Two tired feet and two kinds of gumbo (one with regular sausage and one with deer sausage, if you must know! It was delicious, if I do say so myself.)...
Three scary trees
(seriously, these trees give me the creeps, they are weird-looking)
You're gonna either love this, or you're gonna think I have flipped my ever-loving mind. I'm really not a "with-it" kind of woman when it comes to young people's music (horrors!). I much prefer my oldies! But I have heard of the band Cold Play, and somewhere along the line, I have heard their version of this song* (I may live in medium-town Louisiana, but I don't live totally under a rock!). I've watched this video several times and something about it moves me every time.
This is part of the explanatory blurb from the group's website: The current performers in Young at Heart range in age from 73 to 92. There are some with prior professional theater or music experience, others who have performed extensively on the amateur level, and some who never stepped onto a stage before turning eighty. None of the current performers of Y@H were part of the original group that formed in 1982, but they have kept alive the spirit of the early pioneers and continue to push the group into glorious new directions.
*UPDATE: I have since learned that it was the very cool Ayekah who sent me the link to Cold Play's original version of this song.
It will be an uphill climb, but I know the path will be illuminated, even if only one or two steps at a time. And I am grateful.
(I will update when there is something to tell. We are still looking at rehab opportunities, and one of us is still bemoaning the fact that we are zooming in on a two year program. I believe something like that is what he needs, pray that he begins to believe it too, and if given the opportunity, will enter the program with hope intact and a positive attitude.)
I have not written about it, but my son has been incarcerated for several months now. We had gotten him out and about a month after that he got in trouble again. When we got him out the first time, the judge and I both told him if he got into any more trouble, he would have to sit in jail until his court date.
Thanksgiving was hard for me. And Christmas was looking even harder. We have an appointment with the DA on Monday to talk to him about some possibilities for getting my son some help. I have been fretting over the fact that he was going to be locked up for Christmas and was thinking we could maybe get him out and have him sent to rehab soon after Christmas.
But this past week, an incident occurred which reminded me of how fragile and elusive success is when you are dealing with addiction. We had a young man working for us from a local halfway house and he did not make it into work on Thursday. The people in charge called from the halfway house to tell us that he and three others had tested positive for drugs. We could not believe it. This young man had been counting up the months till he could get out. Now he goes straight back to jail and he loses his good behavior time so he will be serving a longer sentence. I think we could bail my son out and have him home for Christmas, I think the DA is shocked that we have not done so. And sometimes, it feels cruel to leave him in there when we could get him out and bring him home. But lately, I have had the feeling that what my son needs is more time to wait and figure out that this is his problem and he has t o devote himself to helping himself. I can't do it for him.
I have been trying to encourage him and to remind him of his progress (he has been working on preparing for his GED test and has made great improvements). It is so hard sometimes to know what to do. It hurts to visit him once a week and not be able to touch him or hug him. It's very hard to think of him being in there over the Christmas holidays. But these thoughts have come to me, thoughts of Advent in jail, and waiting in darkness, thoughts that maybe that is how it needs to be, as hard as that is to accept. There are no easy answers.
And maybe I need to deliberately and consciously quiet myself and wait with expectation, as hard as that is to accept.
Does that make any sense whatsoever? As far as my son (and I) are concerned, does it make sense that I should consider this a time of waiting in darkness for the light to come and shine, in particular for my son? Isn't that a part of the task of Advent, waiting for God to show up in the darkness? Could I dare trust that this is a season pregnant with hope, that my son might suffer the darkness of a jail cell in this wonderful season and might emerge with a greater appreciation and a stronger desire for life in the Light?
I had this terrible dream one night that some sympathetic souls had bailed him out and they did not know his problem and when they found out, they were trying to call to let me know he was out and on his way to get drugs, but I almost did not get the phone call because the caller was not sure of my name and we thought it was a prank call. I awoke in a panic with my thoughts set on running to rescue him, and then I thought, I wonder if he is angry at us for not getting him out of that terrible place? Oh my God, the agony. May God's protective hand remain upon my son's shoulder.
(I am not that short, she is just tall. What can I say? She ate dirt as a kid, I did not, and it obviously stunted my growth!)
She lives within walking distance of Galveston Bay. I was taking photos of my youngest daughter and her boyfriend and asked youngest to get a photo of my sister and I. The original photo had trees and a handicapped parking sign that I edited out. I was thinking of doing something with this for her for Christmas or her February birthday (my mom would probably like one too. Hmmm, two gifts with one stone. That's always a bargain!), but when I printed it, I saw that I did not leave enough border on the edges and the type runs too close to the edges. So that means if I am going to print the darn thing, I will have to do all the Photoshop work over again, once again taking out those silly background distractions, which is a tedious job. Yeah, well, I will get it done right, eventually. But probably not while it is still called Today.
However, that is one of my hopes for the year to come, to be more aware of the value of each "Today" and to use them more fully, whatever my circumstances are. I have fallen into a bad habit of "waa-waa-ing" and have been letting too many days slip through my fingers. Since the majority of my days have already been spent, I would like to use the rest of them to the fullest degree possible.
Today. Right now. Right this instant. It is all we really have.
I am in a slump of sorts. I can't seem to think of anything of substance to write about so here are more pictures.
Though I am somewhat like my mother who loves to peruse old cemeteries, it was SpookyRach over atSkewed View, who influenced my fascination with taking cemetery photos. Here are a few from cemeteries on Barbados and one from St. Lucia...
I did not hear nature stand up and say anything at all to the world, frankly, but I do sometimes wish my own elements were a little better mixed.
You go down steps to get to the door of this vault. I don't kn0w why I did not think to get a photo of the steps themselves (probably because I was worried about hurrying up and getting back to the bus, because the driver make it quite clear he had no qualms about leaving us if we were late.)
This door looks mighty thin to get a casket through. Notice the ocean in the background. They have a lovely view!
The pink and black theme of this one reminds me of a fifties kitchen or bathroom!
One Christmas Eve service....
Two tired feet and two kinds of gumbo (one with regular sausage and one with deer sausage, if you must know! It was delicious, if I do say so myself.)...
Three scary trees
It will be an uphill climb, but I know the path will be illuminated, even if only one or two steps at a time. And I am grateful.
The keeper of the blog slipped up and forgot her second blogaversary!
She lives within walking distance of Galveston Bay. I was taking photos of my youngest daughter and her boyfriend and asked youngest to get a photo of my sister and I. The original photo had trees and a handicapped parking sign that I edited out. I was thinking of doing something with this for her for Christmas or her February birthday (my mom would probably like one too. Hmmm, two gifts with one stone. That's always a bargain!), but when I printed it, I saw that I did not leave enough border on the edges and the type runs too close to the edges. So that means if I am going to print the darn thing, I will have to do all the Photoshop work over again, once again taking out those silly background distractions, which is a tedious job. Yeah, well, I will get it done right, eventually. But probably not while it is still called Today.
I did not hear nature stand up and say anything at all to the world, frankly, but I do sometimes wish my own elements were a little better mixed.
You go down steps to get to the door of this vault. I don't kn0w why I did not think to get a photo of the steps themselves (probably because I was worried about hurrying up and getting back to the bus, because the driver make it quite clear he had no qualms about leaving us if we were late.)
This door looks mighty thin to get a casket through. Notice the ocean in the background. They have a lovely view!
The pink and black theme of this one reminds me of a fifties kitchen or bathroom!