“Music cleanses the understanding; inspires it, and lifts it into a realm which it would not reach if it were left to itself.” ~ Henry Ward Beecher
Sometimes I cannot make sense of a single thing in this world. In those times the wisdom in poetry and music helps me sort it. And when it doesn’t, I can always dance it.
Boy In the Bubble
Nothing like a broken foot, even an 11-months-ago broken foot, to help me appreciate the miracle and wonder of standing in the shower and walking around my kitchen. Let alone dancing with my people and hiking in the woods.
Modern medicine is amazing. The human body is amazing. Even in the scariest moments of my healing, I was blown away by what was happening. And now that I can do all the things I want to do on my feet, I am overwhelmed with gratitude for the art of medicine.
Medicine is magical and magical is art
Think of the boy in the bubble
And the baby with the baboon heart~ Paul Simon
Listen here: Boy in the Bubble by Peter Gabriel
Big Yellow Taxi
Nothing like a 4-day power outage to remind me that everything in my house is a miracle. Hot water coming out of the faucet? Just wow. Lights in the bathroom? Incredible. An oven? A washing machine? You’re kidding, right? And don’t even get me started about the Interwebs. Utterly mindblowing.
No, no, no
Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you got ‘til it’s gone
They paved paradise, and put up a parking lot
~ Joni Mitchell
Listen here: Big Yellow Taxi by Counting Crows
So Beautiful Or So What?
Nothing like a terminal diagnosis – whether for a person (to be clear, I’m fine) or a democracy – to point out that everything matters … and nothing matters. Everybody matters… and nobody matters. It is, to me, the great paradox of life.
I’ve been thinking about human history and how it rises and falls and evolves and disintegrates. Everything in this world comes together and flies apart. I’ve been thinking of the billions of people who have lived and died on this earth with lives as rich and compelling as mine. I remember reading an article about facing death which (and I’m paraphrasing), death is a complete catastrophe and the most normal thing in the world.
I'm gonna tell my kids a bedtime story
A play without a plot
Will it have a happy ending?
Maybe yeah, maybe not
I tell them life is what you make of it
So beautiful or so what
So beautiful, so beautiful
So what~ Paul Simon
Listen here: So Beautiful Or So What by Paul Simon
Music is, to me, proof of the existence of God. It is so extraordinarily full of magic, and in tough times of my life I can listen to music and it makes such a difference. ~ Kurt Vonnegut
For me, when the world feels confusing and life itself seems like a mine field of mysteries, when I feel myself blinded by the incomprehensible, I turn to music and poetry for reminders of miracles and what matters. “Hard times,” said Alice Walker, “require furious dancing.”
Amen. Join me on the dance floor.