Being the Harp...

It was a cool, brisk Friday night, and rather than veg at home binge-watching something I probably shouldn't anyway, I took the long trek to the other side of town. I picked up my sister. We rarely get to hang out anymore. Between us, we have 15 grown or nearly-grown children, scads of their spouses, grandchildren, puppies, activities, responsibilities and drama. Our paths diverge into fantastically beautiful splinters and then converge into meaningful similar trails. It's just a lot. So I'm really grateful for any us-time that we get to carve out. On this night, we went to hear a lovely lady play a senior recital's worth of harp music. Yes, there are Harp Doctorates. And after hearing this magician, my chin was on the floor. I kept thinking, "How many actual hours did this take to master?" And you don't get to rest on your laurels. That stuff doesn't just stay there. You have to keep practicing, growing, learning, and changing or it turns to rust. I'm a mature woman, and have been playing the flute most of my life, and have really just starting seriously practicing scales and such. No. I'm a toddler. I'm trying to figure out what planet I've been living on, because I'm seeing that there is a whole lot more to know. And there's also some more kind-of ceiling to things. Just because you practice, you might not get to be that great. You might not have the greatest ear, or the best eyes, or the nicest idea about rhythm. God has to give you that. Then a great teacher might help a lot. And luck...you might get lucky and land in just the right group of folks or school that help you learn the right skills. And on and on. But no matter what, you could make perfection your goal in life, work your fingers to the bone, wear out all your tendons, spend all your money, be an obnoxious diva to everyone you know, be outrageously skilled and famous, and still never get it. 

As this young lady started to play. she stilled herself. She closed her eyes, laying hands on either side of the harp. It seemed an eternity before she began to play, but then her swift fingers ran over the strings, nary missing a beat. What I noticed, maybe even more than the individual notes, was the way that her face immersed into the spirit of the music. Forgetting the audience, she became the song, be it classic, quirky, folk, quirky, fearful. Her pure-hearted preoccupation with the music was a thing of beauty. It was why we show up for these things, isn't it? It's why we listen, in the end. Ah, music...  

Villa Rica Partying

The family had gathered, partied...all the energy had risen, crested and then fallen back down to a quiet murmur. Most everyone had gone home. Papa was back in his recliner, some of the Nortons were nestled in their beds in the back of the house, Yaya and Jesse and his wife and clan were in the kitchen, snacking and trying to keep it to a small roar with the giggles of their three children. These are the days, the times that mean the most. The words that squeeze out are the meaningful ones, the ones that you don't waste. 

I'll try to sum up what our son said to me last night, without ruining the meaning of it...  he said, "Why do we waste our sorrows? Why do we waste our days, our years, on grief? When our loved ones die, our loved ones who love Jesus, who are safely in heaven...we spend too much of our emotions and time left on earth grieving them when we could be using that to tell others about Christ, to love others and to win others to Him." Wow! He specifically talked about his Grandpa (my Daddy) and how he would bemoan us dragging our feet over his death, when we're going to see him very soon. Life is a mere breath. Eternity is looooooooong. We're way too transfixed on the here and now and tend to get morbid on what was rather than what is gonna be. 

I do know this: it sure was fun to see a little 9-year-old country girl running around on her birthday, eating her favorite meal (beans, cornbread, slaw, and collards -- yes!) with her cousins, just like we used to do. It makes you feel hope for our country when you see things like that again.  

Noble Reasons To Live

 We had Blackberry Winter this past weekend, waking up to icy steps and blustery winds. I grabbed a container of Kosher Salt and sprinkled it all down the deck stairs, thinking how smart I was. Now we can't get that mess out of the house. It's everywhere. The dog coincidentally decided to eat something strange, causing piles of unmentionables all over the house, for days. And days. Then Ken's truck acted up and he missed work today. After countless cleanups, a trip to the vet, transporting vehicles to and fro to the shop, and trying to figure out the apps for Ken's new job, we rather collapsed on the couch,  which turned into naps while the TV blared. (If You Give A Mouse A Cookie...) Life in first-world countries is exhausting. What if we had to actually forage for our food? We might need to be thinking about that soon.

I moved some of our plans around, when our daughter said she would be dropping by...and then our son-in-law was going to meet her here, after he got off work. And of course, the real treat was getting to squeeze 1-year-old Ethan in the mix. We sat in the living room, enjoying their company and trying to decide on where to eat ('cause Yaya don't plan too well). Liz whips a white plastic stick out of her purse and you know what that means...I saw two pink lines and squealed, "You're pregnant!" Yes, it's #12 grandbaby. Yes, it's not their first. Yes, you'd think I'd get tired of this. But no -- it's the most wonderful gift that God gives people when they're done raising their children: grandchildren. Our society has been down on having children for quite some time. They say you can't afford them (I mean, if you have too many you might never get to go to Disney World, poor dears. I haven't gone yet and I've had a wonderful life). They say they are a liability. How in the world will you pay for their college (we don't - they paid as they went or got scholarships or were wildly successful in a trade)? They say that people are nuts to bring kids into this evil world (remember, we're taking over). They say you should enjoy yourselves and limit bringing those big carbon footprints into the world (how about raising them to be energy-givers?)

Having risked all these "dangerous burdens" and birthing four, who are now grown, responsible adults (who've married well, thank God), I have to say that there is no amount of money, fame, career or treasure that could compete with the joy that our children and grandchildren have given us. Those early years were sheer exhaustion, right along with the fun parts of it. I didn't know that I would re-live my own childhood through their eyes, that all their firsts would be like buds on the trees and flowers in springtime. I had no idea how much I would laugh (and cry) because of them. I'm still tired, but would love nothing more than to have the ability to just rotate my time around to each, one at a time, then start over. I'm guessing that's some of what eternity is for. Once, I did a study on all of the words "children, seed and womb" that are found in the Bible. Did you know that God loves children, that He always says they are a blessing from Him, and that Jesus is really keen on them too? They are our future. We need to teach them to be tough, raise them right and love the fool out of them. And pray a whole lot.

The Dark, Long Night

I remember hot, summer nights spent riding in the hinder parts of a tiny vehicle, with us three siblings wrapped together like sardines in a can. Our parents' car didn't have air conditioning, so the windows were open. I imagine we always rode through the night because it was cooler to travel that way in the dead heat of July. We hauled it from Atlanta all the way up to the breadbaskets of Illinois, where it was flat and sweltering, with miles and miles of rows of corn growing. I always wondered why it seemed to be just as hot there in the summer as it was in Georgia, because winter was an entirely different story. Our Grandma Betty always made sure we went swimming in the city pool at least once or twice while we were there. Sometimes it was at an ancient monstrosity of a pool; it looked like a tank for whales, not people. There were even murky portholes under the surface, where folks could go down and see all the chubby legs swimming. That seemed strange to me. While I was swimming, I made sure I stayed in the center of the pool, far away from any weirdos looking for cheap thrills down in the tunnels. Not that I was winning any body building contests. I looked like a tall, pre-pubescent child up until after we married. The month I got pregnant, strange things began to happen, as if my body wasn't going to grow up until there was a baby on the way. I always worked at a pool or swimming hole, from the time I was twelve. I love the water. I have enough unusual stories from those years to fill a small book. People do bizarre things when there's water involved. Boys were always fancying they were in love with me, just because I was the lifeguard. I was followed home from the pool on many occasions, where my Dad was fortunately, usually, working outside. He was the sweetest man on earth, until he wasn't. There abides much power in the craggy eye of a good Daddy. 

Thinking back to those muzzy trips, where us kids slept and sweated those hours away in a hot vehicle. Mama would pack some snacks and a thermos full of sweet tea, but since we left after supper, there generally wasn't a meal until we arrived at Grandma's house, some 14 hours later. Soda crackers smeared with peanut butter, stacked back inside the sleeve. Fruit, usually apples. If we were lucky, Little Debbies. No matter what, there was a Stuckey's somewhere along the highway there or back, and Daddy would buy a giant pecan roll. He'd hand each of us a chunk and we thought we'd died and gone to heaven. There's no misery like riding in a blistering car with the windows rolled down, going 70+ miles an hour. We were raised right, where things like whining were not rewarded. So you learned to endure and stick your head out the window, pretending you were on the back of a wild horse or riding the wind. When daylight came, there were books strowed all around the back seat, from the public library. We'd make ourselves carsick, trying to read them while the car swayed. Grandma was a book freak herself and worked for a publisher, so the days at her house were full of us languishing over the ones she'd brought from the book sales. Her house was cold with central air conditioning. Napping and reading were considered right and good activities. There was a requisite night out for steak dinner and often fireworks at the park. She always had a dance floor in her house, as well as a fully stocked bar. We'd sneak maraschino cherries and ogle her tins of strange food and bottles of drink from far-off places. She was a glamorous Chicago socialite and we were country bumpkins, full of wonder. I wish I could talk to her now, show her her beautiful offspring, pick her brains. 

On one such trip, I awoke to the sight of a policeman at the window, talking to Daddy in the middle of the night. It was in the 70s, there was a weak President in the White House, energy resources were low and they were rationing gas. Those days were frightening; it seemed like things were tipping on their head. But somehow we made it there and back again. Today I felt the same way, like I was staring at the edge of a precipice. Wars, rumors of wars, uncertainties and conundrums. All the wonders of the universe, along with the simple and the good, the bad, the ugly, I'm still glad this ain't all there is...