Category: gratitude

This is living

I have set up my stereo set in the living room like my father did. On Saturday mornings Dad would celebrate the beginning of his weekend by cranking up big band music, sometimes before his three boys had crawled out of their beds. Believe it or not, it is a fond memory.

This Saturday morning, while I fiddled on my laptop, I put Artie Shaw on the turntable, specifically The Complete Artie Shaw, Volume IV: 1940-1941, a two-record set from Bluebird Records.

I think my dad was aghast when I confessed one day that I thought Shaw was better than Benny Goodman, whose music I heard on many a Saturday morning growing up. I am no judge of which man was better on the clarinet, but I thought Shaw was more adventurous, as when he incorporated harpsichord on Gramercy Five recordings like “Cross Your Heart,” the first track on this album.

This particular album covers studio sessions in chronological order from September 1940 to March 1941. I found myself once again marveling at the technology that enables me to time-travel and listen in on performances from more than 85 years ago.

The set includes Shaw’s version of “Moonglow,” the song that was playing when Dad proposed to the girl who would become my mother a few years later. I’m pretty sure they were listening to Benny’s take on the song.

It was a very long time before I discovered that “Moonglow” actually has lyrics, as none of the versions I’d ever heard included singers. “It must have been moon glow that led me straight to you … I still hear you saying, ‘Dear one, hold me fast,’ and I start in praying, Dear Lord, please let this last.” That’s an appropriate song for a marriage proposal.

I have no special message to share today, other than life is better with music, Artie Shaw was a remarkable talent, I’m glad I kept my records, and my parents were always a cute couple. That’s probably enough.

About today

Now — what else can I offer the universe today, of all days? It is, after all, the day the Lord has made, so I for one will rejoice and be glad in it. Of course, that could be said of any day, but the thing about days is that each one is different from all the rest, just like snowflakes or humans.

Even when you have rituals you follow day after day, each day is unlike every other day. The ones you remember are the ones where the ritual is interrupted. For example, I recall the kickoff of the Green Bay Packers game of Sept. 30, 1984, because the phone rang with a coveted job offer while the ball was in the air.

This morning I’m planning to do a little yard work before I tackle my morning web surf, because the forecast is for highs around 90 degrees and my brain starts to wilt when the temperature climbs much higher than 80.

Will this day be more or less memorable than any other? It’s hard to say at this moment, but I need to take this moment to remember that the Lord gave me another day and to be grateful about that, which brings me joy. May I suggest that you consider the possibilities, too?

Three years on

Three years ago this morning, I sat by my beloved’s bedside in the hospice residence and read to her from the Gospel of Matthew, and after Jesus declared the two greatest commandments, I noticed she was no longer breathing. I glanced across the room at the clock; it was 7:20 a.m. 

Something profoundly shifted inside me the moment Carol Jean died, a shift that had never occurred before when death visited my loved ones.

From that minute, I have wanted to tell people to savor every moment they can share with the people they love, especially their special someone.

I have wanted to scream at people who wish death on their enemies. 

Having found another soulmate by a miracle of God, I have made a point to remind myself how precious our times together are. I try never to fail to tell her I love her.

All things pass; it’s a given. All lives end. 

While life is, embrace it. Appreciate it, protect it, love it, live it, and worship the Creator who made it all.

The songwriter said, and I fully believe, “Only God has the right to decide who’s to live and die.” The day comes for all of us, and when it does, you will want to know you loved as much as you could, for as much of the time as you could.

And don’t you dare wish harm on another human being. What an arrogant waste of energy; what a contemptuous and contemptible way to treat the Creator’s work.

And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him: “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” 

And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”