Wednesday, February 24, 2010

How Things Turn Out



 I am remembering being  very young, my cousin Joannie and I playing in the fenced in yard, making gourmet mud pies. We added little orange and red berries which grew on two bushes next to the porch. Joannie's were always much better than mine. They tasted the same, however!!!

Whether or not life would be any different was not even on our minds. But, then one rainy day, four of us, cousins, Donna, Dorothy, Joannie, and myself,  were spending time together with Nana LeBaron, in her liviing room.  She was watching us play - each doing a different activity, and asked us to share  with her what we dreamed of being when we grew up. Dorothy was going to be  a secretary, and was busy writing "shorthand" while she spoke. Joannie was going to be a teacher and was reading a book. Donna was going to be an artist, telling us this with her crayons in her hand and showing her picture.  I was going to be an actress, dancing and humming a tune while sharing this.

Dorothy has now published two novels I am aware of, one with her daughter. She wrote a family newsletter for a while, and now has a great blog - BloggerOne which you can go to by clicking the link in the right hand column.


Donna,  had her own advertising business, but got tired of it. Today, still a CEO, is sewing  fleece hats and mittens, doing well in New England.

Joannie,now with her doctorate, was a teacher. Even more, she created a reading program which pioneered diagnosing reading problems holistically. She's written a book on using portfolios to measure student progress, and is a Dean of eduction at a university .

 I had a full drama scholarship to Ithaca College, but life had other plans for me.

Two  common seeds all four of us shared:  practical creativity and service to others - and a grandmother who opened the future for us.

Today, Nana LeBaron's boarding house, her living room where we dreamed of the future that day,  and  its bushes with little red and orange berries, is now a tarmac paved parking lot for a Baptist Church.  Even the mud is gone. The past is gone, gone, gone. There is no family place with a long history,  to share visions and dreams. Yet, we are all sustained.

Who and what is your community?
Does its Being contribute to creating dreams for the future?









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Ecstasy

The photo is a recent picture of Jessye Norman.
The video is of  Jessye Norman, performing "Sanctus from Gounode's Mass in D Minor in
Notre Dame Cathedral
I am not a master musician. In fact, for years I was afraid to get up in front of people. I did sing in a group, and in a chorus or two. In the shower, I was a great singer -able to span at least three octaves., or so I imagined. When sitting around AT a party, everyone singingor playing an instrument, expected to harmonize, I couldn't.

"I put it on my "bucket list" - when I was in my late twenties - to successfully speak in front of a group - AND to sing a solo. It would be a childhood dream actualized - at last.

I was asked to sing "And Neither Have I Wings To Fly" at a wedding. I practiced and all went well. At the wedding, nothng came out, This event happened a lot.

Then in my late 50's, I encountered Jessye Norman. I played her tape and sang along over and over. I could sing anything she could sing, or so I imagined.

The choir was singing "Panis Angelicus", which is on that tape of hers. In rehearsal, I was singing out, with the sopranos, at the top of my lungs and on key. For the concert, when I was supposed to step forward and sing above the rest of them - a somewhat solo - nothing came out.

But, then, at my mother's memorial service,when her grandson's were supposed to sing, they backed out. I had been singing Enya's, "Time Never Promised a Dream Come True", imagining myself singing it in front of a whole house full of people. I sang it in the shower until the water ran cold and the rest of the household protestested.

So, having it memorized, and having imagined myself singing it in a full house,I began the memorial, singing it - acapella. I lost myself in the image I had created of singing in a full house, and was successful beyond what I had thought possible, but still, it wasn't quite the bucket list event!

After that, I had a dream that I sang, "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child". I was as intense and passionate as Jessye Norman's singing. Shortly after that, an occasion presented itself to me to participate in a Mother's Day event. I told the coordinator of the event about my dream. She put me on the program.

The moment came, I stood in the center aisle, imagining myself as capable as Jessye Norman about to begin. Again, a capella, I lost myself in the singing and ian ad lib interpretation of this powerful spiritual . Victory at last!

A lot of surprised people commended me later. That was fun, too. I loved the feeling that I had created a feeling of deep joy in those who listened. But, to be truthful, I did it for myself - even if it did take until the other end of my life to reach.

It was ecstasy. I self-actualized. I imagined it to be. I visualized acting it out - at all levels. Stepped out of the dream and now it is history. I do believe it took the presence of the Soul, which Norman eminates, for the will to be strong enough to support dreams coming true.
We all have this passion inside that has to express itself.

What has been for you, an experience of ecstasy in your own action?
What is the difference in that and just being successful?

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Rob's Poem


Desperately I cling
Unto reality defined
But always
My grasp falters
And as the autumn leaf
Withered crisp and dry
Falls slowly spinning
From the tree standing steadfast
So must I
Fall into the depth
Of all that is not known.

Rob wrote this poem in high school. I have a xerox copy. The poem is under a picture he drew.
My first response was to ask myself, "These are images in MY son's mind? Where was I?  Why did I not have a clue?"  Here is a profound statement of a young man connected with his Soul's longing. Was this always this way, or did these images reveal themselves to him as a teenager. As I look back on our lives and at what I know about him, and of his other  creative expressions, I suspect he was born to live in the depths of life -botrn to stand in the seering presence of the Mystery that life finally is - born to have suffered deep wpimds and fin it find the poetry to name the ineffible.

Robert A. White, Age 44.

How did the old TV ad put it  - the one that showed at 10:00 pm? "Do you know where your children are?"  I confess, I did not know. I have heard it in his music, especially in playing his harmonicas and guitar. I have felt it in his angry rages. I have appreciated his thoughful gifts and cards on special occasions. Still, it is a miraculous wonder to me that I should be privileged to discover this ever so sensitive part of my own son. Pulling this out of the archives of family memorabilia was an awakening moment.  I hope I get to know more of my son's great depths - at least a taste of his deep truth. I hope. I hope. I hope.

When is a time that you were able to connect with someone very special?
What did you find you have in common?
How do we honor these great gifts of our children and of their children?

Family Pictures

Recentlly, I pulled out a suitcase stored way back in the closet. It was filled with family pictures through the years. I stored them in the suitcase and in a waterproof sack in preparation for a hurricane's onslaught. 

When each of my three sons turned 21, I presented them with an album with photos and certificatesthey had achieved. Russ and Randy's albums were in the suitcase. They had given them to me on different occasions for safekeeping. At the end of each of their albums was their very first picture taken. I had cut it so that each had the half that was his own picture.  I might mention that they are twins. That I cut the picture in half like that has bothered me for over 20 years, now and then.  So, while I had both albums out, I took Randy's picture out of it's place and put it into Russ's album. It fit like a puzzle piece. For a moment, all was well with the world.

One album had the remainder of the pictures I had removed to make the albums for my sons. I took them all, labeled them and put them in a new album. One other album is still missing. The old wedding album remains in tact. I organized artifacts and pictures of grandsons into envelopes for later assembly into albums, packed all in plastic and found room for them in the album closet.

As I closed the closet, , I noticed two big shoppiing bags of unsorted pictures which, I vaguely recall storing there with full intention of creating a visual journey through their time. Several years have passed since that storing of those pictures. I didn't even venture to look to see if I could remember their stories!!

when my mother died, I packed up all her albums and gave them to her granddaughter to keep. I don't recall if they are labeled. I gave pictures to my brothers that were of their family alone and sent a few to cousins of their families. I found a few pictures in frames that I thought one of the hurricanes took with them when they broke opened my door and took my roof, while passing through!!

At the end of the day, I closed the album closet's door with the full intention of getting back to it really soon.  If I don't, I don't. There is history to be told and all the memories are stored in our hearts, waiting to be told. The pictures help with the details. They all have smiling faces, but sometimes, there is a darkness that accompanies them, that won't be forgotten either. Forgiven, yes. Lesoons learned, yes.  Wounds heealed, for the most part. The most valuable part of the pictures is that they reflect that there has always been joy along the way, something I sometimes forget.

The most important part is putting the pictures together into a story. How will the story read?
Suggestions are welcome here.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

New Moon


New Moon Dreaming
always of You
New Moon Dreaming
Never Comes True
Forever is gone now.
Forever is gone.

This is the beginning of a song I was writing about  the time the four hurricanes were having their way with Florida and where they traveled to before and after their visit here. The chords were an A minor and an Eminor and another minor at "forever". LIfe was a roller coaster ride for several years and those hurricanes were top of the ride. Life is more of an ambling path these days, a refreshing change.

Now, if there is an underlying sense of being alone, it is definitely to be found on the internet. Games played, gifts sent back and forth, crops harvested, points made, levels reached. It is a cyber interaction with neighbors of the game and that's it. Whatever I make of it, I made of it, and it has nothing to do with the growth and bonding of friendship at all. I have enjoyed all of the posts from new friends and friends of yore. In fact, with many, the posts have been encounters with great experiences of art or calls for social action. Again, what I make of it is what it is.

This blog, I have decided, is me writing my life for myself. If another reads it, I am grateful that words that I intended to write from my heart, have reached another to experience. I am grateful to be able to know what is happening in the news directly from where the news is happening. Right now, I want, in the worst way,  to hop on a plane and go to Haiti for crisis intervention care of the caretakers there. Yet, here I am, sending healing light and blessings as a constant vigil.

There are gifts to being so totally alone. I am getting a lot of writing done. But, there is community, too. It is the "forever" that needs to be recovered at this time. I long for the sense of community to be more than a cyberspace phenomena or an annual conference.

As I drum under the new moon, having been invited to attend a drumming that is occurring in a community who are actually gathered, I feel community. Yet, here I am alone, however connected.

Is the time right for real community to resurge for me? What would be a global demonstration of its value?
Where do I begin?

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