Posts Tagged ‘inspiration’
Lifting Spirits
Amid the glut of dramatic economic distress and virus fears in the news every minute, there continue to appear glimmers of calm and inspiration. I can’t add any words to enhance the wonderful a cappella collection of student voices from Rome singing a Crosby, Stills, & Nash song that has been in my repertoire since the early days of my acquiring an acoustic guitar. They deserve your full attention.
Hat tip to Howard Rheingold for pointing me to this gem.
Claim a few minutes from the calamities of your day to sit and enjoy this. It is a worthy distraction.
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I’m going to find it difficult to sing this song alone from now on after having watched them.
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Celebrating MacPhail
Last night we met Cyndie’s parents downtown in Minneapolis again, this time at MacPhail Center for Music, where our daughter, Elysa, is Manager of Student Services. It was MacPhail’s annual appreciation dinner for supporters, which included a couple of award presentations and showcased some incredible student musician performances.
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Board members even showed off their singing chops with an enthusiastic rendition of a holiday classic, to which I’ve already lost the memory of the title. Student music performances included a group of harpists, an electronically enhanced cello and flute duet, a pair of powerful young singers with opera voices, a demonstration of a typical group lesson for beginning young cellists, and a smooth couple of songs from their Dakota Jazz Combo ensemble.
I’m a little biased, but the highlight for me was visiting Elysa’s office while we were there and seeing that she has Beatles figures staged in her bookshelf. It was also a treat to witness a glimpse of her workplace in action and meet some of the people she works among.
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One additional surprise bonus was the unlikely chance sighting of a fellow Tour of Minnesota cyclist, John Toomey, who also happens to be a MacPhail student and often uses rehearsal space there. What are the odds we would cross paths in the short time we both happened to coincidentally be near the main entry last night? I would say, long.
We are proud of Elysa’s many years of contributing to the success of an organization that is improving the world via music, “transforming lives and strengthening communities through exceptional music learning experiences that inspire.”
It certainly inspired me, providing hope that good will triumph over evil from the transformations MacPhail is producing in so many lives.
Music makes the world go ’round, and MacPhail is making sure the world will keep spinning.
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Fine Love
I was clinging to life yesterday, what with an intermittent drippy nose and a congestion headache invading my otherwise stellar health, and from beneath my snuggly blanket, I kept hearing lyrics from a John Hiatt song, over and over in my head.
I’ve seen an angel or two before
but I never asked one to be my wife
Cyndie and I have taken turns caring for each other over the years, and when it’s my turn to be the patient, Cyndie becomes an angel of mercy for me.
She took this picture yesterday morning that gives the impression of some kind of energy emanating from our barn. I expect it is a couple of dissolving jet contrails that painted the morning sky in such dramatic fashion, but I’m happy to imagine that it means something about our place.
Love is one of the pillars by which we live our lives, and it continues to inspire our imaginings of what might be possible on our precious property in the rural countryside. The last few years have been a struggle, in a variety of unrelated ways, not the least of which was the passing of our herd-leading horse, Legacy.
The ongoing painful dysfunction of our government that for over two years has been providing a daily scourge of depressing results hasn’t helped, either.
Cyndie and I are in a bit of a holding pattern as to what comes next. It was a response to her discoveries working with horses, and our time spent with Ian in Portugal that brought us to this property. I was happy to join her in this adventure to unknown possibilities.
Back to John Hiatt’s song…
I left my map way back there baby
I don’t know where we are
But I’m gonna pull my pony up
Hitch my wagon to your star
“Real Fine Love” Written by: JOHN HIATT Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
I’m not sure what comes next, but it seems to me that it would likely have a focus that emanates from that barn.
Whatever it is, it will be infused with a real fine love.
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Trail Inspirations
After a second visit on Saturday for pure maple syrup and pancakes, Cyndie enlisted the artistic energies of visiting Williams girls, Ella and Sarah, to decorate some of the new blocks before we placed them on the trail.
It’s a bit of a shame that their designs will all too quickly be subject to the abuses of plodding muddy boots and paws, but that won’t stop the creative exclamations from still offering glimpses of inspiration to passersby.
The 60 new blocks paved another 8.5 feet of sloppy trail, but we’re still going to need a lot more pallets if we want to cover the length of perpetually wet ground down there.
The picture I used yesterday to show the blocks on the trail was from October of 2016. Yesterday, Cyndie took a picture with the newest blocks in the foreground, which is actually viewing in the opposite direction from the first image.
It’s not an exact comparison, but I like seeing one next to the other.
Can you see how far in the distance the old blocks run in the picture on the right?
2016
2018
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Reminds me a little of the yellow brick road. Oh my!
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