Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket. Never let it fade away. Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket. Save it for a rainy day. — Perry Como (1957), written by Paul Vance/Lee Pockriss.
[My thoughts from a December evening, a few months ago, during the Geminid Meteor Shower.]
I debated whether I wanted to go outside in the cold again, but I felt moved. Unlike last night, I’d wear a scarf this time, and zip my jacket, and I’d sit, make myself comfortable, in my summer deck chair.
Just what I did.
Clearly, it was starry. The sky was beautiful and the night around me felt wonderful. I was glad I was there.
Less than a minute, and I saw the moving flash to my right…behind the tree branches in my next door neighbor’s yard. Enough to make me gasp. It wasn’t the kind of meteor where you’re not sure you saw it. This was bright and clear, and it arced, fading along the way, to the right. Shooting stars are what they are. A second’s worth of something magical about the universe. Not the kind of magic we see with our imaginations. But the real deal.
I sat and looked to see if there would be more. And the dark sky, with shimmering stars loosely scattered among the tall branches, was more exquisite, I believe, than the meteor itself. The very reason we go outside late, on a cold December night. A pocketful of starlight. I was glad I was there.
Weary. Wasn’t sleeping last night, My soul wandering, It wandered about time, And it scared me a trifle. [It scared me exceedingly.] Couldn’t figure how to place things. What’s real? What belongs with my dreams. Pink chiffon and music, Footsteps … And angel wings.
Sometimes you hear accomplished and celebrated musicians talk about the first chord they learned to play. I’ve heard Paul McCartney talk about when The Beatles only knew three chords. It makes me remember we’re all people. The same basic genes. We all start out the same. How can these musicians remember their first chord? I don’t even remember my first chord. I’m sure it was A, A minor, or C, maybe F, but I don’t really remember my first chord. Maybe E??? E minor? House of the Rising Sun?? No, not House of the Rising Sun. Possibly Blowin’ in the Wind, or Cruel War. Some Peter, Paul & Mary Song.
So maybe there’s still hope for me? Maybe not. I’ve been at this a long time. But there will always be a special place in my heart for guitar chords and picking guitar strums.
For those moments when we as individuals think everyone seems so much better than us, we can remember we all start with an A, an A minor, or a C. Maybe an E. Your first guitar strum. Yeah, just like that. Where I’m heading, I don’t know, but there’s the basic stuff we all had to learn when we start out.
Maybe February is there for these very thoughts. When my physical body is weary, exhausted, and my heart feels heavy…which means, I guess, my eyes feel weighty. Which means what? I feel sad? Sorry? Knowing those deliberate thoughts of encouragement, and visuals of twinkly stars and wintry tall branches, knowing these aren’t enough to re-set my frame of mind.
Maybe perennials need the cold dormant period of winter to find energy for a new spring. Maybe I need February to get through to the other side of my mood.
All the snow has turned to water Christmas days have come and gone Broken toys and faded colors Are all that’s left to linger on
~ John Prine, Souvenirs ~
Souvenirs was my introduction to John Prine. I loved the sound, I loved his words. I love the way it transports my soul to a place many years ago, holds me in a place not so distant, and soothes everything about where I am today.
Those first lines of the song sound like the melancholy of January to me, and the images that follow feel like the way we cling to our precious memories and view life through what we remember of the past. Broken hearts and dirty windows, etc.
Just some of my favorite lines. Thank you, John Prine.
If I could build them a shelter, I would, so they can stay alive in the winter. It doesn’t work like that, though. As they say, such is life. Such is their lifecycle.
I’d like to believe my sweet butterflies live out a gentle life after they are done here, after sucking nectar from my flowers, enough to fly off to a wonderful exotic southern location, where they can winter over, and live on, however butterflies can live on. Not so. They live a few weeks, or however long it takes to fulfill their lifecycles, and then flutter off into nothing, wherever their spirits take them. I don’t want to think they’re gone, not just gone from my flowers, but gone, dead and gone, for good.
Does it help that, once, once I loved my sweet butterflies? I think so. I think it matters that once I so loved my sweet butterflies. That they said, don’t look down, dear…hold on…and I saw and heard, and I held on, and I so loved my butterflies.
They should have a place, my butterflies, they should have a place to flutter among exotic flowers in a place where the Southern Cross takes its place in the night sky. It would have to be a sunny spot in the day. My butterflies like the sun.
___________________
Southern Cross, Crosby, Stills and Nash (1982). ___________________
Joyeux Noël. Jingle, jingle, jingle bells. [no, that’s not quite what I want to say] scribble, scribble Joyeux Noël. Time to eat and drink and smile. [maybe not] scribble, scribble Joyeux Noël. Peace and joy to one and all! ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
It’s a dark and cloudy November night, and you have to close your eyes to remember fireflies. Tonight. Tonight I’m missing the on/off drifting flicker of July’s fireflies. It was months ago, I know, but they were here in July, I’m so very grateful, they were here in July, flying and flitting here and there among us, and above us, like a bit of magic, among friends. Like a folk song with a picking strum. Like the notes my friend Laura taught me to play so many years ago. Like the sound of my favorite John Prine song. Like my sister’s laugh.
Ahh, I remember the year fireflies sparkled like magic amongst the highest leaves of the tallest oak trees, mixed with the glitter of stars in a clear night sky on the 4th of July.
Cold nights have their charm, they do, but I miss fireflies. Yet I wonder if I really miss the flying and flickering here and there fireflies, or just the dreamy whimsy of a summer evening.
etikser 