Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.


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Lost in the music

Tonight was my first concert in a very long time.  The first time in years that I was sitting in the band rather than out in the audience.  It’s heaven.  I wish everyone could have the experience of being in the music; to hear the sounds as they’re being created before the notes head out over the heads of the audience.

This was our “Spooktacular” concert filled with scary music about snakes and magic and phantoms.  In fact we had our very own phantom, a tenor with a beautifully powerful voice, who sang music from Phantom of the Opera while we accompanied him.  He was singing about 18 inches from where I sat, and on a couple of occasions during the long piece of music I actually stopped playing, mesmerized by the power of his voice.

I didn’t want that piece of music to end, because when again will I be surrounded by sounds so exquisite, be so close to a voice like that?  I was treasuring it while it was happening, enjoying the full-up feeling of being totally happy, glad to be in the moment.

I said before that if everyone could play music, either alone, or with large groups, if everyone could get that special high from making something beautiful, if everyone in the world could create something, something so elusive, so transparent, so temporary, but so solid and powerful, if everyone could make music the world would be better.  I still believe that.

Wishing each of you days filled with wonder, music and art.  It can’t hurt.


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Forever peaceful

A last bit of story from our trip up north.  As we were leaving Grindstone City, way back on a dirt road we passed this:

It was a beautiful little hill with a family plot, all fenced in with obvious care.

We climbed the hill and quietly explored.  It was beautiful.  Maple trees were in full color, there was no sound except for birds and chipmunks.

We wandered about, reading the headstones, piecing together the family histories.  One stone caught my attention; a small unassuming stone of a little boy who was born and died the year I was born.  Next to him were his parents, who died many years later.

I stopped a moment and thought back to all the things I’ve done in my life.  While I was walking to kindergarten in my “milk money” dress, the one with pockets to carry the nickle for the week’s milk, this little boy was resting here.  When I graduated from high school, learned to drive a car,  went off to college, he was still here…when I bought my first house, got married, changed jobs, traveled…well…he was up on this beautiful little knoll.

For whatever reason I connected with this little boy who missed out on so much.  He should be about ready to retire now, he should have stories to tell his grandchildren.  He should be peacefully sitting on a porch somewhere, listening to the birds and chipmunks.

When things get hectic and crazy and when I’m overwhelmed and tired all I have to think about is a little boy forever peaceful up there on that knoll, and I’ll know that I’m the lucky one.

Peaceful or not, I’m the lucky one.


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Katie and the weave poles

I think some of you need a Katie fix.  Just because you haven’t seen her in a week doesn’t mean she hasn’t been doing her homework.

We’re working on weaves out in the backyard.

She’s got the general idea, the weaving in and out.

It’s just those darn entries that are difficult.  So hard to remember where to start Mom!

I’m using her frisbee as the “treat” at the end of the weaves.  Sometimes she gets so excited getting ready to run that she pops out one weave too early.

We’re working on it.


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Grindstone City

I bet you all know that Michigan is shaped like a mitten, but did you know there is a grindstone cemetery of sorts at the tip of the thumb?  Grindstone City was named in 1870 for the large grindstones that were mined and shaped there, then shipped throughout the country.  You can read more about the city in this short historical essay. (The picture above was borrowed from this website)

As a youngster I stood with my Dad along the shore of Lake Huron at the tip of Michigan’s thumb among huge grindstones that had been dumped there years and years ago.  I’ve held this vague memory for decades, and last weekend I stood in the same place again, feeling Dad with me, as my husband and I explored  the shoreline until we found the grindstones.

It amazed me that the grindstones were still resting on the shore much the way I remembered.  To think they’ve been there all these years…that I didn’t know exactly where we’d been more than 40 years ago and yet here I was again feeling the same sense of history and wonder I’d had as a kid.

I walked among the grindstones, touching the rough surfaces, the square holes in the centers, thinking about the people who had made these stones, and wondering about the reasons these particular stones had ended up as defects on the shores of the big lake.

The sun was warm on our shoulders, the water lapped peacefully near our feet, the stones offered up their stories silently.  I could easily have sat on the warm stones imagining history and remembering that trip with my Dad all afternoon.

Just another place that holds a piece of my heart.


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And the answer is…

You’ve all been very patiently waiting to find out what that metal thing was.  I know you’re sitting around at home just aching to find out.  Really you are.

We began our weekend trip in Port Huron, a town on the Eastern coast of Michigan across the river from Canada.  The Blue Water bridge connects the two countries.

Port Huron is also the boyhood home of Thomas Jefferson, something they are very proud of. You can read all about his exploits as a boy in the museum at the train depot under the bridge.

And the thing I found most interesting in the park below the bridge was a lighthouse boat.

The boat was built in 1921 and went out on the Great Lakes to help ships in trouble.  It had a lighthouse on board and the beam could be seen for miles.  It’s a museum now, though we didn’t get to board because it wasn’t open when we were there.

What fascinated me was that there was a small, outboard motor boat sitting on the deck, the little boat so similar in size and shape to the first family boat we had years ago.  I tried to imagine a boat that small out on the big lake, and I just couldn’t imagine it.

So now you know the rest of the story…at least about Port Huron.  There’s much more to show you from our trip last weekend.  And here it’s almost the weekend again!

Stay tuned.


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Do you know what this is?

Can you guess what’s piled up here?

Does this help?

Hmmm…I didn’t think so.  Unless you’re a farmer…or have farming in your family it’s unlikely you’ve got this figured out.  Is that enough of a hint?  No?

During our drive in middle Michigan this past weekend we saw lots of farmers out in the fields bringing in crops and tilling empty fields.  One of Michigan’s exports is sugar.  Can you guess now?

Yes!  That’s a heap of sugar beets!  There’s a sugar processing center for Pioneer Sugar up at Sebewaing which is on the western coast of the thumb of Michigan.  And this was one of the smaller piles there!  There were huge dump trucks filled with sugar beets lined up to dump.  Kind of amazing!

On Sunday morning when we woke and began to pack the car there was a semi truck with a flat bed full of brand new, shiny red and yellow farm equipment parked in the motel parking lot.  I thought the new farm equipment was beautiful.  What do you think?

To me it was sculpture…though I’m sure if anyone saw me taking pictures they’d have thought I was nuts.

Things are pretty straight forward and down to earth in middle Michigan.  Not so much into sculpture I’m thinking.

And you know how I usually give you photos of sunsets over water?  Well…how about a sunset over a corn field?

Just as beautiful, don’t you think?

We saw so many beautiful things, and I have so much to share with you.  It might take me a whole week of posts just to show you what we saw in two days.

Now for your next assignment.  Can you figure out what this is?


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Memorizing sound

This weekend husband and I explored the coast of Lake Huron.  While I have been in love with Lake Michigan my whole life, I have never spent much time near the big lake on the eastern side of our state.  After two short days in and around the vicinity I can see how easy it would be to cheat on my first love.

As we were driving along on assorted “Lakeshore Drives” up the coast I was looking at the homes – some little cabins, some monster estates – and wondering if these people who are so lucky as to wake up to that huge beautiful lake ever take it for granted.  Or if they, like I believe I would, wake up each day in awe and wonder and thankfulness just to be there.

One of my favorite stops this weekend was Tawas State Park, which we walked on the beach for what seemed miles.  There were little spits of sand sticking out into the water, and at the end of one of them, Sunday early afternoon I stood with my eyes shut and memorized the sound of the soft waves lapping at my toes, gurgling around the sand, sliding away.

Today, when I find myself back in my cubicle working on files and making decisions, when the hours grow long and my neck is tired, when my head aches and I’ve adjusted my glasses for the thousandth time, I’ll think of that moment standing on the sand with water all around me.

And in my heart I’ll smile.


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The race not run

I spent last weekend in a small town a couple of hours away at the home of a friend.  Once upon a time I would have called her one of my running buddies…but I haven’t been running in two years so I guess now we’re just regular friends.  Friends who happen to get together for running events.

A year ago she did a half marathon that sounded like a lot of fun and I vowed that by this year I’d be in shape to do it with her.  And I was moving along toward that goal, up to six miles, when I messed up my knee.  So though I was registered to participate in the event this year, after spending most of August and September sitting around with ice on my knee I was in no shape to run.

But I didn’t miss out entirely!  Three of our little band of four actually DID run the half marathon on Sunday.  I went with them to the spaghetti dinner the night before, spent the night at our “runners slumber party” and got up early to see them off the next morning.  Then the husband of one of the runners and I went out to eat breakfast while they ran the race.

Doesn’t seem a bad thing does it!  And it wasn’t.  It was great to see everyone, to talk about old races we had done, to plan some races for the future (because FOR SURE by next year I’ll be back on track!) and generally support each other in our attempts to foil the aging process as we keep active.

The race itself was small, but beautiful. It ran through the streets of a quaint, Norman Rockwell type town for a mile…

…then most of the rest of it was along a rails to trails path that ran past ponds and colorful trees, farms and open fields.

I got to walk some of it, and kept myself busy taking photographs of the beautiful scenery, including the current header picture, as I waited for the front runners to come back by on their out and back race.

So this old runner had a good time, even though I didn’t get to run the race.  Running can be a solitary sport.  Or it can be a sport that brings solitary people together in celebration of good health and friendship.

Great job ladies!  You’re all my heroes!