skipping, part two...

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"The Last of the Real Cowboys". You won't want to miss Billy Bob Thornton skipping in this whimsical western. Brilliant dialog as two cowboys discuss getting in touch with their inner child. It's pretty clear who's being real!

EXTREME skipping...

Skipping Boxes -- Dave Bckerman

"Nobody puts Extreme Gene in a corner. Green grass...blue skies... The world's spinning. It's time to take a ride." -- Extreme Gene

A recent, horrifying discovery: it seems I can't skip anymore. Well, technically, I can - but there's not much height in my steps. I crave the lithe and lofty ease of a 7-year old's advantage.

I'm showing signs of the cost associated with a low-exercise life. Vigorous practicing/playing piano is actually quite effective. But, it takes a Hindemith-type workout to get my respiration rate up and to feel the 'burn' (yeah...I'm exaggerating). I do have Mozart, Kabalevsky and Bruch on my plate. But right now, I feel called to spend quiet and somewhat more introspective time at the piano.

If it were summertime, I could go outside and power walk. The weather is currently...well, frightful (technical term from a Christmas song). Currently, it's 5 degrees (-15 with wind chill). At 7pm last night, it was close to 50 degrees. We expected the dramatic storm that hit late evening -- severe winds and rains turning to snow. A California girl is always ready for "blizzard conditions" to come , but, that -- the pretty part -- didn't materialize. Translation: very little snow! Drat. It's only attractive to have frozen condensation on the inside of a storm door if it's a wonderland outside. There's nothing out there that beckons, unless, perhaps, I might like to see if my breath would freeze in mid-air.

This morning, I jogged around the house. The kitchen island, the dining room table, the living room coffee table -- they present themselves to one who is willing to 'run in circles'. Thank goodness for stairs, also! A small epiphany: Why not simply run instead of walking when needing to move about the house? Yet...skipping truly beckons, and not just because I might miss being a child (I can still be child-ish). It seems I am very much not alone.

I happened upon extremeskipping.com today (a warning for the language sensitive: some things on the site might be offensively in your face). 'Extreme Gene' shares the zen of it all in this fairly famous video*:



I picked up a new trick from Gene (besides intuiting that there really aren't any rules): zigzagging. Crossing a foot over the other adds an extra twist to the body. Oops, this newcomer just twisted her ankle. I guess I won't be jumpin' off curbs and bouncing off walls...just yet.

Skipper Kim from San Francisco has a blog and a website devoted to the subject.

Highlights from Jay Aaron's review of Gene's video can be found here. Then, just click 'On This Page' to go to the article.

P.S. I did find a video on YouTube that shows a very trim Gene!

intersecting milestones...

This past weekend marks another significant milestone -- the 10th anniversary of my stepfather's death. This sweet man had swooped down upon our (in some ways...) dark lives when I was 15. A prince of a man, he was, who redeemed my mother's sorrowful life and brought blessing to us all.

My mother had worked a full time job and a weekend job and occasionally took 'roomers' into our home to make ends meet, post-divorce from my father. There was something very sad about that time, of course. I remember being left alone at night while she and my next older sister went to work. It was sometimes frightening. I would have much preferred going with them and sitting in a corner of 'Ye Olde Hoosier Inn', watching the hordes arrive...dine...depart (the glory years of this now defunct establishment). One night, imagination running wild about who might break in and 'get me', I made my way to the corner of our kitchen and hid, shaking, under the table -- the only place I thought I could have a comprehensive view of someone entering. (Yet, that era did begat imaginative creativity in many, many positive ways...sewing, playing piano, reading, etc, etc... that necessary flow from 'alone time'.)

And then came Maynard on his white horse. Life, in technicolor, he brought with him. He & my mother had over 30 years of loving life together. In the end, his Alzheimer's robbed them both of some pretty important dreams. Pneumonia was his final ticket out. On the day he was moved from the hospital to the facility where he would die the next night, another person's life was rudely interrupted and forever changed.

Even as Fr C was saying prayers at my father's bedside, the St. J's organist's 30+ years of service came to a halt with a literal stroke. Kenneth recovered somewhat, but the next ten years brought new cataclysms and greater challenges to his fragile self. This year, in the same month my father had died, he went into the 'nearer presence of our Lord', with a loving send-off from those whose lives he had touched. I could not be there. From afar, I pondered how I was touched not only by this man's life, but by his impaired life.

Hours after my father's death and our organist's stroke, I hoisted myself onto the St. J's organ bench. And there I sat...and played...and struggled...and learned for ten years. And, thereby, an undeserved, grace-filled blessing from this 'work' entered my life. This journey was shared with amazing musicians and friends -- and even sweet, laughing children who came up post-service to try out the keys and offer gifts of artwork and hugs!

The 'one degree of separation' between these two men who had never met, who shared suffering on the same day, has facets that defy mere human understanding. Together, they do embroider the spirit within and around the many they touched.

I've already remembered...given thanks... during this, the January anniversary my stepfather's walk into the Light of God. I had carried with me the sadness of having wanted to be with him the night he died, but didn't. Knowing only his death was generically imminent, I went home to rest before rising to play at church. I recently found out that my oldest sister had gone over to stay with him -- with his body -- just after he died. That speaks the peace I had been seeking.

Holy Maynard, Holy Kenneth, pray for us.

Recently, a playful internet search of Maynard's complete name brought up an out-of-print book that mentions my stepfather twice. As a nurse then -- and also a manager of a doctor's practice -- his kindness made an impression on the author, a fledgling nurse . Fortunately, I found a copy of this book to send to my Mother.

a pre-december 2007 *wish*...

What I wish +JDS had written to +KJS.

Hmmm...

What I wish +KJS had written to +JDS.

OH: What I wish +JDS/+KJS had simultaneously found so inspiring that they had to pick up the phone and plot together.

+J/+K: I had an impulse to call you today. Not entirely sure why...but it seems to be prompted by the Holy Spirit.

Contacting you has been on my heart also. An unlikely scenario has been playing through my mind. It would involve us taking on a work of grace together.

My heart has been strangely prepared for the possibility of this. Recently, I've been meditating on Philippians, chapter two -- specifically the verse that refers to humbly regarding other better than yourselves.

Unbelieveable. I also have been pondering this verse in my heart and have felt called to specifically consider those 'others' as being from a group that I consider misled or just plain wrong. Or even, and perhaps more especially, you!

I agree! I've had a growing concern for the sheep on the edges -- the ones in our respective flocks we are working and praying for...the ones we are acting to protect and nurture in the name and cause of the gospel of our Lord.

There is great woundedness out there. I see sorrow and fear; even anger and indignation. Many are in pain and feel persecuted, belittled, and misunderstood by the other side. I believe the Spirit can heal all this, regardless of any essential or even remaining differences between them.

I share that act of faith.

So...what if we were to focus on them together unlikely act of service -- temporarily laying aside our regular responsibilities, along with any important crusades for what is right, and instead take on a shared role of service to those most marginalized and suffering?

I've thought along the same lines. This may sound outrageous, and even impossible, but we know all is possible in our Lord: What if we went on a journey together around the country, humbly regarding these weak as better than ourselves and...well, what better way to do this than by washing the feet of those who are in need?

Excellent! I'm convinced that our Lord has laid this upon our hearts. I can almost see us dressed in our servant roles, without any indication of our ecclesiastical stature -- would that we could show up in robes and sandals!

...stopping in with our bowl and towels...

...taking turns washing and drying...

...serving in blessing...

...blessing in serving...

Some may be hurt and angry and wary of being served by 'the other side'.

Then I will be honored to step aside and humbly offer prayers silently while you serve.

And I will do the same for you. Why don't we come up with lists of those most in need to start with?

It would please me to first visit ones you are most concerned for.

Thank you. And then we'll continue by stopping in and serving some of your sheep and continue to zigzag our way across the country. And what if we meet people along the way that are outside of our collective fold, but want to be served by us?

Then, of course, we will do so with ministering hearts overflowing with love and grace...seeing Jesus in them.

Perhaps at some point maybe we won't even need our bowl of water...

...but could wash their feet with our tears.

(together): "Well, it seems we are of the same mind. May I wash your feet first?"

malcolm guite and mystical sake...

Malcolm Guite oh so very kindly stopped in today. Rather an epiphany...a generous shining. Ah, grace...

Today's post was to be entitled "mozart...mozart...and then, mozart! mozart! mozart!!!" But, this is for Malcolm. I'm wondering if the Spirit that breathes upon poetic waters was/is the root of a distinctive presence -- a mysterious renewal, really -- that I felt a week ago.

The semester's Grace symphonic chorus project is the Mozart Requiem. The accompanist asked if I would fill in for her at the first rehearsal this past Monday. Sure, I said...amid trepidations of orchestral reduction reality checks. Then, the conductor asked if I would sub for him, as he went off to N.Y. for an audition. Why, Sure...

Not Brahms, Berg, Chopin, or Rachmaninoff. Mozart. Wow. Perhaps it's the prayers that sustain this place that whispered to me, 'Prepare". So, I spent time with the score - mostly the opening movement...marking themes...relishing them...admiring them. Internalizing them. Then, on to 'motifs'...and more of the same, admiring, relishing... In the end, it all came out well. The alums of the group were strong -- they sang it three years ago. For the student cohort, it might have been the first requiem ever (there's much to offer, beckon, embrace there - but they'll discover that). Yes, it went well.

Throughout the process, the prevailing spirit in my soul was one of wonder...of 'other'. Of timelessness. Of 'beyond'. These, from beginning to end, were a part of a unique epiphany: a connection with...a palpable sharing of...creation at Mozart's hand and of God's inspiration. I found myself calculating the 'mere' generations of separation (single digits, perhaps) that connect a work's premiere and a resurrection experience in the 21st century.

Later that week, a Grace violinist left a Mozart Sonatas book in my box. It plays vaguely familiar. A previous accompanist's life? Again, the Spirit glides over the waters. I rest in it.

This past Sunday, the much-larger-city Philharmonic chamber group came to Wonderful W for a concert. Actually, a rescheduling of their usual December visit (snowed out). T.V. says, with both dismay and amusement, "They usual dumb down for us" (totally unnecessary for this cultured crowd!). But they can't do Christmas music now. Nope. It's Mozart! (Eine Kleine...), Mozart! (piano concerto). Mozart! (Jupiter Symphony). Wow.

I prefer concert variety. But, this is an epiphany season. And, in such, of such, is a manifestation, an obligatory covering of glory. I take it, with gratitude.

The circle of blessing continues. Read and relish, Malcolm Guite's poem, Mozart at Greenbelt.

It was not lost on us that, as this concert ended, another one on the west coast was being prepared for at St. J's: furniture moved, musicians arriving, conductor's baton guiding the group as they glide through their second and final rehearsal for an event that evening -- the first of this year's 7th annual series of three. Sounds of John Rutter...of world class clarinetist Patricia Shands on Finzi (Here, you may read about one of her other performances. I am listening to the Presto as I write. Wow!).

Many thanks to T&S M for the Moonstone Sake accompaniment to this moment.

big flakes...

Big flakes. That's how we define wonder in Snowland. We've had some in recent days. But nothing to match the magical saturation of such as the calendar turned a page into a new year.

New Year's Eve began with innocent fun on the pond. In the morning, the neighborhood ice hockey youth scraped off the thin layer of nighttime icy snow from their rink on the south end. It was beautiful: nice and square, with two goals marking the victory spots. Next to us, young-family-on-the-pond were putting on their skates. For their youngest child -- this was obviously a first. She couldn't control her blades even while sitting on the edge of the dock. Adorable! Soon the family unit was gliding and sliding around the ice, their numbers extended by visiting relatives. Afternoon brought other skaters to the frozen surface. Traversing the full circle of the pond, they had to duck at the bridge each time they completed a lap. I'm wishing for stronger ankles.

Then the drama began. Late afternoon, Fr. C and I made a dash to Much-Larger-City for a little electronics run. The helpful employee asked if it was snowing yet. Hmmm...this took us by surprise. We laughed at the light dusting as we drove off to find a quick dinner before the 45 minute drive home.

But later, it was NOT a happy drive back to Wonderful W. Does it count as a blizzard if large fluffy flakes blow angrily into your windshield, negatively affecting crucial visibility? This Californian thinks so. The driver searched for signs of tracks from other vehicles (if you can actually follow the snow plow, so much the better). The state highway was nearly deserted, and rightly so. So were the parking lots of eating and drinking establishments in our town as we finally drove in. Those who had New Year's Eve plans obviously found themselves with a sudden change in such.


The storm persisted over the next few days. It snowed...and snowed...and snowed some more, eventually turning into one of those 'once in quite some years' kind of white beauty all around -- the effect my mother paid dear money for when she had our Christmas tree flocked each year: Fluffy snow with a kind of thick heaviness that defied gravity, everywhere you look. Though there was a plethora of huge fir trees with floppy branches weighed down by white glory, my gaze and heart (and camera) were transfixed by the sculptured bare trees which sported inches thick frosting on their branches. Even the power lines were impressively and inversely laden with inches of snow on top. A close up view from the dining room window gives the impression of 'air snow-tunneling' - an inverse, above-ground, white equivalent of what moles are doing in the dark underground.

Then the rains came and all melted -- creating flooding as overloaded streams and rivers join with others. Muddy. Dull. Cold. Not entirely unlike the central California Valley in the grip of winter -- including the flooding part, which is unlikely there, but struck them recently. As the waters generally recede here, some will not have an escape route and are preserved, freezing in place as we speak, until spring (or earlier if global warming shows its face).

As of Tuesday, some big flakes were sighted. The pond - which had completely thawed and was rippling like a summer lake with highs in the 50's - is freezing around the edges. Bring on the snow, ice, freezing temperatures. Please. Oh yes, and the pond ice hockey.

Been toying with this post for a while. Now, as I truly 'post', we have record-setting lows. I'm not sure if it is because it came on so suddenly. But, rather than the usual opaque, ice-cube look, the frozen pond looks dark, ominous...with a sheen that perhaps comes from being wind-scoured during its freeze. You can really sense a menacing depth which bears no actual connection to the innocence of this shallow and sweet place. If I had taken the pic below a bit earlier in the day, there would be no blue in it at all, but only black.

RWO...RIP...

A post-midnight email from California on New Year's Eve bore the not entirely unexpected news of my father's death.

This was a man I truly did not know well, but whose shadow affected me deeply through the suffering of my mother...though his 'mistake' was redeemed many-fold in the lives of both of them through succeeding, blessed marriages. He was essentially out of my life way before my age got into double digits (i was the youngest of four daughters); and, before that, he was, to my young mind, an 'impresent' presence, traveling up and down the central valley, plying his cattle-related veterinary business.

But I came to know of him more completely in recent years, through updates from a California sister who, along with other family members, lovingly and respectfully has cared for him during the challenging six years prior to his death. She is known as a 'Buddhist Quaker', and undoubtedly both those edges defined and shaped her lovely actions.

In between those poles of time & experience, of my growing up & his dying, there was a slightly awkward re-entry into a somewhat shared life which began when he called me over 25 years ago. I had a father already - a stepfather. My children had a grandfather already - one who shared, lovingly and creatively, a giddy life of grandchildren joy with my mother. Yet, my father came as a quiet, gentle stranger into our lives and will be remembered not for tragedy and mis-steps, but for that very gentleness along with a lifetime love of music and its practice.

For this man who became a libertarian and an atheist soon after he left us...but who still remembered every tenor part to every hymn from his youth and sang such loudly as my sister played piano in his nursing home-away-from home ...my sister left 'How Great Thou Art' looping on the CD player at his bedside the night that he was to die. It played for quite some time before, during, and after his death.

That night, certainly some time around the actual moment of passing, Fr. C had a dream...of playing How Great Thou Art on the piano. In that dream, folks were singing. But, at some point, he started improvising and losing himself in it. And voices grew quiet.

But at the finish, they joined once again in song.

As he watched S2 play, the embroidered 'RWO' is barely visible on his sleeve
during a visit to us in Oregon oh so long ago...

epiphany of beauty: they still gives me shivers...

The untimely death of Christopher Bowman ('Bowman the Showman') just came up in Yahoo news. A google image search on him - his brilliant career and all too short life - led to further searching (as it always does with google, eh?), and landed where art begins and ends: heart-shaking videos of the all-time greats, Torvill & Dean. I still weep with wonder and gratitude for them.

Their perfect scores in the Olympics of 1984 ('Bolero') remains at the top even now, despite their magnetic tide pull on all wanna-be's to their altar of style and originality over the years. But today it is their 1984 paso doble that makes my soul hold its breath. It is one of several required dances in the Olympics - 'compulsory', with prescribed steps and rhythmic precision providing a platform for the pair's creativity. Torvill & Dean set the standard with this one. So: Enter Christopher as matador. And Jayne as cape...with inherent possibilities for twirling, throwing, dragging...and (for her) draping. Despite its 'age'...Breathtaking.



Some other (more recent) high points out of their myriad: Oscar Tango. And Sarabande (a collaboration with Yo-Yo Ma). YouTube has many others, including their interpretations of Dave Brubeck's Take Five, John Lennon's Revolution paired with Imagine, and even Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend.

it's epiphany...

...with manifestations & insights...spiritual & artistic...life & beyond...remembering Louisiana excess in the form of king cake, parades, and general obligatory partying...now embracing epiphanies in all colors and dances...