Little Free Library in sandals. There have also been three rabbit holes: One was the lore surrounding St. Matthias, in the course of pulling together twelve lines for tomorrow's Tupelo poem; I was also intrigued by the why and wherefore of coppices, but that didn't make it into the draft. (Today's contribution was 14 lines of dog-gerel, so to speak . . .)
The second was triggered by Sam's Tumblr post on Sargent's depiction of Robert Louis and Fanny Stevenson. What an intricate household that was. I did not know that Fanny and her daughter Isobel were both cougars (with the same writer-illustrator).
I have not watched this video of "Let Beauty Awake" in full yet, but even a few seconds . . .
The last is a current memory-melody worm: there's a Swedish cradle song in a 1957 textbook called Singing in Harmony that one of my elementary schools discarded when I was a kid. (The Commonwealth of Kentucky Public Instruction stamp inside the front cover has a line where one was supposed to indicate "White" or "Colored" . . .) The setting is similar to some Beethoven art-songs I'm fond of; the next-to-last measure particularly gets me, and I've played it several times today:
Last night I looked up the composer and lyricist. There doesn't seem to be much online about W. Th. Söderberg (though the song got around enough to merit sheet music for mandolin and guitar -- published in Seattle . . .), but the author of the English words, one "Auber Forestier," turns out to have been the formidable Aubertine Woodward Moore, whose many roles included serving as music director of the First Unitarian Society of Madison, Wisconsin. (For some other day: she apparently gave Whitman season tickets she couldn't use and may have been on a first-name basis with Alcotts and Emersons and fiddlin' Bulls . . .)
But I slogged through this, that, and more, so some deliverables got delivered, some reportables got reported, the house is cleaner, and I pulled together a lemon-rosemary-olive-panko-parmesan-macaroni thing for dinner. It was mild enough today to walk to the Little Free Library in sandals. There have also been three rabbit holes: One was the lore surrounding St. Matthias, in the course of pulling together twelve lines for tomorrow's Tupelo poem; I was also intrigued by the why and wherefore of coppices, but that didn't make it into the draft. (Today's contribution was 14 lines of dog-gerel, so to speak . . .)
The second was triggered by Sam's Tumblr post on Sargent's depiction of Robert Louis and Fanny Stevenson. What an intricate household that was. I did not know that Fanny and her daughter Isobel were both cougars (with the same writer-illustrator).
I have not watched this video of "Let Beauty Awake" in full yet, but even a few seconds . . .
The last is a current memory-melody worm: there's a Swedish cradle song in a 1957 textbook called Singing in Harmony that one of my elementary schools discarded when I was a kid. (The Commonwealth of Kentucky Public Instruction stamp inside the front cover has a line where one was supposed to indicate "White" or "Colored" . . .) The setting is similar to some Beethoven art-songs I'm fond of; the next-to-last measure particularly gets me, and I've played it several times today:
Last night I looked up the composer and lyricist. There doesn't seem to be much online about W. Th. Söderberg (though the song got around enough to merit sheet music for mandolin and guitar -- published in Seattle . . .), but the author of the English words, one "Auber Forestier," turns out to have been the formidable Aubertine Woodward Moore, whose many roles included serving as music director of the First Unitarian Society of Madison, Wisconsin. (For some other day: she apparently gave Whitman season tickets she couldn't use and may have been on a first-name basis with Alcotts and Emersons and fiddlin' Bulls . . .)
Entry tags:
preserving
Well. The past week included more collisions than I would have cared for with figurative handbaskets and pavers, but I managed to get to bed within an hour of either side of midnight most nights. (The exception was the night before nochevieja, when filing all the FSA paperwork and herding Picasso ducks to the designer kept the candles burning past 3:30 a.m.) Yesterday I closed my work laptop by 5:30 p.m. (in time to catch Ailey's Revelations Through the Decades while the streaming window was open) and my personal laptop by 11:45 p.m. (with a promise to myself to refrain from checking social media until after noon today, which I kept).
This current round of reflux has been enough of a nuisance for me to dial back on citrus and other trigger foods for a while. I'd bought a sale bag of grapefruits before deciding this needed to happen. Fortunately, I now have water-bath canning in my culinary toolbox:
I also prepared a batch of pickled clementines two days ago. One of the jars didn't seal properly, though, resulting in orange syrup splattering across my counter yesterday morning. (At least I tested it before delivering it to the recipient!) So far, the seals on the jars of tomatoes I canned back in October-November have definitely done their job; I usually have to pry them off with a knife, and the jar I used in Wednesday's oxtail stew was no exception.
For Thursday, the BYM picked up ribs and beer from Various Artists Brewing. A week earlier, I'd picked up a Feast of Seven Fishes from Nicky's Coal Fired. It ended up covering both Christmas lunch and dinner, plus a cannoli nightcap on Boxing Day and a risotto break the following week. I'm dreaming about re-creating the baked clams, and getting the pasta again. (The octopus in the seafood salad was also outstanding, but that's one I'll leave to the professionals.)
Christmas Eve also included a Zoom service and social hour hosted by my church.
I'd contributed tracks to three of the carols, and the video for a modern setting of "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" (way less lugubrious than the traditional Calkin hymn!) was created by Trigg. I had been on the fence about catching the service (I worked fifteen minutes into it), but I was especially glad that I had done so when I saw the reactions in the chat as the segment aired. It's archived on YouTube (the carol starts at 42:27):
( In other news (behind cut-tag for profanity) )
Christmas itself was marvelous. Like today, I jettisoned my extensive to-do list in favor of a long nap, and I have no regrets. (Aiming for much more sleep in 2021 is definitely going to be a thing here.) Because of the title of this entry, I will note that the bounty included apricot preserves from American Spoon (all the more delightful because I had talked myself out of ordering from them just a day or two earlier). Because of the title of this blog, I feel compelled to celebrate here the most over-the-top present I opened that morning:
That's a bar of zirconium, y'all. Carefully machined, sanded, and polished by my friend Bill, with its own fitted cherry stand. I've done enough wood- and metalwork to have an idea of how long it took (augmented by conversations with and messages from Bill this year about his adventures in acquiring and working with other elements. He had particularly sulfurous comments about antimony . . .). I can't stop admiring it. :)
2020 ended with the BYM turning in an hour before midnight. I wasn't making a point of staying up (I'm usually the one dozing off before the guitar falls) but there had been a poem I had been trying to write all month, so I buckled down to fleshing it out and hit the Submittable button forty minutes before midnight (and again at twenty minutes 'til for another packet). Then I put away laundry while peeking at the lights still up on my street and on Holly. A year ago the ones on Holly would not have been visible because of trees the tornado knocked down.
Tonight's dinner is leftover rice with black-eyed peas and Chinese sausage, with sparkling wine. It reached 74 F in parts of Nashville today, so I spent part of the afternoon cutting spotted leaves off the rosebushes, and tomorrow I'll spray them.
Friends, here's to a year with an abundance of roses and other rewards. And, if you aren't blogging or tweeting about your goings-on, drop me a line on what you are seeing, hearing, tasting, or considering? Message me for my address if you'd rather send (and get) a (post)card. :)
This current round of reflux has been enough of a nuisance for me to dial back on citrus and other trigger foods for a while. I'd bought a sale bag of grapefruits before deciding this needed to happen. Fortunately, I now have water-bath canning in my culinary toolbox:
I also prepared a batch of pickled clementines two days ago. One of the jars didn't seal properly, though, resulting in orange syrup splattering across my counter yesterday morning. (At least I tested it before delivering it to the recipient!) So far, the seals on the jars of tomatoes I canned back in October-November have definitely done their job; I usually have to pry them off with a knife, and the jar I used in Wednesday's oxtail stew was no exception.
For Thursday, the BYM picked up ribs and beer from Various Artists Brewing. A week earlier, I'd picked up a Feast of Seven Fishes from Nicky's Coal Fired. It ended up covering both Christmas lunch and dinner, plus a cannoli nightcap on Boxing Day and a risotto break the following week. I'm dreaming about re-creating the baked clams, and getting the pasta again. (The octopus in the seafood salad was also outstanding, but that's one I'll leave to the professionals.)
Christmas Eve also included a Zoom service and social hour hosted by my church.
I'd contributed tracks to three of the carols, and the video for a modern setting of "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" (way less lugubrious than the traditional Calkin hymn!) was created by Trigg. I had been on the fence about catching the service (I worked fifteen minutes into it), but I was especially glad that I had done so when I saw the reactions in the chat as the segment aired. It's archived on YouTube (the carol starts at 42:27):
( In other news (behind cut-tag for profanity) )
Christmas itself was marvelous. Like today, I jettisoned my extensive to-do list in favor of a long nap, and I have no regrets. (Aiming for much more sleep in 2021 is definitely going to be a thing here.) Because of the title of this entry, I will note that the bounty included apricot preserves from American Spoon (all the more delightful because I had talked myself out of ordering from them just a day or two earlier). Because of the title of this blog, I feel compelled to celebrate here the most over-the-top present I opened that morning:
That's a bar of zirconium, y'all. Carefully machined, sanded, and polished by my friend Bill, with its own fitted cherry stand. I've done enough wood- and metalwork to have an idea of how long it took (augmented by conversations with and messages from Bill this year about his adventures in acquiring and working with other elements. He had particularly sulfurous comments about antimony . . .). I can't stop admiring it. :)
2020 ended with the BYM turning in an hour before midnight. I wasn't making a point of staying up (I'm usually the one dozing off before the guitar falls) but there had been a poem I had been trying to write all month, so I buckled down to fleshing it out and hit the Submittable button forty minutes before midnight (and again at twenty minutes 'til for another packet). Then I put away laundry while peeking at the lights still up on my street and on Holly. A year ago the ones on Holly would not have been visible because of trees the tornado knocked down.
Tonight's dinner is leftover rice with black-eyed peas and Chinese sausage, with sparkling wine. It reached 74 F in parts of Nashville today, so I spent part of the afternoon cutting spotted leaves off the rosebushes, and tomorrow I'll spray them.
Friends, here's to a year with an abundance of roses and other rewards. And, if you aren't blogging or tweeting about your goings-on, drop me a line on what you are seeing, hearing, tasting, or considering? Message me for my address if you'd rather send (and get) a (post)card. :)
I've always wanted brook trout / for breakfast
The subject line, which I typed into this window two days ago, is from Raymond Carver's "Looking for Work." It incurred a sudden jones for pan-fried fish, which I hadn't planned on cooking, and the canned tuna in the pantry wasn't going to address that, nor the tofu-fish cakes in the freezer, and moaning about bar-crowding putzes wasn't going to make me feel better, so I closed my laptop and wrote postcards instead.
Had I started this entry this morning, the subject line probably would have been "The letter A was once an inverted cow's head," from Arthur Sze's "Water Calligraphy" (username=okrablossom, there's zucchini in there as well, albeit as in a frittata rather than as frites). I just posted some notes about Sze (and other translators) over at Vary the Line.
On Saturday afternoon, I ate at a restaurant for the first time since March 13 -- a fried "chicken" sandwich with fries, washed down with a sorrel drink and ginger beer, at Vege-licious, a vegan soul food joint adjacent to Fisk University. The three of us spread out across two picnic tables behind the restaurant. (The heat index had reached 102 F by that point, so there was no competition for the seats -- there was a steady stream of takeout traffic, but only one other group of diners, at the opposite end of the large tent.) This was after a taping at Hadley Park for this event (co-sponsored by NMAAM, FUUN, and the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Huntsville):
I sing alto in the quartet; it was our first time singing together as a quartet, and the soprano's first time singing one-to-a-part ever. We did well, all things considered, and Patrick is well worth listening to. Register at https://bit.ly/323IZwn to view the webinar this Saturday.
This may be the year I learn to can vegetables, as there are now forty tomato plants in place in the yard, and another dozen or so waiting for me to clear ground, and a handful of cuttings from the starters that looked too far gone to tend to further.
I have coaxed some vetch into sprouting on a formerly barren strip next to the porch. The balloon flowers are fantastic right now, the zinnias are admired by passers-by, and I'm harvesting a few peppers each night.
Had I started this entry this morning, the subject line probably would have been "The letter A was once an inverted cow's head," from Arthur Sze's "Water Calligraphy" (username=okrablossom, there's zucchini in there as well, albeit as in a frittata rather than as frites). I just posted some notes about Sze (and other translators) over at Vary the Line.
On Saturday afternoon, I ate at a restaurant for the first time since March 13 -- a fried "chicken" sandwich with fries, washed down with a sorrel drink and ginger beer, at Vege-licious, a vegan soul food joint adjacent to Fisk University. The three of us spread out across two picnic tables behind the restaurant. (The heat index had reached 102 F by that point, so there was no competition for the seats -- there was a steady stream of takeout traffic, but only one other group of diners, at the opposite end of the large tent.) This was after a taping at Hadley Park for this event (co-sponsored by NMAAM, FUUN, and the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Huntsville):
I sing alto in the quartet; it was our first time singing together as a quartet, and the soprano's first time singing one-to-a-part ever. We did well, all things considered, and Patrick is well worth listening to. Register at https://bit.ly/323IZwn to view the webinar this Saturday.
This may be the year I learn to can vegetables, as there are now forty tomato plants in place in the yard, and another dozen or so waiting for me to clear ground, and a handful of cuttings from the starters that looked too far gone to tend to further.
I have coaxed some vetch into sprouting on a formerly barren strip next to the porch. The balloon flowers are fantastic right now, the zinnias are admired by passers-by, and I'm harvesting a few peppers each night.
Entry tags:
"Thank you for being a car"
Charmed by: picture books about mail-critters, including Angela Cronk's Monster Mail (disclosure: I'm one of the book's backers) and Marianne Dubuc's Mr. Postmouse books.
Starting the month with:
remembering how my iron works (oh hi, reset button)
not remembering how to update my website
skipping the gym (something in my back twanging hard)
not listening to Wait Wait Don't Tell Me (I cannot take any more takes on cults this week)
enjoying some garlic I pickled back in November (the plague has been knocking out colleagues left and right...)
not engaging further with a forum troll ("Never wrestle with a pig...")
planning a crockpot full of Slap chili for a company cookoff. (A friend gave me a spice mix called "Slap Ya Mama" which I am doctoring into my "Slap the Patriarchy" variation. Because.)
Just read: Shiv Ramdas's And Now His Lordship Is Laughing (short story; h/t Mary)
Also reading: the Wildsam field guide to Charleston
Rehearsing: Lauridsen's O Magnum Mysterium, which the chamber choir read on Wednesday and will perform tomorrow (February 2), along with Gwyneth Walker's Prayer of Compassion. Services are broadcast and archived on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVB2xDLhfjQnrXx-2zWmfeA/featured
Ahead:
Poetic Medicine plans to publish "Eichengrun in Terezin" later this winter
Grand Magnolia: immersive theater at Oz Nashville this June. I'm in the cast! [The subject line is what was said to me at the end of the callback audition, which included creating scenes inspired by the story of the first interracial wedding in Chattanooga -- in particular, the blockade set up by friends of the couple to prevent disruptions. Hence me channeling a Buick Skylark getting bumped into and sinking down as its tires flattened out ...]
Starting the month with:
Just read: Shiv Ramdas's And Now His Lordship Is Laughing (short story; h/t Mary)
Also reading: the Wildsam field guide to Charleston
Rehearsing: Lauridsen's O Magnum Mysterium, which the chamber choir read on Wednesday and will perform tomorrow (February 2), along with Gwyneth Walker's Prayer of Compassion. Services are broadcast and archived on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVB2xDLhfjQnrXx-2zWmfeA/featured
Ahead:
Entry tags:
it being December 1...
...a friend or associate of a former classmate tweeted a video of harpsichordist Scott Ross, who died of AIDS-related pneumonia 30 years ago.
There is a recording on YouTube of Ross playing the Gigue from Rameau's "First Book of Keyboard Pieces," which happens to be what I played most often on the harpsichords around Connecticut College back in July.
This morning I sang a solo about God having countless names and faces, and slid a stone into our water communion bowl in memory of Thomas Peck.
There is a recording on YouTube of Ross playing the Gigue from Rameau's "First Book of Keyboard Pieces," which happens to be what I played most often on the harpsichords around Connecticut College back in July.
This morning I sang a solo about God having countless names and faces, and slid a stone into our water communion bowl in memory of Thomas Peck.
Entry tags:
Sous les feuilles d’un chêne
["Under the oak leaves" - a line from "Au clair de la fontaine" (By the clear fountain)]
The senior minister at my church is on sabbatical, and Rabbi Rami Shapiro is visiting monthly as a guest preacher. On September 11, he brought with him a shruti, which he played as the congregation learned a new round:
Longtime readers/friends may recall that I do have a thing about fountains... though this past month my scant spare time has been more on lake and river. My Labor Day getaway plans having fallen through twice, I decided to get on a paddleboard four out of my five days off, and last Friday I watched the full moon from my lantern-lit plank on the Cumberland.
Elsewhere and elsewhen: Paying work. Housework. Homework. Paperwork. Footwork. Speaking of--
Dancing: hip-hop, flamenco, Afro-Cuban (orishas), English country.
Friends: Visiting from France and elsewhere. Running for office.. Organizing campferences. Selling taco + lesbian farmer buttons (coupon code here, btw). Preparing for High Holy Days. Coding. Cajoling. Caretaking. I could go on ... in short, inspiring me.
Harvesting: peppers.
Deadheading: zinnias.
Recently published:
At unFold: "Spacing for Sky," with typography by J. S. Graustein
At Folded Word: "O Margaret, Here We Are Again"
At 7x20, a weekful of polished micro-poems: 8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 8.5
There is more to say and write, much of it off-blog, but a guest arrives tomorrow, so for now it's back to cleaning. Onward!
The senior minister at my church is on sabbatical, and Rabbi Rami Shapiro is visiting monthly as a guest preacher. On September 11, he brought with him a shruti, which he played as the congregation learned a new round:
Longtime readers/friends may recall that I do have a thing about fountains... though this past month my scant spare time has been more on lake and river. My Labor Day getaway plans having fallen through twice, I decided to get on a paddleboard four out of my five days off, and last Friday I watched the full moon from my lantern-lit plank on the Cumberland.
Elsewhere and elsewhen: Paying work. Housework. Homework. Paperwork. Footwork. Speaking of--
Dancing: hip-hop, flamenco, Afro-Cuban (orishas), English country.
Friends: Visiting from France and elsewhere. Running for office.. Organizing campferences. Selling taco + lesbian farmer buttons (coupon code here, btw). Preparing for High Holy Days. Coding. Cajoling. Caretaking. I could go on ... in short, inspiring me.
Harvesting: peppers.
Deadheading: zinnias.
Recently published:
There is more to say and write, much of it off-blog, but a guest arrives tomorrow, so for now it's back to cleaning. Onward!
Entry tags:
better mean what you sing
There's a feature on Dr. Ysaye Barnwell in the current issue of UU World. It includes this:
Barnwell elaborated on this at the end of today's workshop at First UU Nashville, whose members will be singing a half-dozen-plus songs/arrangements by Barnwell tomorrow morning (9 a.m. and 11 a.m.). The Freedom Riders sang "Kumbaya" in their camp at a point where calling to God felt like the only option. Barnwell demonstrated how she sometimes opens concerts with a furious, fast, rough-edged rendition of "Kumbaya" that is nothing like the Girl Scout version -- to get the audience toward hearing it as the bone-deep cry for help the words are to convey.
A recurring theme in the workshop: take time to think about the words of spirituals from the perspective of the enslaved, often after being preached to by so-called Christian masters. What is being taught or signaled?
A book to read: Rising from the Rails -- how the Pullman porters led the creation of the black middle class, all the while navigating social tightropes. Barnwell described how the porters closely observed the lives of affluent white passengers , to then subsequently teach about investing and other skills new to most postbellum communities. How the porters would gather up discarded newspapers in the cars, bundle them up, and toss them into towns where newspapers weren't available.
There was much more. I sat, stood, and danced among and between several different people during the course of the day. The afternoon session included a quolidbet that combined "Honor, Honor," "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," "I’m a Rollin’," "Couldn’t Hear Nobody Pray," "My Good Lawd Done Been Here," and "Please, Lordy," with "Honor, Honor" in harmony.
Something for me to work toward and look forward to: taming my schedule enough to sing more marching songs and quolidbets. Someday.
She turns solemn and angry talking about how "Kumbaya," which means "Come by Here" in the Gullah language, has become snarky shorthand for feel-good or weak-minded groupthink. A soulful cry sung by the Georgia Sea Island slaves, the song was carried on by Southern blacks in the time of Jim Crow and lynch mobs, and later by the Freedom Riders when they learned three of their workers had been murdered by Klansmen. "When people say, 'It was a Kumbaya moment,' it clearly was not a Kumbaya moment," Barnwell admonished. "It's actually an invocation for God to come by here now because things are needed. If you hear people use it mistakenly, gently correct them."
Barnwell elaborated on this at the end of today's workshop at First UU Nashville, whose members will be singing a half-dozen-plus songs/arrangements by Barnwell tomorrow morning (9 a.m. and 11 a.m.). The Freedom Riders sang "Kumbaya" in their camp at a point where calling to God felt like the only option. Barnwell demonstrated how she sometimes opens concerts with a furious, fast, rough-edged rendition of "Kumbaya" that is nothing like the Girl Scout version -- to get the audience toward hearing it as the bone-deep cry for help the words are to convey.
A recurring theme in the workshop: take time to think about the words of spirituals from the perspective of the enslaved, often after being preached to by so-called Christian masters. What is being taught or signaled?
A book to read: Rising from the Rails -- how the Pullman porters led the creation of the black middle class, all the while navigating social tightropes. Barnwell described how the porters closely observed the lives of affluent white passengers , to then subsequently teach about investing and other skills new to most postbellum communities. How the porters would gather up discarded newspapers in the cars, bundle them up, and toss them into towns where newspapers weren't available.
There was much more. I sat, stood, and danced among and between several different people during the course of the day. The afternoon session included a quolidbet that combined "Honor, Honor," "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," "I’m a Rollin’," "Couldn’t Hear Nobody Pray," "My Good Lawd Done Been Here," and "Please, Lordy," with "Honor, Honor" in harmony.
Something for me to work toward and look forward to: taming my schedule enough to sing more marching songs and quolidbets. Someday.
Entry tags:
yearning across the centuries
More often than not, it cheers me up when a Vaughan Williams setting is included among the opening hymns. This morning started with the Down Ampney tune, with verses by Bianco da Siena (died c. 1434), translated by Richard Frederick Littledale (1833-1890) with further alterations by the hymnal editors:
First UU Nashville sanctuary, September 2015
The Story for All Ages featured Moses arguing with God about returning to Egypt, and the pastor spoke at length about astronaut Edgar Mitchell during her sermon. Between those two points, the worship associate read Neruda's Keeping Quiet and the chamber choir sang Malcolm Daglish's setting of Wendell Berry's "To the Holy Spirit":
Cheekwood, December 2015
Come down, O Love divine,
seek thou this soul of mine,
and visit it with thine own ardor glowing;
O Comforter, draw near,
within my heart appear,
and kindle it, thy holy flame bestowing.
O let it freely burn,
till earthly passions turn
to dust and ashes in its heat consuming;
and let its glorious light
shine ever on my sight,
and clothe me round, the while my path illuming.
And so the glory strong,
for which the soul will long,
shall far outpass the power of human telling;
for none can guess its grace,
till we become the place
wherein the holy Spirit makes a dwelling.
First UU Nashville sanctuary, September 2015
The Story for All Ages featured Moses arguing with God about returning to Egypt, and the pastor spoke at length about astronaut Edgar Mitchell during her sermon. Between those two points, the worship associate read Neruda's Keeping Quiet and the chamber choir sang Malcolm Daglish's setting of Wendell Berry's "To the Holy Spirit":
O Thou, far off and here, whole and broken,
Who in necessity and in bounty wait,
Whose truth is light and dark, mute though spoken,
By Thy wide grace show me Thy narrow gate.
Cheekwood, December 2015
Entry tags:
doggie!
At my church today: Spanky, a therapy dog in the Pet Partners program.
My church observes a custom called "sharing the plate," where half of the "loose cash" (i.e., not designated for pledges) collected during the offertory goes to a local charity. This month the money will go to Crossroads Campus, whose goals include "OFFER[ING] PAID JOB-TRAINING internships to young adults who lack the connections and experience needed to break into the workforce" and
"PROVID[ING] AFFORDABLE HOUSING for young adults on the brink of homelessness; offering stability, safety and community to those who need it most" -- two social issues that many people in the congregation have put in many hours toward addressing.
The literature on the social justice table today included coupons for the Crossroads store and self-serve dog wash, and save-the date cards for Hike for the Homeless (November 7), which will benefit Safe Haven Family Shelter.
My church observes a custom called "sharing the plate," where half of the "loose cash" (i.e., not designated for pledges) collected during the offertory goes to a local charity. This month the money will go to Crossroads Campus, whose goals include "OFFER[ING] PAID JOB-TRAINING internships to young adults who lack the connections and experience needed to break into the workforce" and
"PROVID[ING] AFFORDABLE HOUSING for young adults on the brink of homelessness; offering stability, safety and community to those who need it most" -- two social issues that many people in the congregation have put in many hours toward addressing.
The literature on the social justice table today included coupons for the Crossroads store and self-serve dog wash, and save-the date cards for Hike for the Homeless (November 7), which will benefit Safe Haven Family Shelter.
Entry tags:
step by step, moving forward
A June tradition at my church is Music Sunday, and this coming Sunday, at 9 a.m. and at 11 a.m., the choir will be performing a new setting of Darrell Grant's Ruby Bridges Suite.
It is going to be outstanding. Darrell Grant is on piano and keyboard; man can play. Brian Foti on drums -- ditto. Same for the guy on string bass (whose name I didn't catch, apologies!). Connye Florance is one of the soloists (I haven't heard Lari White yet, who's another). Majic Jackson narrating, with words by MLK and Maya Angelou and others. The gifted and dedicated Seth Adler working sound. Yes, I'm name-dropping, because some of you locals need that to get you out of the house on a summer morning (and I include myself in that group).
Some of the songs have had me tearing up as I study them. The text alone won't convey why -- it's the rise and fall of melody and harmony that hits me in the gut -- but here are some of the lines anyway. In "Hold My Hand," Ruby's mother sings to her:
Hold my hand, child, hold my hand
Someday you will understand
Straight ahead, child, never fear
God is watching, love is near
For the world, child, is not fair
Danger follows everywhere
Lift your eyes, child
You will see
God is watching
You are free
And in "Come in," a teacher sings to her student:
Ruby, you're a special one.
Pray that I can see you through.
There's so much meanness in the world
but you should know they don't see what I see.
In here you're just a little girl
who has a right to learn who she can be.
With faith, and time,
you'll see that I believe in you.
We've much to learn, we two.
Darrell says he spent twenty years writing the finale, "We Rise," originally composing it for a sophomore album that fell through, and then revising it periodically (with a four-bar stretch that kept defying his attempts to perfect the piece), and then realizing that all the great creators resort to "shims" at times, and later recognizing that the suite was where the piece belonged...
Rise up, brand new day
You know that love will find a way
Together we cannot be broken
Up from the bitter past we rise
To build a world where peace is spoken
The time is now
At last we rise
This time the circle can't be broken
This time the ghosts of hate must die
We'll throw the gates of Freedom open
The time is now
At last we rise
Again, the music is essential -- left to my own devices, I don't know that love will find a way, I see circles broken every damn day, and on, and on, but when I'm singing those words, my unbelief doesn't matter. Rise up, brand new day.
Like many other commuters, I've been cranky about the congestion amplified by CMA Fest (a friend retweeted Gretchen Peters's quip about meanderthals, and I admit I laughed out loud) ... but I've also been entertained by the skin and plumage on display, and I managed to miss the fish parts on the interstate snarl-up, and I give thanks yet again for the pleasure of living in a city with session players on virtually every block. When I got home tonight, the rock cellist and/or guitarist (not always sure what the instrument is, but the playing is consistently good) who lives a couple of houses away was practicing licks.
Music in the air, fireflies in the yard, doggie at the door, piano waiting ... praise.
It is going to be outstanding. Darrell Grant is on piano and keyboard; man can play. Brian Foti on drums -- ditto. Same for the guy on string bass (whose name I didn't catch, apologies!). Connye Florance is one of the soloists (I haven't heard Lari White yet, who's another). Majic Jackson narrating, with words by MLK and Maya Angelou and others. The gifted and dedicated Seth Adler working sound. Yes, I'm name-dropping, because some of you locals need that to get you out of the house on a summer morning (and I include myself in that group).
Some of the songs have had me tearing up as I study them. The text alone won't convey why -- it's the rise and fall of melody and harmony that hits me in the gut -- but here are some of the lines anyway. In "Hold My Hand," Ruby's mother sings to her:
Hold my hand, child, hold my hand
Someday you will understand
Straight ahead, child, never fear
God is watching, love is near
For the world, child, is not fair
Danger follows everywhere
Lift your eyes, child
You will see
God is watching
You are free
And in "Come in," a teacher sings to her student:
Ruby, you're a special one.
Pray that I can see you through.
There's so much meanness in the world
but you should know they don't see what I see.
In here you're just a little girl
who has a right to learn who she can be.
With faith, and time,
you'll see that I believe in you.
We've much to learn, we two.
Darrell says he spent twenty years writing the finale, "We Rise," originally composing it for a sophomore album that fell through, and then revising it periodically (with a four-bar stretch that kept defying his attempts to perfect the piece), and then realizing that all the great creators resort to "shims" at times, and later recognizing that the suite was where the piece belonged...
Rise up, brand new day
You know that love will find a way
Together we cannot be broken
Up from the bitter past we rise
To build a world where peace is spoken
The time is now
At last we rise
This time the circle can't be broken
This time the ghosts of hate must die
We'll throw the gates of Freedom open
The time is now
At last we rise
Again, the music is essential -- left to my own devices, I don't know that love will find a way, I see circles broken every damn day, and on, and on, but when I'm singing those words, my unbelief doesn't matter. Rise up, brand new day.
Like many other commuters, I've been cranky about the congestion amplified by CMA Fest (a friend retweeted Gretchen Peters's quip about meanderthals, and I admit I laughed out loud) ... but I've also been entertained by the skin and plumage on display, and I managed to miss the fish parts on the interstate snarl-up, and I give thanks yet again for the pleasure of living in a city with session players on virtually every block. When I got home tonight, the rock cellist and/or guitarist (not always sure what the instrument is, but the playing is consistently good) who lives a couple of houses away was practicing licks.
Music in the air, fireflies in the yard, doggie at the door, piano waiting ... praise.
Entry tags:
sparkling in everything that lives
I have been humming "I Am That Great and Fiery Force" to myself since Sunday, when it was sung as one of the morning songs at church. Words by Hildegarde von Bingen, set to "Ave Vera Virginitas" by Josquin Desprez -- you can hear a bit of it sung by Missing Rachel, and longer versions of the tune on YouTube, inluding one by a Slovak choir, the Hilliard Ensemble, et al. The verses:
The chamber choir sang two pieces, including the Real Group's "Words," which was applauded at both services.
Present reading: Erica E. Hirshler's Sargent's Daughters: The Biography of a Painting
Recent cooking: Chicken with mushroom-wine sauce (and parsley from an early birthday present); Mexican-ish brownies for a Cinco de Mayo potluck (using salted caramel cocoa mix, throwing in a cupful of chocolate chips, cutting the sugar in half, and ancho chile powder -- they turned out fine. The intern who shares my office gushed about them without knowing I was the one who made them. \o/); fufu (to go with the leftover chicken)
Today's workout: a long swim. I had lane 2 to myself, which meant I could indulge in backstroke as well as freestyle.
Today's remaining goal: some ironing. Chores toward comfort: story of my life. ;)
I am that great and fiery force
sparkling in everything that lives;
in shining of the river's course,
in greening grass that glory gives.
I shine in glitter on the seas,
in burning sun, in moon and stars.
In unseen wind, in verdant trees
I breathe within, both near and far.
And where I breathe there is no death,
and meadows glow with beauties rife.
I am in all, the spirit's breath,
the thundered word, for I am Life.
The chamber choir sang two pieces, including the Real Group's "Words," which was applauded at both services.
Present reading: Erica E. Hirshler's Sargent's Daughters: The Biography of a Painting
Recent cooking: Chicken with mushroom-wine sauce (and parsley from an early birthday present); Mexican-ish brownies for a Cinco de Mayo potluck (using salted caramel cocoa mix, throwing in a cupful of chocolate chips, cutting the sugar in half, and ancho chile powder -- they turned out fine. The intern who shares my office gushed about them without knowing I was the one who made them. \o/); fufu (to go with the leftover chicken)
Today's workout: a long swim. I had lane 2 to myself, which meant I could indulge in backstroke as well as freestyle.
Today's remaining goal: some ironing. Chores toward comfort: story of my life. ;)
Entry tags:
hustling
This afternoon's main project is getting ready for this evening's Heartbreak Happy Hour at the Stone Fox -- I'm one of the performers.
The years I've spent drafting sermons (and numerous other speeches for church) mean that I now have a pretty good sense of how many words = ten minutes of material. Which I found myself grateful for this past week, what with trying to bounce back from the flu while going back to work and staying on schedule on a commission and so on. It was nice to know that ten minutes of material isn't actually that many words and that I could knock it out in a day if I couldn't carve out the time any earlier. (But what actually happened was that I started writing it in my head two minutes after receiving the invitation, and sketched it various lines and points in my Workflowy during the rest of the week before slicing and knotting it all together the past two days.)
Coincidentally, two of the hymns in this morning's church service were ones I selected for a service I led a decade or so ago. One was "When Shall We Learn," which is Carl Flentge Schalk's setting of a poem by Auden:
The other is "Creative Love, Our Thanks We Give," a William DeWitt Hyde poem adapted by Beth Ide, and set to "Truth from Above" with harmony by Vaughan Williams:
Also at church: an adorable mop of a service dog, who snuggled into its owner's shoulder for a while during the sermon:
After church, I ran an errand and picked up Chinese carryout. There was an invisible fortune cookie in the bag...
... and this advice in one of the corporeal cookies:
From the speculative writing/publishing realm:
Sue Burke and several other very experienced translators want to bring castles in Spain to you -- specifically Castles in Spain, a bilingual anthology they're raising funds for via Indiegogo.
If you're a Science Fiction Poetry Association member, you have one week left to nominate your favorite 2014 poems for Rhysling Awards. I have both long and short poems eligible this year [downloadable at http://sfpoetry.com/ra/eligible/PegDuthie2014.rtf] . . .
How to Live on Other Planets is available for pre-order. The list of contributors is fierce, y'all.
The years I've spent drafting sermons (and numerous other speeches for church) mean that I now have a pretty good sense of how many words = ten minutes of material. Which I found myself grateful for this past week, what with trying to bounce back from the flu while going back to work and staying on schedule on a commission and so on. It was nice to know that ten minutes of material isn't actually that many words and that I could knock it out in a day if I couldn't carve out the time any earlier. (But what actually happened was that I started writing it in my head two minutes after receiving the invitation, and sketched it various lines and points in my Workflowy during the rest of the week before slicing and knotting it all together the past two days.)
Coincidentally, two of the hymns in this morning's church service were ones I selected for a service I led a decade or so ago. One was "When Shall We Learn," which is Carl Flentge Schalk's setting of a poem by Auden:
When shall we learn, what should be clear as day,
we cannot choose what we are free to love?
We are created with and from the world
to suffer with and by it day by day.
For through our lively traffic all the day,
in my own person I am forced to know
how much must be forgotten out of love,
how much must be forgiven, even love.
Or else we make a scarecrow of the day,
loose ends and jumble of our common world;
or else our changing flesh can never know
there must be sorrow if there can be love.
The other is "Creative Love, Our Thanks We Give," a William DeWitt Hyde poem adapted by Beth Ide, and set to "Truth from Above" with harmony by Vaughan Williams:
Creative love, our thanks we give
that this, our world is incomplete . . .
Since what we choose is what we are,
and what we love we yet shall be,
the goal may ever shine afar--
the will to reach it makes us free.
Also at church: an adorable mop of a service dog, who snuggled into its owner's shoulder for a while during the sermon:
After church, I ran an errand and picked up Chinese carryout. There was an invisible fortune cookie in the bag...
... and this advice in one of the corporeal cookies:
Business is a lot like playing tennis; if you don't serve well, you lose.
From the speculative writing/publishing realm:
Entry tags:
"the words that we utter reach through all space"
I attended a memorial service for the extraordinary Elizabeth Papousek this morning. At the end of the service, Rev. Seavey said that opening the hymnal at random (a habit of Elizabeth's at worship committee meetings) had led her to these words of Maria Mitchell (a Unitarian as well as an astronomer):
After the reception, I stopped at the Green Hills library, where some Advent calendars from the collection of the Steele Family were on display, including one featuring planets and stars:
(I also saw three other church members at the library while I was there. My tribe indeed.)
Small as is our whole system compared with the infinitude of
creation,
Brief as is our life compared with the cycles of time,
We are so tethered to all by the beautiful dependencies of law,
That not only the sparrow’s fall is felt to the uttermost bound but the vibrations set in motion by the words that we utter reach through all space and the tremor is felt through all time.
After the reception, I stopped at the Green Hills library, where some Advent calendars from the collection of the Steele Family were on display, including one featuring planets and stars:
(I also saw three other church members at the library while I was there. My tribe indeed.)
Entry tags:
Reverb, Day 18: downtime at sundown
From Sophie Appleby, via Kat McNally:
This year, there were a handful of Fridays where I was able to stay offline from sundown on Friday to sunrise on Saturday, and sometimes even until sundown on Saturday as well.
I'm a happier woman when I can manage it. It can be time for reading. Time at the piano. Time with crayons and pencils and markers. Time with my plants and seeds and my plans for them. Time ironing -- which is, yes, a chore, but also a pleasure, in wearing clothes and using linens that look and feel better when cared for in that fashion. Time with the dog. Time sifting through old papers and keepsakes.
It sharpens the saw, to borrow Franklin Covey terminology. It brings a bounce back into my brain. It forces me to wait for answers instead of racing toward them, and insists on my enjoying slices of the "someday" ("someday I'll read that book..." "someday I'll get the hang of sight-reading pieces with umpteen sharps in the key signature..." "someday I'll expand those eleven words into a full sestina...") that I would otherwise not get around to anytime soon.
Tuesday night, I was so dead on my feet that lighting candles was out of the question. Tonight was nice, though. It was a long day at the office and there was yet more work-related stuff to deal with when I got home, but once that was out of the way, it was time for light and for some writing and wrapping.
I sketched this hanukkiah a couple of weeks ago during a visit to Martin ArtQuest Gallery at the Frist Center (where, full disclosure, I'm currently working as their interim editor). Earlier this week, I spent the end of my lunch break at another crafting station stocked with metallic crayon-pencils and translucent bookmark, the better to add a chalice to my bulletin board:
(Yes, Michigan tweeps, that's a Zingerman's postcard. I dig the moose and waterfowl.)
On a related note, here's what's happening at the Center the rest of the year, narrated by the newbie: http://fristcenter.org/calendar-exhibitions/detail/at-the-frist52
In the busyness of the everyday, taking time to nourish the soul doesn't reach the top of the 'to do' list as often as it should.
What nourishes your soul? How would you like to incorporate more of this into your life in 2015?
This year, there were a handful of Fridays where I was able to stay offline from sundown on Friday to sunrise on Saturday, and sometimes even until sundown on Saturday as well.
I'm a happier woman when I can manage it. It can be time for reading. Time at the piano. Time with crayons and pencils and markers. Time with my plants and seeds and my plans for them. Time ironing -- which is, yes, a chore, but also a pleasure, in wearing clothes and using linens that look and feel better when cared for in that fashion. Time with the dog. Time sifting through old papers and keepsakes.
It sharpens the saw, to borrow Franklin Covey terminology. It brings a bounce back into my brain. It forces me to wait for answers instead of racing toward them, and insists on my enjoying slices of the "someday" ("someday I'll read that book..." "someday I'll get the hang of sight-reading pieces with umpteen sharps in the key signature..." "someday I'll expand those eleven words into a full sestina...") that I would otherwise not get around to anytime soon.
Tuesday night, I was so dead on my feet that lighting candles was out of the question. Tonight was nice, though. It was a long day at the office and there was yet more work-related stuff to deal with when I got home, but once that was out of the way, it was time for light and for some writing and wrapping.
I sketched this hanukkiah a couple of weeks ago during a visit to Martin ArtQuest Gallery at the Frist Center (where, full disclosure, I'm currently working as their interim editor). Earlier this week, I spent the end of my lunch break at another crafting station stocked with metallic crayon-pencils and translucent bookmark, the better to add a chalice to my bulletin board:
(Yes, Michigan tweeps, that's a Zingerman's postcard. I dig the moose and waterfowl.)
On a related note, here's what's happening at the Center the rest of the year, narrated by the newbie: http://fristcenter.org/calendar-exhibitions/detail/at-the-frist52
Entry tags:
Shelley Jackson Denham, 1950-2013
Last summer, when I went to the Highlands-Cashiers Chamber Music Festival in North Carolina, I was captivated by the beautiful woman turning pages for William Ransom. She had silver hair and wide eyes and she was so engaged with the music -- not histrionically or showtastically or in any way in the way of the performance, yet vibrantly, fully present.
I was introduced to her at a reception after the concert, but with our first names only, so several minutes went by before the clues added up and I realized I was talking to a woman whose hymns I'd sung many times. At which point I fear I went into stammering fangirl mode, but she handled that graciously, of course.
Last night -- at the end of chamber choir rehearsal -- I learned that Shelley's husband had passed away in May, and that she died on Sunday of a heart attack.
I have Singing the Living Tradition open at the moment to #86:
I was introduced to her at a reception after the concert, but with our first names only, so several minutes went by before the clues added up and I realized I was talking to a woman whose hymns I'd sung many times. At which point I fear I went into stammering fangirl mode, but she handled that graciously, of course.
Last night -- at the end of chamber choir rehearsal -- I learned that Shelley's husband had passed away in May, and that she died on Sunday of a heart attack.
I have Singing the Living Tradition open at the moment to #86:
Spirit of great mystery,
hear the still, small voice in me.
Help me live my wordless creed
as I comfort those in need.
Fill me with compassion,
be the source of my intuition.
Then, when life is done for me,
let love be my legacy.
--Shelley Jackson Denham, 1987
momentum
Two days ago, I cleaned and cleaned and cleaned. I had copyediting and lettering targets I'd planned to meet, but I also had a headache, and I haven't gotten past the "eek!" part of the current calligraphy thing, so scrubbing the tub and sanitizing pots and making a new batch of basil toner seemed way, way easier than putting pencil to paper.
Yesterday, I started copyediting after breakfast and worked flat through lunchtime (which almost never happens, because I loooooooove food and get very, very cranky when I'm running on fumes) and didn't stop until 2:45 pm, when I yelped, "Eek!" and rushed out the door to meet my hiking partner. (There are times when I curse pre-scheduled exercise because it disrupts my grooves, but we saw two fawns at the lake, and the ridge that always kicks my ass does seem to be getting slightly easier to climb.)
I worry about losing touch with people. I worry about people dying before I make time to bake the pie and find my crocheting to take over for a long catch-up chat. I worry about not getting around to planting the seeds I bought this year, or the ones I've put in the "plant later" tray because it's already too hot. I worry about the energy evaporating from the sketches of poems I don't have time to amplify or revise right now. I worry that when I finally throw out the bags of tomato seeds my mother tried to preserve -- I tested a few this spring, and nothing came up -- I'll wish I had them on hand a week later when the poem about Rorschach seed patterns on scraps of Bounty finally gels (I could take pictures -- I will take pictures -- but they aren't going to retain the layers or up-closeness of the actual thing. I could keep just one. I could work on the dang poem after all if I'm gonna think aloud about it this much).
I fret about how everything, but everything, expands into a million marigold petals when I touch it. I want to scrape at the scale on my bathroom faucet with a toothpick, and to paint my living room myself, and to redo every inch of my yard. I plan to find the pillow for the cover that's been made out of my wedding dress, and the upholsterer I'd hoped to ask about recovering my dining room chairs has gone out of business. I resent work for taking time away from studying. I am breathless whenever I spend an hour studying, awed at how much more there will always be to learn. I get deep into a manuscript and it reminds me of how much I actually already know, just from the years I've put in and how they've developed that editorial "sixth sense" that tells me when a name is probably misspelled or that something on page 38 isn't in sync with what the author says on page 83, as well as being hyper-conscious of all the little cues and nuances that separate a professionally designed book from a document assembled by an amateur. (Nothing against amateur efforts, mind--as long as the professionals are getting their due.) I miss learning new music, but not enough to rejoin my old ensembles or start the trio I sometimes dream about pulling together.
I am delighted by Cathy Yardley's review of my book. I'm singing along with madrigals in the car to de-rust my voice (I'm leading hymns at the early service this Sunday). I found a Spanish-language copy of Isabel Allende's Zorro at a used bookstore, and gave it to a GA delegate in my congregation to take to Louisville for the library to be established there. I saw that the bookstore had copies of Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle in both the Reading List and Agriculture sections, and that some of the copies in the Ag section were slightly cheaper, which was intel my hiking partner (and mom of a schoolkid) found useful when she went shopping there a few days later. My E player in fantasy tennis (the delightfully sassy Donna Vekic) has made a surprising run to the semifinals in Birmingham (UK), and I'm still alive in Survival at the Shore (horseracing predictions) -- ranked 1118th, true (my second-best day got negated by a cyberglitch, woe), but I haven't let myself dive deep into researching the ponies, so I'm fine with merely swimming along. Go Chocolate Drops! Go Zealous on the Run! Go Toute Allure! I'm amused by this interview of Charleston chef Robert Stehling, happy to hear reports that Husk Nashville is living up to the hype, and, in the bath, reading a 1996 Baedeker guide to Canada that used to live on the shelves of the Charlotte public library.
(And now it's been more than fifteen minutes since I applied sunscreen, and I've been asked to deliver a shirt and a gallon of water to my favorite motorcycle repair shop. Time to move from inventory to service! :-) )
Yesterday, I started copyediting after breakfast and worked flat through lunchtime (which almost never happens, because I loooooooove food and get very, very cranky when I'm running on fumes) and didn't stop until 2:45 pm, when I yelped, "Eek!" and rushed out the door to meet my hiking partner. (There are times when I curse pre-scheduled exercise because it disrupts my grooves, but we saw two fawns at the lake, and the ridge that always kicks my ass does seem to be getting slightly easier to climb.)
I worry about losing touch with people. I worry about people dying before I make time to bake the pie and find my crocheting to take over for a long catch-up chat. I worry about not getting around to planting the seeds I bought this year, or the ones I've put in the "plant later" tray because it's already too hot. I worry about the energy evaporating from the sketches of poems I don't have time to amplify or revise right now. I worry that when I finally throw out the bags of tomato seeds my mother tried to preserve -- I tested a few this spring, and nothing came up -- I'll wish I had them on hand a week later when the poem about Rorschach seed patterns on scraps of Bounty finally gels (I could take pictures -- I will take pictures -- but they aren't going to retain the layers or up-closeness of the actual thing. I could keep just one. I could work on the dang poem after all if I'm gonna think aloud about it this much).
I fret about how everything, but everything, expands into a million marigold petals when I touch it. I want to scrape at the scale on my bathroom faucet with a toothpick, and to paint my living room myself, and to redo every inch of my yard. I plan to find the pillow for the cover that's been made out of my wedding dress, and the upholsterer I'd hoped to ask about recovering my dining room chairs has gone out of business. I resent work for taking time away from studying. I am breathless whenever I spend an hour studying, awed at how much more there will always be to learn. I get deep into a manuscript and it reminds me of how much I actually already know, just from the years I've put in and how they've developed that editorial "sixth sense" that tells me when a name is probably misspelled or that something on page 38 isn't in sync with what the author says on page 83, as well as being hyper-conscious of all the little cues and nuances that separate a professionally designed book from a document assembled by an amateur. (Nothing against amateur efforts, mind--as long as the professionals are getting their due.) I miss learning new music, but not enough to rejoin my old ensembles or start the trio I sometimes dream about pulling together.
I am delighted by Cathy Yardley's review of my book. I'm singing along with madrigals in the car to de-rust my voice (I'm leading hymns at the early service this Sunday). I found a Spanish-language copy of Isabel Allende's Zorro at a used bookstore, and gave it to a GA delegate in my congregation to take to Louisville for the library to be established there. I saw that the bookstore had copies of Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle in both the Reading List and Agriculture sections, and that some of the copies in the Ag section were slightly cheaper, which was intel my hiking partner (and mom of a schoolkid) found useful when she went shopping there a few days later. My E player in fantasy tennis (the delightfully sassy Donna Vekic) has made a surprising run to the semifinals in Birmingham (UK), and I'm still alive in Survival at the Shore (horseracing predictions) -- ranked 1118th, true (my second-best day got negated by a cyberglitch, woe), but I haven't let myself dive deep into researching the ponies, so I'm fine with merely swimming along. Go Chocolate Drops! Go Zealous on the Run! Go Toute Allure! I'm amused by this interview of Charleston chef Robert Stehling, happy to hear reports that Husk Nashville is living up to the hype, and, in the bath, reading a 1996 Baedeker guide to Canada that used to live on the shelves of the Charlotte public library.
(And now it's been more than fifteen minutes since I applied sunscreen, and I've been asked to deliver a shirt and a gallon of water to my favorite motorcycle repair shop. Time to move from inventory to service! :-) )
Entry tags:
practicing breathing; being a sports nerd
A couple of days ago, I went looking for photos of some of the Bikram postures, and came across a nifty guide (illustrated with colorful stick figures) produced by a NY studio.
(When I manage standing bow, it feels pretty cool. Then there's me getting water up my nose when I tried to sneak in a sip during savasana...)
I am taking a break from it today, though, because my body and brain both need a timeout -- a couple of old injuries have flared up, and I need a day where I don't have to be anywhere by x o'clock. (It's not really a day off -- I'm planning to divide 8-10 hours between lettering and copyediting -- but not having to stop to get myself ready to go somewhere else will make a difference. I'm such a housecat.)
Yesterday afternoon, I went to Rita Frizzell's memorial service. It included humor and drama and tears and quite a bit of music, including Sarah Dan Jones's "Meditation on Breathing" ("When I breathe in, I'll breathe in peace. When I breathe out, I'll breathe out love"). The humor included Dawn Thornton referring to herself as "Buddish" (referring to her sort-of practice of meditation); the drama included a theatre director reading aloud passages from Hamlet and coming up with a new collective noun ("an incandescence of Ritas") to encompass the different facets of she-who-was-called-Rita. There was chanting from the Tibetan Book of the Dead; there was a colorful portrait of an eight-limbed goddess hanging behind the pulpit. There was a reference to "Tibetan Buddhism's glass ceiling for women" (one of the situations leading Rita to Unitarian Universalism) but also glowing descriptions of the Friday night sangha she led, which will be continued by another member of FUUN.
The closing song was a group rendition of "You Are My Sunshine," a song Rita's mother had sung many times to her. We sang through it three times, twice with the words ("Please don't take my sunshine away...") and once simply humming. Afterward, at least two people said to me, "The humming, that's what got me." Music is such a physical act.
After the reception, I hopped into a friend's car and she steered it downtown toward sushi. Sarge talked about her plans to make blackberry wine; B. and I chatted about our connections to Texas. There was a lot of laughing with and at each other, including me at S. when she declared "I'm too old to be butch" (when B. declined her offer to pump gas) and both S. and B. at me when I waxed enthusiastic about fantasy tennis and horse handicapping. ("Look, I'm a nerd. Therefore I have nerd hobbies." "We're glad you know that.")
Speaking of which: Thanks to an $7K bet on Oxbow and a $10K bet on Mylute, I am currently leading the Smarty Jones Stakes (a Triple Crown predictions contest) over at TalkAboutTennis.com. My penchant for humoring my hunches seldom pays out two races in a row, however; moreover, I've noticed that it's always a longshot I don't pick that ends up second. Still, for the moment, peppermints all around! ;-)
(When I manage standing bow, it feels pretty cool. Then there's me getting water up my nose when I tried to sneak in a sip during savasana...)
I am taking a break from it today, though, because my body and brain both need a timeout -- a couple of old injuries have flared up, and I need a day where I don't have to be anywhere by x o'clock. (It's not really a day off -- I'm planning to divide 8-10 hours between lettering and copyediting -- but not having to stop to get myself ready to go somewhere else will make a difference. I'm such a housecat.)
Yesterday afternoon, I went to Rita Frizzell's memorial service. It included humor and drama and tears and quite a bit of music, including Sarah Dan Jones's "Meditation on Breathing" ("When I breathe in, I'll breathe in peace. When I breathe out, I'll breathe out love"). The humor included Dawn Thornton referring to herself as "Buddish" (referring to her sort-of practice of meditation); the drama included a theatre director reading aloud passages from Hamlet and coming up with a new collective noun ("an incandescence of Ritas") to encompass the different facets of she-who-was-called-Rita. There was chanting from the Tibetan Book of the Dead; there was a colorful portrait of an eight-limbed goddess hanging behind the pulpit. There was a reference to "Tibetan Buddhism's glass ceiling for women" (one of the situations leading Rita to Unitarian Universalism) but also glowing descriptions of the Friday night sangha she led, which will be continued by another member of FUUN.
The closing song was a group rendition of "You Are My Sunshine," a song Rita's mother had sung many times to her. We sang through it three times, twice with the words ("Please don't take my sunshine away...") and once simply humming. Afterward, at least two people said to me, "The humming, that's what got me." Music is such a physical act.
After the reception, I hopped into a friend's car and she steered it downtown toward sushi. Sarge talked about her plans to make blackberry wine; B. and I chatted about our connections to Texas. There was a lot of laughing with and at each other, including me at S. when she declared "I'm too old to be butch" (when B. declined her offer to pump gas) and both S. and B. at me when I waxed enthusiastic about fantasy tennis and horse handicapping. ("Look, I'm a nerd. Therefore I have nerd hobbies." "We're glad you know that.")
Speaking of which: Thanks to an $7K bet on Oxbow and a $10K bet on Mylute, I am currently leading the Smarty Jones Stakes (a Triple Crown predictions contest) over at TalkAboutTennis.com. My penchant for humoring my hunches seldom pays out two races in a row, however; moreover, I've noticed that it's always a longshot I don't pick that ends up second. Still, for the moment, peppermints all around! ;-)
Entry tags:
Mother's Day at church
At the start of the service, the choir sang Ysaye Barnwell's arrangement of Kahlil Gibran's "On Children":
Your children are not your children
They are the sons and daughters of life's longing for itself
They come through you but they are not from you
And though they are with you they belong not to you
You can give them your love but not your thoughts
For they have their own thoughts
You may house their bodies but not their souls
For the souls dwell in a place of tomorrow
Which you cannot visit
Not even in your dreams
You can strive to be like them
But you cannot make them just like you
Rev. Gail preached about family and community, and how individuals possess both the desire to belong and the desire for freedom -- the challenge being as a family member (by blood or by choice) to nurture the people we love in such a way that they also feel free to be themselves.
Midway through the sermon, she stated that the largest category of households in the United States consists of people who live alone, which was true of our congregation -- and that the majority of that group at FUUN live alone by choice. She quoted a member of the congregation who had said to her, "I'm looking for someone to date -- but there's NO WAY I'm looking for someone to marry!" This was greeted with a wave of laughter -- and a heartfelt "Amen!" bellowed from the middle of the sanctuary, which triggered a second wave of laughter.
Maybe ten years ago, a group at church performed another Sweet Honey in the Rock piece, "No Mirrors in My Nana's House." This animated version of it (Chris Raschka illustrations) is a joy:
Your children are not your children
They are the sons and daughters of life's longing for itself
They come through you but they are not from you
And though they are with you they belong not to you
You can give them your love but not your thoughts
For they have their own thoughts
You may house their bodies but not their souls
For the souls dwell in a place of tomorrow
Which you cannot visit
Not even in your dreams
You can strive to be like them
But you cannot make them just like you
Rev. Gail preached about family and community, and how individuals possess both the desire to belong and the desire for freedom -- the challenge being as a family member (by blood or by choice) to nurture the people we love in such a way that they also feel free to be themselves.
Midway through the sermon, she stated that the largest category of households in the United States consists of people who live alone, which was true of our congregation -- and that the majority of that group at FUUN live alone by choice. She quoted a member of the congregation who had said to her, "I'm looking for someone to date -- but there's NO WAY I'm looking for someone to marry!" This was greeted with a wave of laughter -- and a heartfelt "Amen!" bellowed from the middle of the sanctuary, which triggered a second wave of laughter.
Maybe ten years ago, a group at church performed another Sweet Honey in the Rock piece, "No Mirrors in My Nana's House." This animated version of it (Chris Raschka illustrations) is a joy:
Entry tags:
"You are the first chaplain who would ever pray with me."
Last night's bathtub reading was some of the Spring 2013 issue of UU World. I was pleased to see a feature on UU military chaplains, in part because my church ordained one of them (Azande Sosa) a year or two ago. Two excerpts:
[Rev. Sarah Lammert, on a shift in UU attitudes toward the military:] People began to understand that you could be for or against a war without being against the people who serve the country.
[Rev. Chris] Antal [a National Guard chaplain in Afghanistan] emphasizes the importance of having religiously liberal chaplains in the military. Partly it's about those soldiers who might be unchurched or hold beliefs that are out of the mainstream, including those who are pagan. "Soldiers have told me, 'You are the first chaplain who would ever pray with me,'" Antal said.
He added, "I've been able to do all kinds of meaningful ministry in the past year, especially after 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' was repealed last year. Not only does the Army need chaplains, it needs liberal chaplains to balance the overwhelming number of evangelicals within chaplaincy. When we, as a denomination, walked away from the military after Vietnam, the vacuum was filled by others."
Antal said that many soldiers are open to different approaches to religion. "When people face the actuality of war and combat and the possibility of death, they start to search their souls. They want to be prepared."
Congregations have a role too, he said. "Soldiers need to be welcomed when they come to church. Suicide rates of veterans are off the charts. Our congregations and our country as a whole share a moral responsibility to be open to the military. They are working on our behalf."