Una Canción

This first came to me in Spanish... here is how it sounds:

Una canción, llena de alegría, 
con la retintín de una campanilla delicada, 
y emoción profunda me arrulló en los oídos 
después de la cena.  

Estaba quitando malas hierbas del jardín. 
Al otro lado de la paréd, entre mi jardín 
y él de mis vecinos, oí a una niña cantando; gritando la canción suya con fuerza, convicción, y verdad. 

Yo estaba un poco triste por causa de los periódicos, la televisión, y el radio llenos de cuentos trájicos, pero ésta canción de una jovencita de dos años cambió todo.

Ella cantó con la esencia de la vida propia, 
desde el centro de la planeta; la Madre Tierra. 
Sí su voz tuviera palabras, posiblemente declararían: Para toda la gente que sufre... 
Hay Esperanza. 

Hay causas significantes y pequeñitas que debemos celebrar con todo el corazón. 
Celebremos juntos in este momento 
con la música del alma. 

Entonces, yo canturreé hasta la puesta del sol, quitando las malas hierbas. 


Muchísimas Grácias a mi cuñada preciosa
Vicky Gutierrez-Kovner para su ayuda gramática.


Here is a rough translation:

A joyful song, sounding like a tinkling bell, yet filled with deep emotion landed in my ears after dinner.

I was weeding in the garden. 
On the other side of the fence between my garden and that of my neighbors, I heard the youngest daughter singing; shouting her song with strength, conviction, and truth.

I had been a little bit sad because of tragic stories in the newspapers, on television and radio, but this song from a two-year-old changed everything.

She sang with the essence of life itself, 
from the center of the planet, from Mother Earth.
Had there been words with her tune, they might have said: For everyone who suffers, there is hope.

There are grand and tiny reasons we should celebrate with our whole heart.
May we celebrate together this very moment
with the music of our Soul.

Then, I hummed as I pulled weeds, until the sun set.


With thanks to my precious sister-in-love, 
Vicky Gutierrez-Kovner for grammatical help.

Our Mother / Father G_d

There's a reason we celebrate Mothers in May and Father's in June... I just don't recall the reason.

Do you?

Too tired for wiki-ing my pedia...  how 'bout never, is never good with you?

If you're going through Hell, keep going, Mr. Churchill said.

What doesn't kill us makes us stronger said Ernest... (how much does a Hemingway?), now he's dead

When the going gets tough, my fingernails get rough

Of gardening in heat, I've had quite enough

Pulling foxtails and gathering seeds... weed 'em and reap, then fall in a heap

Word play while birds play

Sun shines, so make hay

Plums are ripening on the front tree

Gums aren't tightening teeth working free

Growing old is not for sissies

Growing bold makes better histories

So, where ever you be, whatever you see

Go boldly where none have dared to be

Split your infinitive, write what's derivative

May not be art but it sure is a curative

Good day to all fathers

May it be worth your bother

To bring up the young-uns you know

Whether yours or the worlds, everything unfurls

So, enjoy the ride as you go

Sculpting With Hair and Foot Notes

Cows were present in the delivery room when I was born and they really loved me up, or they just thought me very salty and that’s why I have so many cow-licks. A hairdresser told me recently that I have SIX separate cowlicks. This explains a lot. My hair goes in multiple directions at once. I have to sculpt it into place or it sproings.

With my husband away at camp for the summer, I got so involved in a story on the radio that I forgot to brush my hair before leaving the house Sunday morning. I had put a wet washcloth on top of my head while in the shower trying to tame the biggest whorl near the back of my head, but I forgot to brush it. I'm not fond of the trampled grass look - you know, like when a dog has walked around and around in circles trampling the grasses to prepare for sleep? When I got in the car, I remembered that I forgot to brush.  So, I poured out some water into my hands from the bottle in my car and dragged my hands through to try to tame the hair. It's that one whorl back there that really bothers me. I tried to cover it over - that exposed part of my scalp at the center of the whirl-pool. Without a mirror to view the back of my head, I kept pinching and sculpting it and hoped for the best.

Arriving at church, I sat half-way between the entrance and the stage, where the choir and chamber ensemble were all ready to perform Mozart and Haydn. I sat between friends Ann and Anna, and made a gesture at the back of my head meant to pull my hair over the cowlick patch. Then I let it go, thinking: Just Fuhgeddaboudit! (It's a New Jersey thing.)

My seat gave me a vantage point from which to observe backs of heads of half the congregation. Pew-bound folks seated before me seemed vulnerable, dear, disarming, and innocent as newborns - each with her or his own “head-navel” peeping out from even the most carefully coiffed do. I loved that I could see our common humanity in the whorls on all those heads.

The music began. I got all teary-eyed with love for my fellow humans. Sort of like watching babies sleep and knowing they are angels come to earth. My heart swelled with the music and heaved with barely containable love. People are so dear! 

Why do I struggle so to tame my own cowlick and ban it from being part of my hairdo? Why do I abhor what seems like vulnerability - like being seen naked? On the one hand, I deem the crown as evidence of opening to Spirit; the point through which we may download celestial energy.  On the other hand, (or foot) I can imagine Earth energy entering my feet and rising through my body to spritz out the top of my head like a spouting whale. If I expect the two polarities of Earth and Sky to meet and marry in my heart, why am I so embarrassed to let my cowlick show? Why can't I view myself as compassionately as I view my pew mates and all humanity who got up this morning and either did or did not brush their hair? 

Everyone has at least one whorl where the hair began to whirl and swirl around and around to cover our heads with downy softness before we were born. I wonder what happens to the cowlicks when baldness happens. Is there still fuzz in which we can trace the circular pattern? I think mine goes clock wise - at least the most persistent one near the crown. The other most pesky one is above the outer corner of my right eye brow - right at the hairline. I can’t tell what direction it spirals… it’s just another wonky place where my hair goes kafoogeldie. 

When I was nineteen, I worked as a telephone switch-board operator for a non-profit. One of the public relations fellows had identical twins. Mirror twins. The only way Lloyd and his wife Lois could tell Danny and Stevie apart was that one of them had a clockwise whorl; the other, anti-clockwise.  

No complaints. I’m happy to have hair. I’ve been happy with it at times and I’ve been miserable with it. At this stage in life, the hair and I have reached at a truce. I’m no longer putting it on the ironing board to iron the curl out of it, as high-school buddy Judy and I used to do in the sixties. It’s a very short do now, not flowing down past my waist. Having the cowlicks identified and charted has been helpful. I know what I’m up against. I’m grateful for “product” that can (sometimes) glue it down. Most often, I feel a more like the character Alfalfa from The Little Rascals - with my cowlick sticking straight up, than like a shampoo model. 

I wake up early enough to do a modicum of grooming before going out into the world. I try not to leave before the bed head and chenille marks on my face have been tamed. Still, I wish there were something I could do to cover that spot atop my head. Maybe next lifetime, I’ll order only one whorl, dead center, on top of my head and be done with worry and embarrassment over my dumb-ass hair... or become fond of hats.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

I celebrate my bare feet being in contact with and open to Mama Earth’s electrons. She gives them freely to us as part of her packaged deal to hold us close to her breast through gravity, and to keep us healthy with her Vitamin G. (G, for Grounding.) Those free electrons carry a negative charge. Even more so when we’re walking by a large body of water. It can promote a feeling of well-being as we balance our bodies electrically. Walking barefoot is the best anti-inflammatory and it doesn't cost a penny. All we have to do is take our shoes off! (Just be mindful there's no broken glass or stickers, eh?)

A toddler girl at the school  where I was teaching in 1983 delighted us all one hot August afternoon. We took the class outside and filled some wading pools just to cool off. Little Marsha took off all her clothes and threw her arms skyward, squealing with joy, “Look! I’m barefoot all over!”  Amen.

From head to toe, may you be well and held in the comfort of Mother Earth's lap. And when a cow comes by, let her lick your head. You'll be in good company.

Pieces of Eight

Aaarrrrrrgh!

Ye be wealthy, indeed, Master Jim Hawkins! You've got pieces of eight to delight Long John Silver.

Lucky me to be wealthier than thee, Jim Hawkins. I am grandmother to a lovely girl-child who IS eight! She celebrated being herself this past weekend, and shared the wealth of her humor, graciousness, and tender kindness with six of her gal pals of similar age. They swam, they ate, they played a child appropriate version of Dungeons and Dragons with the help of her Dungeon Master father. They ate more, watched an age appropriate movie, slept very little, and in the morning, they made slime. Slime is made with Elmer's White Glue and Liquid Laundry Detergent. Ooshy gooshy slime! Such fun,

One of the best gifts her weekend celebration gave me was a party with the child's mother, and our younger daughter and new son-in-love from Grover Beach. Lovely visits.

Another gift: Recollecting what it was like to be eight.

Memory meanders. But IF it serves...  I think it was 1956 when my folks built a playhouse for me and I was given a black cat named Eight Ball. He had a white spot over his purr box. The slab of cement with handprints on it that served as the doorstep to that playhouse is dated 1952 when I was only four years old. Perhaps my folks were forward thinking and made the doorstep four years before use?

I do remember playing in that playhouse. I think I was older than four when it was finished. It had a sleeping loft and a workbench that served as kitchen area, desk, and eating table. Once, one of my brother's thirteen rabbits went missing and was found with a swelled head upside down inside the wall of the play house. We massaged his head back into shape and he seemed to be OK until we took them all to Great Uncle Ed who was a butcher. I couldn't bring myself to eat dinner that night at my Grammy Maxwell's house where Uncle Ed lived with her, nor dinner any night after that if it came from our overstocked-with-white-freezer-paper-wrapped-bunnies. I was sad for a long time.

I remember roller skating and having to sweep up all the eucalyptus pods so the metal wheels wouldn't stop short and throw me flat down on the red cement patio. I remember playing with Peter and Angelika Fox, Jeffrey Killen, Gary Davis, and Glen Gillis. We had dirt-clod fights, played Mother May I, Red Rover, Red Rover, Bombs Over Tokyo, and Kick the Can. Hide and Seek was the fall back, most important game and we played it well past twilight - swatting mosquitoes as we called out Olly olly oxen all in free. I can still remember the good scents of sunshine, grass stains, and sweat, and the acrid smell of iodine on skinned knees.

How very different is my granddaughter's life from the one I lived in the wild hills of Echo Park near downtown Los Angeles. She must make dates to play with other busy children her age. Her time is spent at three different homes: his, hers and ours. Mama's house at least has children in the neighborhood. Dad's house is isolated, walled off, and has a security fence all around it. No kids live nearby that I've ever seen. Our home has a handy nine year old boy across the street who often comes to play. He's great with scooters, skateboards, and bikes. She's good with horses which are only available during her weekly riding lesson. Still, Anthony and Miss D find plenty of common ground and points of interest to be creative together and play.

Play is the greatest wealth, is it not?

All things are possible in play.

Viva Play. Viva being eight years old. Viva communities that create safe places for the children to play. Cat Stevens reminded us to safeguard those places where PLAY can happen. Those places are GOLD.

Sound Bites

My family and I attended two Bat Mitzvahs for two grand nieces in New York on consecutive weekends. The first was Saturday of Mother's Day Weekend and was held in a beautiful Conservative Temple on the Upper West Side. The second was on Long Island at a more modest venue.
The two celebration parties were of equal extravagance and included DJs whose ears must be blown-out long ago. The decibel level had our clothing bouncing off our bodies - much like the iconic movie, Children of a Lesser God. Painful! The sound was biting my ears!

At the second one, which was even louder than the first, I was desperate. I have some hearing loss, perhaps hereditary, perhaps related to too much loud music in the nineteen-sixties. It makes some of the finest hairs in the inner ear take on responsibilities for fellow fatter fallen soldiers. These delicate ones don't know how to deal with the force of the sound waves attacking them. They feel pain, akin to having weak muscles do too much heavy lifting.

Remedy: Dinner rolls the consistency of Wonder Bread that are better for making dice and small sculptures than for eating. I followed my husband's suggestion and used small pieces of my roll to make perfect contoured earplugs! Buffered from the onslaught, my ears were happy hearing what conversation I could while the doughy bits held the offending heavy base vibes at bay. Yay! In case you were wondering, NO, I did NOT have them as a midnight snack! Eeeeewww!

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

Delights filled the days sandwiched between the two celebrations.  New York City is alive! We explored it with our two daughters and our granddaughter. After gorging on Zabar's delicacies, we left the first of the obligatory Sunday Brunches on Central Park West to walk with our grand nephew in the Park.  Zach, who is twenty-two and lives in a small apartment near 57th Street and Columbus Circle at the South end of the park, showed us around. There was a Japanese Festival going on with food, face painting, and families dancing to (yes, LOUD) music. Wandering gave us time for quieter conversations. When we got to the lake, we four gals rowed a boat across the very lake on which E.B. White's Stuart Little navigated his human brother's model boat. By the time we got to the very bridge on which Stuart's family stood to cheer him on, the granddaughter was really into the whole adventure, recalling the tension of the story. Her Gran'Pun and her cousin Zach cheered us on from atop the bridge.

Glorious springtime scents wafted to our noses, petals floated on the swells caused by the crowd of boats going in all directions. There was lots of laughter as boats bumped - mostly gently, mostly with cordial apologies. (Who really knows how to steer or slow down these old boats?) Cool breezes and warm sun made it a perfect Sunday outing. As we bid goodbye to Zach and headed toward the subway, a surprise squall drenched us and everyone else on the streets of Manhattan. We laughed and scurried for cover in whatever doorways we could find.

Once on the train back to our hotel, the nearly eight-year-old grandie started up a game of charades. The aliveness of her acting out a book title engaged all surrounding passengers, so much so that a woman seated next to me, when the subject of our plans for the week came up and they  included a trip to the Museum of Natural History, turned to me and said, "Here. I'm a volunteer at the museum. I've got five voucher passes for you." Wow! We could hardly contain our delight at the serendipity. We thanked  her profusely and intend to send a hand-written Thank You note to her in care of the museum.

The day at the museum was a special one too. Sister-in-law Betsy also got tickets for us to get in. While Mark waited in line to turn the vouchers into actual tickets, my job was to scope out a family of five with which to share the vouchers. Two little ones and three adults from Argentina proved to be the perfect recipients. The funny part was that as the long line snaked forward and doubled back on itself many times, my beloved husband / kid magnet, who didn't know who had received the vouchers, kept encountering this same delightful family and making the kids giggle at his goofy antics, jokes, and rope tricks. We bumped into them again at several of the exhibits... mummies, and dinosaurs, and dioramas, oh, MY!

*    *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

Families each have their unique dynamics. Being on vacation couldn't stop my observing mind. My take-aways from the week spent with ours were love and feelings of great compassion for all the nieces, nephews, grand nieces and nephews, sisters and brothers-in-love.

Wishing the miles weren't so many between east and west coasts, but grateful for the opportunity to traverse them, I'm resolute to stay in touch with family.

Stay Tuned...

My Monday Muse will be off line for two weeks while I am on a computer fast.

Please join me again Memorial Day, May 29, 2017.

May all mother's everywhere be remembered for their labors of love.

May all women who have taken up labors on behalf of any wee living thing be celebrated for their gift.

May all beings be happy. May all beings be well. May all beings be peaceful.

Namasté,

Melinda

Morning Songs

Uncle Larry will turn ninety-three May 10. He and my cousin Lynn spent five days with us and we celebrated his Birthday together Sunday morning, with cake and ice-cream, before they drove back to Los Angeles.

During their stay, my husband and I gave them a tour of Oakland, Berkeley and surrounding areas. They seemed particularly taken with Roberts Redwood Park's hiking trails, and Julia Morgan's iconic architecture, which we saw from the outside-in. It takes some doing to get four folk ready to leave in a timely way from our house. Chapel of the Chimes at the Piedmont Cemetary had just closed by the time we pulled up to the curb Saturday afternoon, so we walked around a bit and looked in windows while I described for them the urns of ashes that look like library books on shelves, with names, birth and death dates on the book's spines. Room after room after naturally lit room, with fountains and lush plantings hold these book-shaped urns as well as more classically shaped Grecian ones. Sunset is a perfect time to be there. All is awash with golden light. The sound resonates in these lovely spaces and Jazz Concerts are a regular Sunday feature at Chapel of the Chimes. Too bad our timing was slightly off.

We piled back in the car and went over to Berkeley City Club, where we could go inside, delight in a a bride and groom posing on the sun-drenched steps for a prenuptial photographic session. We observed diners arriving at the members-only-restaurant, and even found a door accidentally left ajar, so we could peek in on the gorgeous pool - so reminiscent of Ms. Morgan's stunning indoor pool at San Simeon's Hearst Castle.

Friday we went to the Oakland Museum - everyone's first time except for our granddaughter, who has been there many times before. Such fun to see the California History exhibit. In the Hollywood section, we had fun recording sound effects for an old Western Movie in the Foley room, and coloring costume designs over tracings on a light box. The Grandie also liked watching the huge coy and turtles in the outdoor pond.

Sunday morning was my favorite time of the visit. Uncle dines early on the same foods each morning - yogurt, prunes, oatmeal, toast with peanut butter, and coffee. Cousin Lynn lingered longer in bed. Uncle and I sang morning songs alone together in the brightly lit east-facing kitchen. Oklahoma's "Oh, What a Beautiful Morning" was top on his mind. He didn't know about Cat Steven's rendition of "Morning Has Broken", so I pulled out our large print edition of "Rise Up Singing" so he could see the lyrics and chord progressions. He's quite an eclectic musician. Guitar is his most accomplished instrument, but he also plays Ukulele, piano, flüegel horn, and slide trombone. He's in a group called The Geritones that plays gigs at senior centers and nursing homes. 

There's such a fine line between "fine" and "not-so-fine." My mother's brother at ninety-three has all his faculties, shops and cooks for himself, drives himself to folk-dancing, stores, and book club meetings every week, in addition to any gigs where his group is playing.

I'm listening to Atul Gawande's "Being Mortal", which is about frailty, dependence, and aging, Oh, My! I recommended it to my cousin. She lives with her dad and, right now, everything is "fine."  

His sister, my mom, had a catastrophic brain event one day, which ended her independence with a BANG. Bodies have moving parts and they wear-out. I have a great deal of respect for the elders I know who are vibrantly alive even if they live with diminished and diminishing capacities. To greater or lesser extent, we all have capacities that wane. When in the presence of those who are wobbly of foot or of mind, I sometimes have the fear that I'm sharing company with a ticking time-bomb - that may explode at any moment. Perhaps the suddenness of my mother's extreme decline marked me, and I expect something like that will happen to everyone eventually. Here today... gone tomorrow. New Normals are hard on the soul.

Uncle shows no signs of not being fine. I wonder how Frank Weller was that morning at home, before he mistook the gas pedal for the brake in his car and plowed into the Santa Monica Farmer's Market. I worked with a child who was badly hurt by his mistake simply by being innocently in the pathway of his speeding, out-of-control vehicle. Heart-breaking - for all concerned.

Cousin Lynn, my honey and I had a conversation, out of Uncle's earshot, about THAT conversation which must be had at some point with her father. We came up with the phrase, "We'll know it's time to hand over the keys when the joy of independent living, which includes driving yourself around, is outweighed by the risk of possible danger."  We didn't have to have that conversation with my mom. After her stroke, it was a no-brainer. (Pun, sadly appropriate.) With my mother's boyfriend, however, it was a one-sided conversation that fell on his deaf ears. He continued to drive - illegal - even after having caused a bad accident. Fierce independence is admirable as long as it stays out of the driver's seat. 

Meanwhile, morning songs continue to knock around my noggin... "... but she lived on the morning side of the mountain, and he lived on the twilight side of the hill," and "Good morning star-shine, the earth says hello, you twinkle above us, we twinkle below." (From Hair)

I look forward to singing with Uncle Larry again soon. My preference is that we sing only morning, and no mourning songs.