Home

Home, home, home. How I love home.

It's been a lovely visit home.

This holiday, we have put together two jigsaw puzzles. We busted out the first one the night after I arrived. It was a 1000-piece conglomeration of Hershey's products. We started at 9:00 Saturday night with the intention of having it available to work on it piecemeal-like for then next few days. We finished it five hours later at 2 a.m.

That out of our system, we meandered our way through the second puzzle for the next week and a half and got to reap the benefits of puzzle-putting-together.

The conversation meandered from one unrelated topic to another as we sat there trying to put together the figures.

We celebrated with each other when someone finally found the piece with the fox's eye.

As my sister rifled through the remaining pieces in the box, she kept saying with unvaried enthusiasm, "Ooh, now this looks like something." And I would remind her, "mmhmm, I bet it is something."

We did the puzzle at the kitchen table which was perfectly suited for stopping for a break to peel an orange or grab a handful of nuts to munch on ("Hey, can I have one?").

The best part of puzzle-putting together is just the being together doing it. Hunting for a piece with a white tip while your sister/mom/brother/dad nearby hunts for their piece. I like being there at the old, worn-out kitchen table talking, or not talking. We don't have to talk to say, "Hey, I like this. This being here with you." We just know.

A follow-up

So, I finished it. Gone With the Wind. What a great read! After the initial shock of the juxtaposition between integration and the antithesis of integration (plantations, slavery, and racial slurs, oh my), the story was delightful. And I think what I enjoyed about it more than anything else is that I had the opportunity to enjoy an iconic story with no idea how it ended. Sure, Gone With the Wind was immortalized by Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable in the 30's, and sure there are countless pop culture references to this epic novel (now I can understand and appreciate the hilarity behind Carol Burnett's use of curtains for elegant eveningwear), but somehow, against all odds, I maintained innocence in regard to Scarlett O'hara's outcome.

I was reminded how fantastically fun it is to read a well-written, well-known, well-crafted story and enjoy the unraveling and discovery of the characters a page at a time.

I feel so sad for the generation of kiddos that will never experience the magic of reading Harry Potter...discovering the loyalties of the characters from one book to another. Movies hand it to you...in an hour and a half to two hours.

Books slow me down. They remind me that taking time to discover is okay. It took me two months and a smidgeon to finish Gone With the Wind (I'm in school, you know...). I had to waylay the discovery of the end for two months (and a smidgeon).

It was way worth it. :-)

Likening the Scriptures

You know that story from the Old Testament about the widow who is gathering sticks for the fire that will prepare her last meal when the prophet Elijah moseys up? No? Basically, there is a famine in the land, the woman has no food left and she is destitute. The prophet approaches her (the Lord has directed him there) and asks for some water. On her way to get the water, he calls again and asks for some bread as well. She informs him the only food she has is a handful of meal and a little oil and she is preparing it for her and her son to eat before they die.

It's a terribly sad situation.

(painting by Elspeth Young)

And then Elijah tells her not to fear and carry on with her plans, but to give make him a cake with the remaining meal and oil first. Before she and her son eat. I've wondered if Elijah agonized over this direction. Did he feel guilty about making such a bold request? It seems awfully chauvenistic (but just wait, the story has a really cool ending). He goes on to explain that if she does this, she won't run out of meal or oil until the Lord sends rain again.

So, she does it. And she and her house eat for many days thereafter, "And the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to the word of the Lord." (1 Kings 17:16)

She did what the Prophet asked, and look at the incredible blessing that resulted. It's a powerful lesson.

While I don't have a holy bucket of meal nor a sacred vat of oil through which the Lord pours out his mercies, he has blessed me in other ways. For example, I've been using the same deodorant for upwards of 6 months now.

Yes, I apply (and sometimes reapply) on a daily basis. And yet, the deodorant wastes not neither does it's cruse of antiperspirant fail me. This occurred to me yesterday morning when, the deodorant I've been expecting to use up for several months now keeps deodorizing day after day after day. And I thought, "I'm having a widow of Zarapheth experience!" No, a prophet has not come and asked, "Let me therefore use that deodorant first and then thy antiperspirant shall never falter." (good thing too, because I'm not a fan of sharing armpit residue with anyone, even if it is a prophet. Nasty...) Nor do I feel as though I am about to pull the lid off and use the deodorant for the last time and then perish in mortal agony.

But, the deodorant keeps going and I'm saving a few bucks by not having to buy more. And so that's what I'm grateful for tonight. Deodorant that wastes not nor fails me. It's a good thing.

A Word About Music

So, I love music. I have always loved it. In fact, just the other day, my mom was relating the fact that I responded to music while still in the womb (for serious). Rumor has it that my dad would hum directly onto my mom's swollen belly while she was carrying me, and my little body would just settle right down, relaxing into a quiet calm. Music can definitely still have that effect on me. I love creating it. I love listening to it. It fills a deep emotional and spiritual need for me.

But, my brother appreciates music in a way that I cannot, or do not, understand. He excitedly finds new music and loves to share his passion for this new music with all who are willing to hear it. I admit that I am not always willing. A few weeks ago, we were discussing this disparity between the two of us in how we listen to and/or appreciate music and when he asked me to describe what music I liked to listen to (I think, in response to my comment that he and I seemed to have different tastes in music...), all I could come up with was, "I like acoustic-y stuff. And, oh, I don't know, I know the stuff I like when I hear it."

That was it. I had nothing else to tell him when it came to what kind of music I liked to listen to. So, he challenged me to figure out what I like and learn to articulate it. He recommended a podcast to listen to--that he loves. So, I listened to it. And, believe it or not Big Brother, I have learned a thing or two about my preferences.

This is what I know so far:

1. Songs need to have an appropriate Melody-Percussion ratio. In my world, the songs I tend to like are those in which the Melody is more salient than the Percussion. Percussion has its place (I played in the pit percussion in marching band!), but it should not overpower the melody.

2. The simpler the instrumental accompaniment, the likelier the song is to make it into my shuffle rotation. Put another way, I love songs accompanied by just acoustic guitar....or a regular old piano....etc. The music in some way feels purer and more real to me. Maybe even more sincere.

3. As sort of an adjunct to #2, I shy away from songs that have a million different things going on in the background. For example, there's 2 or 3 synthesizer parts running--all different patterns, different pitch ranges, all running simultaneously on top of a heavy bass beat on beats 2 and 4 and cymbal crashes on beats 1 and 3, with 3 or 4 different backup vocalists running 3 or 4 independent parts all on top of the lead singer who is singing a melody that doesn't readily "go with" the rest of the music. I think I have a hard time finding order and my brain just gets irritated, frustrated, and tired. I don't like it.

4. I do NOT care for songs that involve a section that repeats the same 16 bars over and over while increasing in loudness and intensity, usually with a buildup of percussion as well. This sort of repetition drives me batty and seems like a cop-out for artists. To me, it feels as though the songwriters reach some sort of block and don't know how to add to their song and simply decide to repeat an "interlude" of some kind over and over and over and oVER AND OVER AND OVER. Not a fan.

5. I love harmonizing vocals. GOOD harmonizing vocals. Well-sung harmonizing vocals. Balanced harmonizing vocals. Good harmony can give me chills--but, the good kind.

6. I do not care for shouting vocals. Please, just sing. Don't yell at me.

7. As a whole, I do not like LOUD music--LOUD vocals, LOUD accompaniment, LOUD percussion, LOUD anything. I don't know as I can adequately explain the irritation I feel when my ears are met with an incessant barrage of noise (and yes, LOUD music can count as noise, in my world). But then, there are a lot of LOUD things I don't like. Vacuums, lawn mowers, motorcycles, large trucks, popping balloons. I don't like LOUD. I never have.

So, this is where I'm at for now. I'm working on articulating what it is that I love about the music I love. I must disclose that there are songs I know and love that violate each of these stated preferences, however, these are general rules of thumb for me. If a song does violate one of these "rules" and yet has made it to my list, it is usually because somewhere along the line a friend (or a brother) convinced me just to give it a shot for a few days and lo and behold, it turned out not so bad. With that said, as a whole, these are my preferences. I'll keep working on it.

Can you articulate your music preferences?

p.s. Mike - Bon Iver's Blood Bank was my definite favorite for the podcast (All Songs Considered Best of 2009 (the first half of the year)). Loved it. :-)

Makes an Aunt proud....

So, a couple of weeks ago, my sister sent us her children's Christmas Wish lists. On my five-year-old niece's list?

A gift card to Barnes and Noble.

A woman after my own heart...

Highlight of my week

I heard this week, from a friend in the music department, about a undergraduate who came in to audition for a vocal choir. He sang "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off", which was immortalized by Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. You know,

"You say po-tay-to, I say po-tah-to

You say to-may-to, I say to-mah-to

To-may-to! To-mah-to! Po-tay-to! Po-tah-to!

Let's call the whole thing off."

Anyhow. This kid sang with gusto and passion. But, somewhere along the way missed the memo and whole point of the song. With fervor, he proudly sang:

"You say po-tay-to, I say po-tay-to

You say to-may-to, I say to-may-to

To-may-to! To-may-to! Po-tay-to! Po-tay-to!

Let's call the whole thing off."

Poor kid. But, seriously, it's been making me chuckle all week.

I haven't heard if he made the choir or not...

To an old friend

Dear Hoodie,
Oh, how I have missed you. Your smooth, cozy, goodness knows no bounds. These many long months, I have longed to feel your fleecey goodness envelope my frame in a cocoon of warmth and snuggage.
I know your pouch pooches in the most unflattering way, but it keeps my hands so cozy warm on those frigid chilled-to-the-bone days.I know your shapeless form masks what precious little feminine shape I have.

I know the bunchage around my neck from your hood is not known to be necessarily becoming to a lady, such as I.

But Hoodie, dear Hoodie, I knew today was the day. I felt the chill in the air as my eyes peeped open this morning. Fall is here.

It's so nice to see you again. Welcome back.

Love,

Me