red shoes…

April 28, 2009 at 4:15 pm (Uncategorized)
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I wonder if the girl who put on the Red Shoes in the story by Hans Christian Anderson actually did know what she was getting into and chose the shoes anyway.

Sometimes I feel like that dancer…choosing the shoes that keep her on her toes until her feet bleed and knowing I’m unable to take off those shoes.

I know this is dark. Don’t worry, there’s light here too.

I’ve been working on a few new projects lately and I’m filled with inspiration for them. I feel so overflowing with the inspiration that I’m lamenting that I have only the time before me. I wish I could clone myself.

What’s weird is that when I’m busy and I LOVE to be busy like this, I actually feel the most capable of being parent and homeschool mom as well. I crank out the school work with the kids when I’m cranking out my creative endeavors too. I am more willing to jump in the car and go to the zoo or the museum. I feel energized by it all even as I feel overwhelmed and just plain tuckered out.

So that led me to thinking about those wicked red shoes and I wonder if maybe that dancer did have moments where she would not have chosen otherwise even as she danced.

just a thought. that’s what I got today.

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coming home…

April 25, 2009 at 10:04 am (Cry Together, Mid-life Crisis, Ordinary Time, expanding your view, things you never knew about mrs metaphor)

I’ve had a couple of hard but good conversations this week with friends from Chicago. I think we’re all feeling the loss of each other. We were so intertwined in our growing and our faith, in our parenting and our lives as spouses…it was hard for me to imagine that coming here to TN I’d ever find a community of women that would equal the support I had gotten from these Chicago Wise Women.

So after three and a half years it’s taken a lot of energy and a lot of focus but I have found a wide base of support. I have started deep, meaningful relationships with these TN Wise Women…and I cannot fathom how I’d have survived out here without them. I do not take lightly the relationships that were built and kept in Chicago nor the ones that are being built and nurtured here. It’s miraculous to me. I’m overcome with it all when I stop to think about it.

This morning as I thought about the hard conversations I had this week with Chicago friends I was struck by how formative their voices have been in my life and how thankful I am for that. The women I’m friends with here in TN are direct beneficiaries of the bricks that these beautiful Chicago women put in place with me so many years ago. Their speaking into me even after I left and their willingness to hear me speak into them from so far away is a testimony of the bonds that come with authenticity, integrity and love in friendships.

What is striking me just now is the idea of coming home. I do consider my home to be where I am living with my family of course. My home is here with this community now and yet there is another kind of “home” too. In so many ways Chicago feels like home because that’s where this community of women reside. They aren’t friends anymore, they are family….so Chicago is also home.

“Coming home” means visiting but it also means hearing from my “friend-family” members there, it means reaching out and being willing to be examined from 500 miles away and being willing to examine them in the same, loving way. That is coming home too. It’s scary to be honest. I want to put on my best face but I commit to being authentic. I want them to know the loss I have for them but I also want them to know I’m alright. It’s hard to walk with any certainty.

The hardest part about coming home is that it is humbling. These are people who knew me in my emotional and spiritual infancy and chose to love me anyway. It’s humbling to have people know me so deeply. It’s humbling to be allowed to see into them just as deeply.

So today I’m thankful beyond compare. I don’t even know what to do with this joy except to take hold of my children and husband for random acts of hugging, let it spill out in the exchanges I have with local “friend-family” members and write about it.

so there’s that.

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Gabriel Suit

April 22, 2009 at 12:35 pm (The Glass Factory)

I’m a lyric writing machine these days….dunno why. This one line has been ricocheting in my head for months…MONTHS I say!
“dressed as an angel in your Gabriel suit”

I love the imagery of it but couldn’t figure out what or who it is about. Let me know if it’s you because frankly I haven’t a clue.

The melody on it lends itself REALLY nicely to a sort of bluegrass meets “down on his luck circus performer” vibe with a little Stray Cats mixed in for good measure…don’t worry, I’ll get my talented music Shaman, Stephen Mason to work it out in the end…(and while you’re at that link pick up their new CD. It’s amazingly great)

GABRIEL SUIT

How many castles will you build around you, brother
Just to watch them come tumbling down?
I watch you stack the bricks and roll the rocks from riverbeds
It is the best show around

You may be stunning when you stand before the mirror
While the war rages on the inside
You may be running like you haven’t run for ages
Playing games with the wording of your false pride

You’re dressed as an angel in your Gabriel suit
Even so, you and I, we know better
Lay down the halo and the mask that you make
I’ll be waiting here
As long as it takes.

How many fences make it safe for you my brother
When you see them come crashing on down?
There is a rhythm in the sound that all the pounding makes
It is the best show around

You may be stunning when you see you in the mirror
While the war rages on the inside
You may be running like you haven’t run for ages
Playing games with the wording of your false pride

You’re dressed as an angel in your Gabriel suit
Even so, you and I, we know better
Lay down the halo and the mask that you make
I’ll be waiting here
As long as it takes.

How many roadblocks will you build around you, brother
Just to watch life run them all down?
I watch you place the planks and then smooth out your clothing
It is the best show around

You may be stunning when you stand before the mirror
While the war rages on the inside
You may be running like you haven’t run for ages
Playing games with the wording of your false pride

You’re dressed as an angel in your Gabriel suit
Even so, you and I, we know better
Lay down the halo and the mask that you make
I’ll be waiting here,
as long as it takes.
©adc 4/09

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winter people…

April 17, 2009 at 6:42 pm (Radical Thoughts, The Glass Factory, random musings)

I finished up the words and started a quick melody on this one last week. I love it, I really do and yet it makes me sad every single time I sing the melody. I suppose that’s alright. Maybe that’s what being one of the “winter people” means to me.

I wrote this with a couple of friends in mind though as well…other winter people I’ve found in the last 2 years. I recognized them first I think. I’m not even sure they know that they ARE winter people. That will be a good discussion one day.

Winter People

We both know
there’s always heavy somewhere
But we carry on
And yes, this is the wonder
Feel the deep dark hurt of the soul
And the wide truth
Of mirrors in our skin
Pack it up tight
a bundle on our backs
Walk a dirt road
being careful not to wander

We both know
it’s always winter somewhere
But we carry on
because we are winter people
Feel the deep dark hurt of the world
And the wide truth
Of mirrors in our skin
Pack it all tight
a bundle on our backs
Move along real slow
being careful not to let go

You’re the quiet voice
In the back of my head
Offers up, a simple cup
Because

We both know
There’s always thirsty somewhere
But we carry on
And yes, this is the wonder
Feel the deep dark thirst of the world
And the wide truth
Of mirrors in our skin
Pack it up tight
A bundle on our backs
Walk the long road
Because we are winter people
© adc 2009

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wearing it well….

April 13, 2009 at 7:00 am (The Glass Factory, poetry among friends, random musings)

I love Maya Angelou’s writing. I do. I love her poetry a whole lot. One thing that sticks in my head though is a while back, I dunno, maybe in the late 80’s, Maya Angelou did a record with Peaches and Herb. Google it. I hated it. I’m sorry, I just did. She rapped poetry over and inbetween their lyrics and I just did not dig it. I did not. meh.

This got me to thinking…
I do see a fundamental difference in song lyrics and poetry. I don’t think one automatically can become or should become the other. I also am not sure how the two intersect. Spoken word or Performance Art done WELL is awesome. Two thumbs way up…but gah, Maya Angelou and Peaches & Herb…not so much…

Given that I’ve posted my lyrics and my poetry here from time to time I thought I’d jot down my thoughts about the difference between those two creative pieces of myself….while there are many qualities they share there are some very basic ways in which they differ.

I completely own this. I do not expect everyone to agree with me because frankly, this is about me. It’s all about me…isn’t it? Don’t answer that….it’s rhetorical.

Alrighty.

My poetry is inward looking. It’s intimate. It’s not something I put on like an article of clothing to show off. It’s not something I write down to keep me warm at night. It is more like my skin, a part of me. Perhaps it’s best described as a tattoo. My poems are tattoos on my body. Some I show. Most I do not. Some are meant to peek out from under my clothing. They never give the whole story. They are ingrained. They represent me because they are me. It’s fine if no one sees or likes them. They are not created for you. They’re mine. I’ll show them ’round if the timing is right, if I really am proud of their craft or their form but generally they’re not open to debate because they reside in my flesh.

My lyrics, though. Those are clothing. There are some I wear around the house for comfort but mostly they represent my mood or my fancy. They are a statement about what I see in the world at times. The are inward looking, of course…not a costume that I wear to be someone else, you see…but I can take off that article of clothing. I can lend it out to other people. There are quite a few in fact that I WANT to be seen by other people…I WANT to be liked by other people. I want people to want that piece of clothing to reside in their closet too.

In some ways maybe that’s part of why I’m making The Glass Factory. I know that I don’t feel it’s enough for me to write songs and never have them heard by other people. I’m hand crafting this article of clothing that might keep you warm or might help you define the creative you as well. It might speak something to you when you hear it. When you wear it, it may speak something to another person. Maybe it will inspire them to fashion something of their own in turn…

that’s the hope anyway…to wear it well….

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in the garden…

April 9, 2009 at 10:24 am (Uncategorized)

As a personal trainer I have been programmed, at least it feels in part, to think of the body as a machine. Just as I always considered my spiritual life a “house” I was building…my body was like my “car” I guess. I’m responsible for changing the air filter and the oil and keeping it clean. It all fits, right?

Put that together with the house that my spiritual life has become. I park my car in the garage of this house. The car doesn’t even LIVE in the house. You see how this is? Do you see this picture in your head? What does that feel like to you? To me, it’s so disjointed. So wrong. That my body would be so isolated from my spiritual life…I mean, sheltered by the house, of course but outside the LIVING of it! Wow. It’s overwhelming how wrong this feels to me.

BUT
AND

Let’s move from this picture. Let’s move to another picture. Our bodies are NOT a car, they are NOT a machine. They are a living, growing, changing organism. They are organic in nature…like our spiritual lives. Our bodies are a GARDEN. We tend it. If something dies we mourn it. If it’s sick we nurse it back to health. It’s a part of us. We do not leave it in the garage at night. We ARE our bodies and our bodies are US. We ARE the garden…each of us.

Now, move this piece in. This tree of our spiritual lives is planted right in the center of that garden. It is a part of the garden. The centerpiece. Maybe it’s a young spruce. Maybe it’s a fine, strong oak. See it there in the center of you, the center of the garden of you. It informs everything that happens in that garden. It’s roots reach deep down into you and it’s branches reach up BEYOND you…into the air and the sky and the clouds…into the very heavens above, yes?

Put this picture place of the mechanized, unfeeling and unmoving one that the world has supplied in years past and be the garden today…water that garden, feed that tree, swing from it’s branches and delight in the miracle that is YOU.

live here.

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the weight of the world…

April 8, 2009 at 12:00 pm (The Glass Factory, Uncategorized)

I had this line in my head about knowing that sometimes the right choices make us cry…and then this really very talented friend of mine, that Steve Mason (who has graciously agreed to produce this project) was saying this thing about the weight of the world being comforting….
and so these lyrics were born.

I’m not sure if this one will make it to The Glass Factory but I’m sure they’ll show up somewheres. We’ve a few thoughts on the melody if it makes the cut for this project. Thought I’d give you a preview on the lyrics to date, though…

Weight

when the
weight of the world
is a comforting thing
hold it all close
keeping your grip tighter still

I think
sometimes the right choice
just might make you cry
take it all in
and then watch it spill from your eyes

If we shoulder it well
if we just pass it round
I will carry the hope
you can carry the sound
if we shoulder it well
it’ll be well enough
to carry the weight
the weight of the world
the weight of the world

when the
weight of the words
are a comforting piece
hold them all close
keeping your grip on the truth

I think
sometimes the right choice
will just make you cry
take it all in
and watch as it spills from your eyes.

If we shoulder it well
if we pass it around
You can carry the hope
I can carry the sound
If we shoulder it well
it’ll be well enough
to carry the weight
the weight of the world
the weight of the world
© ADC/SDM 2009

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Electra-cool!

April 5, 2009 at 3:45 pm (Uncategorized)

You know who I love? My old college pal, Michael Brewer. He’s electra-awesome for reminding me (via Facebook) of this show from the 70’s. I actually remember watching this…gah.

Hope it starts your week off in a super electra-fabulous way!

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