Maracas in the Sky (Summer Sounds Revised)

I also did a version of this one in July of 2011, but I think I like how this one turned out better. From October 2011, the last installment of the-story-of-my-life-in-one-hundred-words-or-less-assignment:



Maracas in the sky, I call them. They play their music with the whispering of the trees or in the heavy heat of a breeze-less day. Always, there is sun and warmth to accompany their continual concert of hypnotic buzzing and maraca-like harmonics. It is the steady, bewitching song of the cicada that has the power to soothe my soul and transport me back to my childhood summers in Michigan--camping with my grandparents, lazing in the hammock while reading Nancy Drew Mysteries; collapsing onto the cool, fragrant grass with ten other kids after a lively game of freeze-tag; walking home from Warren Pool in quiet contentment with my best friend, the flip-flopping of our shoes in rhythm to those maracas in the sky. It is in these hushed moments that our minds acknowledge the lulling call of the cicada and the renewing sway of their good vibrations.

It Will Only Hurt for a Moment

As I lay on the couch, cocooned under a light blanket, in the throes of shivering feverish shudders, I argued with myself about reaching up from beneath that shelter to grab a heavier blanket. I wanted it so badly; it was draped across the top of the same couch, yet my fear of the intensely painful symptoms resulting from any movement, stopped me. I argued, justified, and taunted until finally, I just did it. New waves of nausea and misery wracked my body...but in a few moments it was over...and I laughed. Many of us do this everyday: afraid to move on from a situation, even though we know we will be better off. We stay--wishing, obsessing, arguing--but in the end, we can only help ourselves (and oftentimes, others involved) and know that the pain it causes to move on will pass. And then we will fly.

Do Your Thing

It is that thing that is closest to love, making you do things you would not ordinarily do. It is a different form of love. It is passion and joy. When you are doing it, you lose all sense of time; you forget to eat and sleep. It is that thing you have done since you were a child. If you have a child, they have told you that you should be doing it. You can't stop thinking about it even if you tried because it keeps coming up in your daily life: in movies, books, conversations, and most amazingly, in the people you meet. It is that thing that makes others secretly think you are crazy for giving up a stable, decently paying job in order to pursue your dream of doing that one thing. For me, it is writing, writers, and butterflies and my life is transformed.

Look Who Else Says to Dance (not Ellen...but we know she does, too)

Literally, within a few hours of deciding to post my old Dancing Upside Down piece last night, I was in bed leafing through a book I had just bought as a gift for Nathan or for all of us as a family--I had not decided--which was why I was looking through it, to see if he would like it. It's called Daily Joy and is a book of 365 photos with inspirational quotes by some of my favorite people. The book was put out by National Geographic, one of Nate's favorite organizations, and the photos are stunning, of course. Each page is dated, and there, right at the start of the book (I opened up to it--it's for January 4), is a quote by Rumi: .

Dance, when you're broken open. 
Dance, if you've torn the bandage off.
Dance in the middle of fighting.
Dance in your blood.
Dance when you're perfectly free.

Dancing Upside Down

I need to use my own words...

In October of 2011, I did four little writing projects: my life story in 150 words or less. Yesterday, while revising a larger project, I was sifting through some of my old pieces in search of a particular one to assist me with that larger revision. The piece I was looking for was one of those four short projects and was saved with the other three. When I pulled them up, I realized I could use my old words just as I was using other writers' old words. The Dancing Upside Down Snoopy was just what I needed to read, so maybe it's just what someone else might need to read too. (I did blog about this one when it first happened in September 2011, but this version is a bit different, not only for its brevity, but because I wrote it to encompass more of my life.)

I will print one piece each day for the next four days, just...because...they are my words and that is what a blog is supposed to be...


My dad always loved Snoopy. On a particularly dissonant day in September, I placed a dancing Snoopy sticker in my journal to somehow ensure my dad's guiding presence. The next day, I realized I had inadvertently stuck Snoopy upside down...

During my first thirty-three years of life, people doubted and awed as I deftly managed my riotously convulsing father through his daily grand mal seizures. To them it was improbable and precarious. To me it was just life. I danced when others could not hear the melody.

That day to day training taught me to flex and flow and be supple of spirit. My husband lives in Arizona while I raise our kids here in Michigan. Though we chose, we never expected...nearly three years now...but we dance. Even when we look or feel upside down, we find harmony and we dance. Thanks, Dad.