Writing Music

Over the years, I've had periods when I've paid attention to the music I often have on VERY quietly while writing, and periods when I have not. There was a nice time long ago, when I had Fiona Apple and Bowie's Hours on random mix, that worked curiously well.

Of late, it's been seventies easy/funky rock - Gerry Rafferty, Atlanta Rhythm Section, that sort of thing. This is among the many kinds of music I grew up on, but not exactly because it was anyone's "thing" particularly. It's good stuff, often really good stuff (not quite the white bread same thing, but another groove I really love - Bill Withers' Ain't No Sunshine, or just about any track of his).

Something about the buzzing funk but the soft rock goes-down-easy-ness of this music really works for me creatively. It reverts me out of the present time, almost firmly taking me out of my own head and sitting me down with a rhythm that can be dramatic, but also comes to the calling. It's easy and crunchy at once - the echoing rasp of "Driver's Seat" opening up a space for my creativity to work - or the infectious but gentle "Couldn't Get it Right" bouncing my brain along.

For the writers amongst my readers - or just for those who like to work with music propelling their time along, especially the work days - what is the soundtrack of your productivity?

Collection

Just two mourning posts today.  I've got a post archived, but this just is not the time.

For anyone in reach, the Met has an exhibition of mourning gowns of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.  I would love to see this, but though I'm on the correct coast, "in reach" just now has a proportion that keeps this event off my social calendar.

Pour La Victoire, always meticulous and fascinating, with copious detail photos, also has a look at just one mourning gown, but a fascinating look it is.  In this case, too, the comments add to the post.  Take a look at a rare and endangered silk dress, circa 1867.

Confirmation

I had wanted to write about my confirmation in the church this past Sunday, but seem to have let myself get distracted.  It's the sort of thing you want to think of as important, but "no big thing" in the sense of epochal personal development - sometimes, it's too hard to contemplate the magnitude of the spiritual, and for me it is just too presumptuous.  It is hard enough for me to give myself up to guidance.  Harder still, when the power of my own emotional experience asserts itself - and my emotional assertion tends to take the form of attempts to control my life.

When I started to look for a church (my gracious, it'll be three years ago in spring), I was on guard against exactly the emotional experience I think some people hope for in this sort of a search.  Being a drama queen, I found I wanted something else to take me where I needed to be, rather than to turn this into A Very Special Episode in the mental narrative I tell myself as the story of my life.  In the end, it was fellowship and prayer which  bound me to my congregation, and the beauty and sense of comfort I felt in our sanctuary.

When the search for a leader yielded the Priest In Charge, getting to know her, I felt the blessing of her coming, and have been as grateful to know her as if I had been a "real" member of the church family.  So "getting my papers" now, so to speak, it is like a confirmation of something more than simple congregational validity.  And, to my honor, I was blessed by our Bishop on the same day she herself was named Rector.  We get to keep her; the ministry is hers, and that is wonderful.

Against those early wishes against being dramatically swept up in the moment, on Sunday I did feel a bit of that impulse.  The bishop's hands on my head as he prayed over me - a sensation I will remember, clearly.  And he meant it to be memorable - his hands were firm and direct, not avoiding really touching me.  His fingers moved, his pressure wasn't impersonal.

It was a little hard, this high-churchy-ness, on my mom.  A lifelong Baptist, there is a mild sense of her giving me over to another team, and as much as she wanted me to find a church home, she did hope I would find one more familiar to her.  The maternal dynamic of confusion at a child's rebellion was in play.  But she was there for me; as was a friend, my dear and generous B.  When the service was over, I got a "mazel tov" from her - and then from the priest.

Another step, and a blessing both in the religious, AND in the personal sense.  I am confirmed.  It feels good.

Happy New Year

Oh, my achin' back ...  *Grin*

I do enjoy Christmas decorations, and the holiday was REALLY lovely - nice time in my own home this year, just me mom and her husband - but me oh my, how I do love how big and clean and bright the house seems for New Year's when I take it all down again.  It wasn't up long this year, scarcely over two weeks.  But today I finally got a huge new piece of furniture brought into the house.  Today all the dismantled tree bits, and boxes of ornaments, and standalone knickknacks are all stowed.

Today the house is very much lighter and more open.  Larger and spacious - even with a huge new piece in the dining room.  Today the stress of moving that, and all the picking up is done.

Tomorrow, I return the furniture dollies.  Tomorrow, I go to the grocery for a few very special ingredients.  Tomorrow, I will observe my New Year's rite - and worship - and dust and scrub the small stuff.

Tomorrow, the decks will be clear, the work of 2011 done - and I will be loaded and ready to fire away for 2012.

Love Never Dies

I stole my headline (minus the "true" - I'm making an Apoptygma Berzerk reference) from HFO, where I found this link, but honestly, this seems less romantic to me than just sort of fascinating.  I am intrigued by the story, and the unknowable - but not actually goopy about how nifty it is to die with a lover.  I just want to be holding hands when I'm an old lady.  My corpse I'll probably have 'em burn or something.  (As mom says, after all - I'm single and childless, and there's nobody who'll ever want to come to see me after I'm dead.  Thanks again, mom.  Heh.)