Every Single Day

The Year

What can be said in New Year rhymes,
That's not been said a thousand times?

The new years come, the old years go,
We know we dream, we dream we know.

We rise up laughing with the light,
We lie down weeping with the night.

We hug the world until it stings,
We curse it then and sigh for wings.

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

There's a couple more stanzas to this poem , but I don't like them. These seem to touch on the hopes and fears we have for new years.

Of course, hope starts out as the strongest emotion of each year, and, with luck, each new day. Because all we really know we'll have each year is each day we're lucky enough to live.

And I think that's exactly what I'll focus on -- living the happiest, healthiest, best I can every day. There's my sappy yet sincere wish for my new year.

What's yours?

Time Changes Everything

He brought me a tree
And strung it with lights
He's trying real hard
To make everything right.

My husband and I had lost connection, not affection for each other. So we decided after 5 weeks of separation and just talking and seeing each other rarely, to spend a few days together over the long Christmas weekend.

He surprised me with a little Christmas tree, knowing I love them most as part of Christmas. Love to sit in the dark with no other lights on other than the tree. We decorated it, and I'll enjoy it every day until it comes down.

We talked some, played music and games some, and watched movies. Just had a fun, relaxing time together. We'll see how things progress; so far, so good. Counseling helps; reading helps; time helps.

Till and I ended up in third place in the "Make 'Em Laugh" category of Broadjam.com's contest with our song 'Til I'm 93! We're happy.

So onward to a new year, the symbolism of which is more hopeful this year than others.

My mother would have been 85 today. Happy Birthday, Mama! I love you and still wish you were here.

Twenty's Plenty

TWENTY’S PLENTY.

Today’s the day I stop denying

Knowing love’s been slowly dying.

I’m so done that it ain’t even funny.

Honey, TWENTY'S PLENTY.

This is the chorus to a song I wrote a couple years ago -- when I'd been married about 20 years. I guess my separation has been brewing for some time. Still, after 25 years together, it's a weird, sad, and uncertain thing to not be living with the person you've lived with for so long.

As if I'm the first person to go through it! First time for me, so it's fresh.

Singer-songwriter Till (see prior post) entered our first experimental song in a contest, and we did pretty well! I've finally found someone to write with -- we click and will steam ahead...maybe even 'Til I'm 93! (the name of our song).

Till and Tillie -- T 'n T -- the bomb; dynamite, explosive. What a hoot!

Go to her site and take a look/see/listen: http://www.tillsounds.nl/Home.aspx

And stay tuned; lots of changes in the air.

Grab for the Gusto

Through every season, turn, turn, turn.
From every lesson, learn, learn, learn.
Everything changes, churn, churn, churn.
But where there is life, burn, baby, burn.

This is fun: I belong to SongU.com as a way to learn more about songwriting, pitch my songs to real industry people, keep me motivated and moving, and taking advantage of fun opportunities that they provide.

Currently, that's called "Over and Under," in which they match you with someone in another country, and you write a song together. By December 15. Long-distance, to say the least.

And I got matched with a cool woman named Till. (Those of you who know one of my nicknames is Tillie may find that amusing.) We have e-mailed and Skyped already.

She's much more accomplished than I; she can do it all -- write lyrics, compose music, and sing. Whew! Lucky for me.

And she's in Amsterdam. Eight-hour difference in time. Good thing I'm an early bird. She caught me this morning on Skype. I told her I'd just gotten up (5:30 a.m.); she said she had too (lunch time!). There's a real musician for you!

Anyway, we will ponder growing old as a theme -- not a new subject to this blogger -- and see what happens. Stand by for a link to another song later this year.

"Mama" is doing great on YouTube! Thank you very much.

Another Chronological Year Bites the Dust

Monday's child is fair of face,
Tuesday's child is full of grace,
Wednesday's child is full of woe,
Thursday's child has far to go.
Friday's child is loving and giving,
Saturday's child works hard for a living,
But the child born on the Sabbath Day,
Is fair and wise and good in every way.

I was born on a Sunday, 62 years ago today, and I'm heading full tilt into the last 3 decades of my life...god willing and the creek don't rise.

October 9 is Leif Erikson Day. I'm Norwegian on my dad's side -- Frantsen -- born in Minnesota, so it was interesting to just now discover I was born on the day that old Leif actually discovered America.

Forget Columbus. Norwegians were the first Europeans to set foot in the New World. According to Wikipedia, a Norwegian ship named Restauration landed in New York Harbor on October 9, 1825.

Anyway, it's the start of a new world for me, too, what with no dogs and no boy for the first time in 25 years. Exciting, scary, sad, liberating...and definitely a new frontier in my life.

What will I do with it?

Dear Diary

Dear Diary, Dear Diary,
Dear Abby, Dear Ann,
Please help me think through things
As fast as you can.
Life is not going according to plan.
Dear Diary, Dear Diary,
Dear Abby, Dear Ann.

Nobody told me there'd be days like these. Or years, even. Of course, there have been signs, what with changes coming faster -- and more furiously -- the older I get.

Loss has me reeling emotionally. As well as the hindsight that slaps hard with the realization that I probably should have followed the rules about working for retirement. Now I'll be working instead of retiring.

Time to overcome the stress and paralysis and blog on.

One of my best friends in the world died of cancer at age 54. The last of our most recent four dogs just died. My marriage is dying. And I'm facing middle age alone, sad, and lonely. Who'd-a thunk?

At least I have a job. Hahahaahhahahahaha

This, too, shall pass. But it feels pretty bad right now. Still I know things will change, and I can't wait to see what happens next. I've got one arm up for protection.

Mama and Me on YouTube

Write a new song,
Right an old wrong.

I'm determined to get my lyrics noticed...with luck, by someone who will want to record them. I've made 3 demos (with music, so they're songs now, not just lyrics), done the "hunt for publishers" route, and it was all tough.

The music biz is tough, even for those with connections. For the rest of us, it's a pipe dream in dream pipeline. But you never know, and the universe often surprises us.

I can't wait to be surprised.

Please check out my song and video "Mama, What Do You Wish?" here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sJfrr5r6Kk

What Happens Next?

If a blogger stops blogging
Or ceases to be,
Will the blog still live on
Through eternity?

Cyberspace still boggles my mind. All those pages and pages of stuff — words, images, music — somewhere in time and space, but physically untouchable, untactile, unreal in a sense.

Without a computer connection, you have no access to all that stuff that you know exists somewhere in space and time. What a weird library. What a weird way to journal, for everybody with a computer to read.

What a weird way to communicate with...you don't even know who!

To me it feels more like essay or memoir writing, rather than a diary or journal. Who the hell wants to know what I had for breakfast?

Then again, who the hell even wants to know what anybody else thinks about anything? There's certainly a human need to communicate, though, even if you don't know who — or whether anyone — may be reading/listening. I guess that's what drives cyberspace interactions.

Once upon a time, people talked face to face, not Facebook to Facebook. I miss those days. And I feel like I'm going to be forever boggled.

The Missing Year

And so this is Christmas
And what have you done?
Another year over
And a new one just begun.

From "Happy Christmas" by John Lennon

Have you ever had one of those years where you look back and ask, "Where the hell did THAT go?" That was 2010 for me. Yes, it happened, and yes, I remember it. I worked hard; stuff happened; I remember it all. But there's something about it that leaves me feeling it's MIA.

What have you done? What did you do? Or is the real question: What did you accomplish?

And what is accomplishment; success; indeed, time? It's different for all of us...the trick is figuring it out for ourselves.

That takes time, and it changes over time, and time is on your side.

Happy Christmas! And happier New Year.