First Day of My Life

No secret that my mother instilled in me a love for the arts; creativity in all flavors whether music, art, nature. I adopted a lifestyle that includes seeing beauty everywhere, even in the darkness. It's also no secret that my son underwent brain surgery when he was 16 years old, something that drastically changes anyone going through anything similar. I've written several things about that time frame and won't revisit it now, but wanted to call it to the forefront because of my thoughts and gratitude today.

My grandmothers and aunts and even a grandfather or two gave me their favorite tunes. Songs that when I now hear I am immediately transported back in time.

My mother gave me the gift of her songs. And they've built up my life and kept me sustained during moments when I thought I wouldn't be able to put one foot in front of the other.

My children have given me the gift of their songs. Throughout their lives they have introduced me to the melodies they have found. The lyrics that have meant the same to them, words that provide an ability to appreciate, define, surf and move through this life.

And my granddaughter brings me hers. Usually wrapped inside the package of dancing or twirling or tumbling.

A common thread tying past to present, a thread bringing love when there is absence, and a thread of hope.

A couple of things happened this week. I was at a venue, listening to music with friends and had begun making my way out after the show. I was stopped in my tracks. No one EVER plays this song, but it came over the loud speakers there. "I love little baby ducks, old pick-up trucks, slow moving trains... and rain." An old Tom T. Hall country song that my dad used to sing all the time. Life wasn't easy as a kid in his household, but upon his passing, after years of seeking out and finding forgiveness and understanding with my adult eyes looking back, that song came to me as if announced over loud speakers at a circus, almost audible as I watched his soul leaving his body and I realized in that moment I would never hear his voice sing that song again. And there it was, crystal clear being played at a venue in downtown Des Moines, in the middle of nowhere accompanying me to my car and reminding me that after all the hurt, after all the pain and suffering spattered with more moments of joy and happiness, all that matters in the end is love; who we love, how we love, what we love. It flows before we arrive here, it carries us through and it takes us further once we are finished with our time here on earth.

And last night something happened that I know would embarrass my son by my sharing, but moms are born to embarrass sons, right? I've heard bits and pieces over the years of my son singing along to the radio or quietly humming something to himself. But I've never heard him sing a complete song, loud and proud with an audience. We were sharing time with friends (and luckily I was invited) and after dinner began "jamming" together. There are no words I can begin to describe hearing "First Day of My Life" sung with so much emotion and power --- coming from the voice of my son who spent his 16th year recovering and rehabbing from the removal of tumors from his brain. I will let the song say it all:

This is the first day of my life
Swear I was born right in the doorway
I went out in the rain, suddenly everything changed
They're spreading blankets on the beach

Yours was the first face that I saw
I think I was blind before I met you
I don't know where I am, I don't know where I've been
But I know where I want to go

So I thought I'd let you know
That these things take forever, I especially am slow
But I realized how I need you
And I wondered if I could come home

I remember the time you drove all night
Just to meet me in the morning
And I thought it was strange, you said everything changed
You felt as if you just woke up

And you said
"This is the first day of my life
Glad I didn't die before I met you
Now I don't care, I could go anywhere with you
And I'd probably be happy"

So if you want to be with me
With these things there's no telling
We'll just have to wait and see
But I'd rather be working for a paycheck
Than waiting to win the lottery  (Bright Eyes)


I truly believe LOVE is all that matters.
Let the songs carry you to heal your own past, to comfort your present, to enhance and guide you into where you need and want to be. Sometimes I think the greatest thing a mom can provide is an appreciation for music and for the gorgeous gems that lay buried waiting to be found by the one who can see through the dust and dirt.

Six Degrees of Seperation and Finding the Yin and Yang in Music

My mom had an old Gulbransen piano. In a dark room back in the farthest corner of the house. Tucked away with a hoarder's fair of other things in piles all around, items shoved in the closet, stacked in heaps; clutter and chaos seemingly organized and purposefully placed. I loved that piano from the earliest point of my life that I can remember. Not only did I love it, I felt like I was a part of it and it was a part of me somehow. Metal, wood and strings, golden letters, mahogany finish, ivory keys, some chipped, some a little crooked. Mom played hymns for weekly church services on Sundays and I would watch and listen any time I heard her practicing. I would sit beside her, watch as her hands moved, watched her looking at the notes out of an old hymnal that never left the piano. Eventually, she started showing me a few things; how to identify the notes on the page "Middle C, you can find every other note from Middle C if you just know where IT is." Middle C became my home base for everything else that layered thereafter. Center of the piano. Great place for both of your thumbs to lightly lay, ready at a moment's notice, either side left or right, to strike that familiar, comforting sound that only Middle C can vibrate. She didn't teach me a lot of things, because as was typical, the more she tried telling me what to do, the more I resisted her telling me what to do. Defiant to a fault. Independent. I wanted to let my own soul figure it out. I felt like somewhere deep inside I already KNEW. The piano had somehow told me about everything I needed to know about the language of music and its beautiful voice that speaks across waters, through the universe, from one culture to the next. I didn't need it "explained" to me.
She lovingly let it go. Let me just fumble and bumble and try to sort it out on my own. I kept watching my hands, watching how they could be efficient in their movements on the keys. One way leads to too much effort, another way seems easy.
Over the years, I received six months of lessons as a gift from my grandmother and aunt and learned to love a woman named Mrs. Wanda Derry. She gave me books. She gave me patience and understanding. She gave me a sense of calm and quiet peacefulness. And she challenged me to push myself to new levels and to keep going even past those points and plateaus. Six months wasn't long, but it was long enough to be a foundation that has never cracked, moved, or faltered.
I eventually came to where I am today. I no longer have my piano, but instead a guitar or two that has the same ability to take me into another world, away from pressures and worries and fears. During my last lesson, I figured out one of my missing pieces in my understanding of music. I know there are several missing pieces in music theory that I have totally missed that if I knew, I think I would have a new sense of empowerment and an ability to arrive at yet another peak. I'm getting there. I can feel it. During my last lesson, the teacher showed me major keys (the sounds that make "happy" noises) and the relationship to their relative minor keys (the sounds that make "sad" noises). He explained the way to find the relative key is six units (notes) away. Just like the theory with people... being separated by six degrees. We're all inter-connected in a web so close, just as musical notes are bound together. Within those two keys; a major and its relative minor, you can play the same notes within any chord combination and nothing you play is "wrong" or sounds as if it doesn't fit. I don't know if I am explaining it properly or effectively, but all of a sudden I saw something, FELT something I hadn't felt before. Yin and yang, beautifully portrayed in sound. Happy and sad are the same, they just begin and end in a different place, six degrees away from one another. Nothing is "wrong" inside either, it's simply part of the music, part of the sound of a song. We have this complex matrix of different options, different choices, different directions we can take, maybe... just maybe no matter what choice becomes the right one in accordance with our lives, with what has gone before and what is coming up next. It's beautiful. And it's grace, knowing that if you are doing your best, (and aren't we all?) whatever step you take next, whether up or down or sideways, as long as you're carried on a wave that is part of your authentic self, the choice is perfect.
I'm so thankful my mom didn't force her knowledge on me. I'm so thankful she simply opened up a door and then let me go and let me explore what is beyond, waiting for me to discover and uncover in my way and in my time. I don't think it would have been so hugely impacting being told to a young me who hadn't yet experienced what the older me has.
"Life is a song. Love is the music." ~ unknown