A List of Things I Am Thankful For In 2011

I was recently challenged to list one thing I am thankful for for each of the 21 days in November leading up to Thanksgiving Day. I tried to do them one by one, but I just can't keep up that sort of thing, so here goes a list all at once and in no particular order:

My spouse who supports me in my crazy plans and even helps implement them with me. 

My sons who are not children anymore but competent adults with opinions and ideas and goals all their own, who are smart and kind and generous and creative and inventive and compassionate and who remember to call their mother on the phone now and again, and their father who helped nurture all those things in them.
Their girlfriends who value their originality and compassion and individuality and do things to take care of them when I can't anymore because we live so far apart.
Friends who support me even when I'm a jerk.
My artwork that has brought me self-confidence and satisfaction and fulfillment and has brought me the company of other artists and has lead me to Mineral Point, Wisconsin.
Nature, especially prairie, and my gardens at my homes and the people who have shared time with me in them.
Music and musicians and especially local singer songwriters that you can see live and up close and musical instruments, and CDs and electronics that allow you to take it home and on the road with you.
Wild Ones Natural Landscapers organization that promotes end educates about native landscaping and the friends there.
Photography
Amazing parents
An amazing sister
The seasons and the changes in nature that it brings. The cycle of a day that brings morning light and warm glowing later afternoon light and night that brings starry skies and cicadas and morning that brings fog and dew and frost and songbirds' song.
Health and quality health care and healthcare professionals and researchers.
Flowers and florists and garden shops and nurseries and growers that supply them.
Facebook and reacquainting with old friends and meeting new friends .
Books and used book stores and small book stores.
Cats - also lemurs, horses, otters, tigers, dogs, and other animals - the companionship offered by some and the gracefulness, playfulness, and beauty of them all.
Hiking and backpacking and paddling and trips to the wilderness.
GPS's that help me with my total lack of a sense of direction and geocaching with my kids.
Schools and teachers and opportunities for individualized education.
Boy Scouts and leaders and parents and how it shaped my sons.

Lakes and rivers and paddling in them and overcoming fears so that I can enjoy the company of other paddlers and the solitude of a solo trip on the water.

Wood and making things with it like houses and furniture and such.
Good food and fine restaurants and chocolate and olives and raspberries and pomegranates and asparagus.
My senses, the ability to see color and light and the ability to hear a voice and music, the sense of touch to feel warm breeze and cool rain, the smell of a damp woods, dry corn fields, skunk, rosemary, flowers, and the essence of a loved one, the tastes of good food and salt in seaspray.

Just a Weekend

It's really just a weekend
One of fifty two
In any given year
Where women come together
On the banks of a river
In a place so rural
It truly really is
In the middle of nowhere.
It's really just an hour
When the bonfire burns bright
Drawing us in
Greetings exchanged
News shared
Conversation flows
Voices raised in rhythmic sound
Drums beat
Hearts lifted.
It's really just a moment
When you're handed o'er the drum
Your fear wants to say no
But you don't let it win.
You feel the power
That was always there inside you.
They saw, they felt, they knew
They drew it out of you
Into the air, into the night
Into your consciousness
Where it will sustain you the whole year,
That instant when
You
Made them dance!

Bittersweet

Sometimes things that make you very very happy can also make you very very sad.
The boys and I had this CD once and it had this song. It was called "How Can I Keep From Singing" by Ken Brown and it pretty much captured how I felt about being with my kids on vacation in the beautiful places filled with amazing nature that we visited on our vacations. Okay, it pretty much was my theme song about how I feel about everything. I played it so much that I wore it out. Well, the musician was one of those singer-songwriter types that travels around to festivals and small venues so I couldn't just go to the store and buy a replacement like when I wear out a Mick Jagger CD or a Dave Matthews CD, and I had searched on line a number of times to no avail. The other night, I got what you call a hankerin' to hear that song again. I was kinda in a bum mood for no logical particular reason and thought it might remind me of happy times and cheer me up, so I started to look around, And lo and behold I found it! Not the CD, but a blog by the artist with links to a few of the songs from the CD, including the coveted one. And I also found there some really lovely new songs that made me pretty happy too.




And I found this little poem by the artist:


Until
The wind makes no sound until it wraps itself in the leaves of the trees
and that sound is just a noise
until it makes someone feel something
then it’s music

Well, I titled this post 'bittersweet' and at this point you might be thinking this is all pretty good 'sweet' happy wonderful news, to have found the artist and the songs and some bonus good writing, so where is the 'bitter' part? Oh, it is there, because you see in my reading around the website, what I found out is that Ken Brown is 'retired' for health reasons and not touring anymore really, and that makes me a little sad that I probably will never hear him in concert anymore and that is a selfish reason, but mostly it makes me sad for him, that such a talented person that brought light to my life should suffer misfortune. That makes me very sad, even in the middle of the great joy of finding the old songs and the new songs and the sweet writings.

There's a lot of that in the world, isn't there? Sweet joy all entangled with bitter sadness.

Music Again

There were times in my life when I played recorded music nearly constantly, as a background to whatever I was doing. These days, I listen in the car and to a specific song now and then on my computer. But some people do not just listen to recorded music of others, but they play music of their own. The ones that play music nearly every day, and the ones like my son that truly 'play' with music by taking a song or tune they have learned and exploring endless variations on it, those are the lucky ones indeed, because for them, music is beyond observing and beyond reproducing all the way into creating. When my son is gone at college, I miss him and I miss his music. It is good, truly very good, to have live spontaneous living music in my life again!

Some of My Heroes

They take my class. They say nice things to me. They say nice things about me. But they knew about WomanSong before I did! They were there one maybe two years before I even heard of it! They are smart and funny and fun and kind. The one in the cool layers and amazing scarves performs on stage, playing guitar and singing! Wow! A real artist! And she takes my class! I am wearing lots of scarves this year in honor of her. It makes me feel more expressive, more womanly, more . . . like I am finding my song! Thank you, women of WomanSong and see you in September!

Pow Wow

Have you ever seen a poster in a store window advertising a Pow Wow and wondered what it was or who it was for? Have you ever driven by a sign on a street corner on a weekend pointing down the road to a Pow Wow and been tempted to drop by? Last Saturday in Batavia, Illinois, was Pow Wow day. What is a Pow Wow? A Pow Wow is Native American dance gathering. Native Americans come together for the day to socialize and celebrate their culture, both their historical culture and their current culture. Some attend in regalia specific to a certain type of dance, which may include traditional elements as well as contemporary elements. There will be portions of the program where only those in dance regalia are invited to participate, but there will be many dances called 'inter tribal' where everyone is invited to participate, including any member of the audience, native or non-native. A Master of Ceremonies will be there to announce each dance and indicate who is invited to participate, so you don't have to know the rules before you go! Dancing must have music of course, and at a Pow Wow the music is the beat of the drum. Traditionally, drumming is done by men, seated in a circle around a large hide drum that sits in a frame on the floor. The drumming is loud and if you are close enough, you can feel it as well as hear it. The drumming is my favorite part. And a Pow Wow is for everyone. For Native Americans, it is an opportunity to celebrate their heritage and connect with other natives. For non-natives, it is an opportunity to learn about the culture of the people that inhabited North America for at least the last 10,000 years. If there is a program, it will contain information to help you know what is going on. If not, the M.C. will announce tidbits now and then. And dance participants in regalia are always willing to answer your questions. But you can read online before you go, doing your searches on such terms as 'Pow wow etiquette'. There are sites that list what is considered appropriate behavior at a Pow Wow. If I had to pick a rule that people don't pay enough attention to it would be to always stand during an honor song. The M.C. will usually announce this during the song at the beginning of the event that honors veterans, but some times he will forget at other honor songs. If it is a song to honor someones birthday or an elder or a local family or the pow wow committee, those honored will dance first, and then others are welcome to join. And the audience should all be standing. If the M.C. forgets to announce this, then please, just go ahead and stand up. Others will notice and stand as well. I would also ask you to be free with your cash. The pow wow is put on by a committee of volunteers and as with any volunteer endeavor, money is always an issue and often a reason why a pow wow dies out: The donations are not enough to cover the expense. So please, give a little extra in any way you can. The drumming is why I go. The sound of it and the feel of it recharges me and seems to reset my energy and my mood. Look online for a pow wow schedule for your area and have the courage to try something you have never done before and be open to learn and experience and enjoy!

The Drum

The drum
It is our heartbeat
The rhythm of our walk feet
It is the contractions of our mother’s womb
It is the in and out of our breath
That began then and continues until our death
When those with us will listen for the last one
And hold their own for just a second
Before they breathe again to live on
The drum
It is the running of the feet of children
It is the rum rum rum of the spinning wheel
The crack crack crack of the pounding of grain into flour
It is the kneading of bread, the crick crick crick of the warming oven
The chewing of happy family
The drum
Is the ocean wave crash crash crashing
Or river waves gently splash splash splashing
It is the prairie grass swish swish swish in the wind
And the tree branch woo woo woo
The bumble of the June bug against the screen bat bat bat
It is the rain pit pit pit, pit pit pit, pit pit pit outside the window
Or splat splat splat on our bare arms
The drum
It is the walk walk walking to the lake’s shore
And the pad pause pad pause paddling of the canoe
It is the beat of the wings of ducks as they take flight
The scrape scrape scrape of harvesting wild rice into the canoe bottom
And the reach pull drop reach pull drop of gathering berries
The drum
It is the rhythm of life
The drum
It is the rhythm of earth
The drum
It is the rhythm of us.

It's What You Raise Them For

You wake up with them in the night and rock them back to sleep and get them their shots and read to them and take them to interesting places and sign them up for lessons so they can learn fun things and get them to meetings and events and encourage them in their schoolwork and buy them books and magazines and cool toys and teach them everything you can get them to pay attention to and then they go off and leave. The oldest is leaving for his second year of college in the morning and I am happy for him and proud of him and very very sad. They are a set and they have both been with me for many many years and I will miss him and his smile and his spunk and his music every single day. It is hard, but not quite as hard as last year. He will do good and have fun and we will see him at Thanksgiving.

Taking a Chance

It was a chance turn on a side road that lead to many wonderful things. We were on the way to an apple farm with goats and a bakery. We'd been there before and loved the place. We saw a sign for "Garfield Farm Harvest Days" and decided to turn to go there instead. We traded in a known for an unknown and found much more than we ever dreamed. There was a group there playing folk music. It as the Friday of the event for school children so we tagged along and heard bits and peices of interesting things about the farm and the prairie. We went back several times to the music gathering where kids sat on the edge of the hay wagon and played along with the group. Here's what that lead to:
Both boys took folk music lessons when the group opened a folk music school near our home.
We took Sunday morning prairie tours there and I ended up leading the volunteer restoration effort for a couple years.
I give prairie tours at the Harvest Days event and sometimes other events.
At Harvest Days, one boy demonstrates wheat flailing and the other corn shelling in the period costumes their grandmother sewed for them.
They met re-enactors of the trapper-trader era who inspired them to build their own muzzle loader firearms from kits.
Both boys have engaged in actual barter with re-enactors
We volunteer at the holiday event where one boy plays music in the ballroom and the other plays checkers in the men's parlor.
They joined band and then orchestra in grade school then stuck with orchestra in high school.
One boy learned to blacksmith at a class there from another volunteer who helped him acquire his own blacksmithing set-up.
We are friends with the sheep girl who demonstrates spinning at events.
Last 4th of July, Wheat boy/blacksmith and sheep girl played for a 'barn dance' on the lawn of the historic tavern and corn boy participated in the dancing.
The youngest is planning his Boy Scout Eagle project to benefit the farm museum.
All because we were willing to abandon plans for a sure thing to take a chance on something new.

Things in Black Cases

Things About Grandma G

Grandma was the principal at a school and had the biggest ring of keys I have ever seen. She would let us play with it sometimes.
Grandma had jewelry boxes of beads and pins and earrings and a giant tin of buttons in her dark mysterious bedroom.
Grandma held us on her lap or had us sit right next to her and read books to us.
Grandma let us color and draw on her coffee table.
Grandma was known and loved by everyone in town because she was a school teacher and people told us that and we felt loved by everyone in town by extension.
Grandma had books sent to use from a book club and brought us books when she went to town.
Grandma brought us art supplies from the teacher store.
Grandma was a flapper when she was young. There were pictures.
Grandma grew African violets.
Grandma was cool and modern because she had a telephone way before we did.
Grandma let us watch The Monkees instead of one of her favorite shows when our dad would not because Gunsmoke was on at the same time.
Grandma kept our baby teeth in glass pill bottles.
Grandma once stopped a cat fight with a broom in about 2 seconds.
Grandma had diverse and exotic musical taste due to giant record sets with music from many eras.