Hanging in there, part ii

A song that has comforted me for many years is "Turning Toward the Morning" by Gordon Bok.  Now the words of the song seem more appropriate than ever before.

Turning Toward the Morning

(Gordon Bok)

When the deer has bedded down
And the bear has gone to ground,
And the northern goose has wandered off
To warmer bay and sound,
It's so easy in the cold to feel
The darkness of the year
And the heart is growing lonely
For the morning

Oh, my Joanie, don't you know
That the stars are swinging slow,
And the seas are rolling easy
As they did so long ago?
If I had a thing to give you,
I would tell you one more time
That the world is always turning
Toward the morning.

Now October's growing thin
And November's coming home;
You'll be thinking of the season
And the sad things that you've seen,
And you hear that old wind walking,
Hear him singing high and thin,
You could swear he's out there singing
Of your sorrow.

When the darkness falls around you
And the Northwind come to blow,
And you hear him call you name out
As he walks the brittle snow:
That old wind don't mean you trouble,
He don't care or even know,
He's just walking down the darkness
Toward the morning.

It's a pity we don't know
What the little flowers know.
They can't face the cold November
They can't take the wind and snow:
They put their glories all behind them,
Bow their heads and let it go,
But you know they'll be there shining
In the morning.

Now, my Joanie, don't you know
That the days are rolling slow,
And the winter's walking easy,
As he did so long ago?
And, if that wind would come and ask you,
"Why's my Joanie weeping so?"
Won't you tell him that you're weeping
For the morning?

Oh, my Joanie, don't you know
That the stars are swinging slow,
And the seas are rolling easy
As they did so long ago?
If I had a thing to give you,
I would tell you one more time
That the world is always turning
Toward the morning.
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Recorded by Bok, Trickett and Muir on "Turning Toward the
Morning", FSI-56, copyright 1975.

"One of the things that provoked this song was a letter last
November from a friend who had had a very difficult year and was
looking for the courage to keep on plowing into it. Those times,
you lift your eyes unto the hills, as they say, but the hills of
Northern New England in November can be about as much comfort as
a cold crowbar. You have to look ahead a bit, then, and realize
that all the hills and trees and flowers will still be there come
Spring, usually more permanent than your troubles. And if your
courage occasionally fails, that's okay, too: nobody expects you
to be as strong (or as old) as the land." - Gordon Bok

I am waiting for the morning.

Joanie

My New Toy

My sweetie has been ill and I did not expect a birthday gift from him, as he has been unable to get out of the house, except for medical appointments, for a couple of months.  But today a box arrived, and it turned out that it was a birthday gift for me.  It seems he had given money to my son and one of his daughters to get together and come up with a gift for me, and they came up with a doozie:

If you don't recognize it, don't feel bad -- it's not something you see very often today.  It is a "lap steel guitar" made by Fender probably in the 1950s.  I have never played one before, but thanks to the internet there is lots of information available.  I tuned it based on instructions I found online and experimented with it, strumming some chords and singing along, but plan to purchase an instruction book.  At my "advanced" age, I don't want to waste time trying to learn it on my own, as I did with other instruments I learned to play at an earlier age (much earlier, actually).

Wasn't this a wonderful surprise?

Joanie

Living with Music

As long as I can remember, there was music around our house. In my early years, we had no tv, and we often sang and played in the evenings. And there was the music at church. Daddy sang in the choir and would take me to sit with him when I was quite little. He taught me to play piano by ear before I ever started formal lessons. Harmonizing came easy to me and I sang alto in the choir as soon as I was old enough.

Mother and Daddy had played in a Lutheran church orchestra before they married, and often they would play together some of those songs. My favorite was "Bye Bye Blackbird." The photo above, taken before I was born, shows Mother holding another instrument but I never heard her play anything but piano and organ. I have the little mandolin on the ground next to Mother, but I only learned to play one song on it.

During the 1930s Daddy played in this orchestra. He is one of the saxophone players shown in this picture that appeared in a local newspaper. He was self taught and could sight transpose to any key.













All of my grandmothers four brothers played music. Two of them are featured here. The picture above shows them in their latter years; Lonie is on the left and Lando on the right. In the second photo, they are shown as they appeared sometime in the early 1900s with Lando on the left and Lonie on the right. I loved to hear them play the old fiddle and banjo tunes and I believe this is what triggered my love of "the high lonesome sound."



I have been fortunate to have many musician friends in my lifetime. One of my most enduring friends is Barbara. We met sometime around 1975 and immediately became friends. She is a soprano and I am an alto, and we began singing and playing together. This photo shows us at the old Birchmere when it was in Arlington VA, performing at "open mike." After all these years, we still get together whenever we can, to talk and reminisce and, of course, sing. She now plays the appalachian dulcimer and I mostly play the autoharp. Sharing music and friendship with her has been one of the great riches of my life.