NaBloPoMo--NoMo?

This is the goal! We shall see!

As I write this it is 6:19 AM. Besides nocturnal Steve and myself, not a creature is stirring in the crowded Thanksgiving morning Seyfried house: Sheridan, Ya-Jhu, Aiden, Peter, Rose, Julie and Gil, are nestled all snug in their beds with, I imagine, visions of drumsticks dancing in their heads. Dad and daughters are running in the Turkey Trot in Fairmount Park at 9, a wise move given the amount of groceries they will be consuming later today.

While they are gone, my Kitchen Kapers will resume. I baked the brown sugar cake layers and made the cranberry-orange jam yesterday, but now I need to prepare the cranberry buttercream frosting--a first for me, and I’m a tad worried because the recipe is filled with advisories: “while adding butter, the frosting will break and curdle. Increase mixer speed and it should come back together. Frosting will be too runny to use at first, try refrigerating for 30 minutes,” and so on. Triumph or tragedy? Only time will tell! But can’t dwell on it for long--the gruyere roasted potatoes must be dealt with, as well as the lobster flatbread appetizer! Luckily the rest of the fam will handle the bird, stuffing and veggies, but it’s still capital W Work.

November is always a chock-full month.  My church duties increase as the education year is in full swing, along with preschool chapel times and Advent prayer center prep and leading adult Bible study every week and on and on…all of which begs the question: am I out of my ever-loving mind to blog 30 times this month??

Well yes I am, but that’s not the reason. The reason is, back in 2016, I discovered National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo for short) when bloggers everywhere were challenged to blog daily from November 1-30. This was related in spirit to National Novel Writing Month, also in November, when you are supposed to write an entire novel (I actually did this, in 2006). So, I did a blog-a-thon in 2016, then 2017, then 2018 and here were are again. Could I have achieved this literary feat in, say, the lazy days of August? Of course, but that would be sensible! It HAS to be November, because…well, it just has to be!

Ironically, in 2017 the official NaBloPoMo disbanded (though the November novelists are still going strong). So no more cute badges for my home page, no more online blogging support group. I am on my own out here in Blogland, cranking out the posts on top of an insane daily life schedule. At any point, I could switch months for this exercise, or stop altogether. I sold an essay the other day (of about the same length as a blog post), for which I am being well paid…reminding me that I am actually trying to make money writing.

To sum up: 30 posts in 30 days=lots of work, no financial compensation, during one of my busiest months.

 Sounds good to me! Bring on NaBloPoMo 2020!

Listen Up!

My friend Holly-one of the world's great listeners!

Great. Now that’s I’ve gotten used to the fact that my eyes are starting to go, my ears seem to be the next in line for failure. I used to have really excellent hearing. I can still absorb the conversation of the party at the next restaurant table just fine (priorities!) but recently I can’t always hear when someone calls to me from another room. For almost a decade now, I have ribbed my husband mercilessly for his dreadful hearing (and it is pretty bad—what’s worse, he stubbornly maintains that it is WE who are mumbling.) Now, it seems, I am getting my come-uppance for criticizing Stevo. This is just like what happened after years of harping on him for snoring—now I snore too. This seems to be our version of people who start resembling their dogs, as we gradually morph into one another.

Physically hearing language is one thing. Truly listening is quite another, and it’s becoming a lost art. We are all talking at, instead of with, each other. This lack of listening and responding from a place of understanding has helped fuel our current polarized societal situation. Into our TV and internet echo chambers we have retreated. Not only has this led to a huge political divide, but it has also increased the amount of loneliness we feel. We yearn to connect with our fellow humans in a meaningful way. For too many of us, our days and weeks and years go by, and no one really cares enough to pay attention to what we say and think.

I just saw a cool short documentary video called “Free Custom Poetry.” It’s the story of Frankie Abralind, who has devoted himself to listening to people. He founded the Good Listening Project, which trains medical professionals at to be better listeners for their patients. Frankie is also a poet, and some Saturdays he sets up a table, and an old Royal typewriter, on the National Mall in Washington DC. He invites passersby to talk about their lives for a few minutes, and then he writes a poem about what he hears, and gives it to them for free. As Frankie says, it’s not really the poem’s quality that matters; it’s the fact that a stranger took the time to care about what they had to say. I believe Frankie is performing a great mitzvah (good deed) for the many, many lonely souls in our midst.

As we enter the home stretch towards Thanksgiving tomorrow, I know there will be some tense table conversations in a lot of households, maybe more than usual. Instead of assiduously steering clear of any topic of substance, why don’t we engage, but lovingly? “Help me understand how you feel about such and such” is a great opener—but only if we DO try to understand, and not immediately jump on the other person. Worth a try?

Wishing you all a heaping helping of peace and compassion, along with your turkey and pie.

Free Custom Poetry video

Packing It In

It;s big, yet, not big enough!

It’s a common writer’s prompt: if you had to leave your house in five minutes, what would you bring? I picture frenzied folks, hurling whole turkeys and lamps and wall hangings into suitcases, venturing out into the cold dark night. And I’m sure, that would be me: grabbing whatever was near at hand and flinging it into a carry-all. I would arrive at my safe place with a print out of a 2012 Sunday School lesson and some hummus (without chips). And that would be sad (especially the chips part).

Clearly we all need to practice before that fateful day! Let’s ready set!

Step one: Locate your luggage. In my house, easier said than done. I have several decent carry-ons, but I’m sure when the moment arrived all I’d be able to find is my mother-in-law’s ancient, beat-up tan suitcase (in which for years Steve has stored extension cords for his shows). But it is still technically something I could use, so…

Step two: Consider your destination. You will obviously pack a little differently for Antarctica and Aruba. But wait…climate change!! Is it a given that it will be cold in the one place and balmy in the other? I think not!! Therefore: snowshoes AND bikinis, parkas AND shorts! By now, Mom Seyfried’s luggage is bursting at the seams. Something’s gotta give! So, of course…

We need to find a BIGGER suitcase…how about my Nana Cunningham’s steamer trunk, circa 1930? Roomier for sure, but so heavy it’d take a village to move the blessed thing. But we are being hypothetical here! So I say we go for it! Even slap some exotic labels on it (Nana’s had one from pre-Castro Havana, as I recall).

Step three: Let’s get deep. If in fact we are leaving home forever, or at least for a weekend, what items simply must accompany us on our journey? I personally wouldn’t dream of traveling without the handwritten journals I kept for my kids when they were little (I am uber-protective of these, because I have this vision of my offspring carelessly tossing them into the trash. Have they no interest in their mother’s priceless musings?) I would also make room for a scented candle. And maybe also a granola bar, because there may well be no Wawa’s where we’re going!

Step four: Final prep. The clock is ticking!! What, finally, makes the cut?

I’m still not sure, but, speaking from experience, I can guarantee:

Whatever I carefully fold, will emerge like a pleated accordion.

I will forget my toiletries, and have to scrounge for toothpaste.

I will pack enough underwear and pajamas for forty years, but forget shoes.

I will gawk jealously at my fellow travelers, who always manage to bring just the perfect stuff.

Maybe it’s good that I have a longer stretch to pack for our Spring trip to Europe. It’ll give me time to think harder. Budapest, Prague and Vienna in April? I’m seeing barbells, a straw hat and some beef jerky.

Right?

A must include!

Missing Dan Fogelberg

I owned this record, and all the others

Dan Fogelberg was what the New York Times, in his 2007 obit, called a “lyrical soft rocker,” and his albums sold in the millions. He was a gentle soul from Peoria, IL who never forgot his roots, and died much too young. I loved his story-songs that formed part of the soundtrack to my early twenties. “Leader of the Band” a touching tribute to his school band director dad. “Run for the Roses,” a paean to the Kentucky Derby and the horses who race. “The Power of Gold,” a song that warns of money’s “lure on the unsuspecting.”

But my hands-down favorite was “Same Old Lang Syne.” This achingly poignant song was inspired by a random meeting he once had with an old girlfriend in a grocery store, on a snowy Christmas Eve. The ex-couple talked for hours about the ways their lives apart had turned out, and “drank a toast to innocence.” I played it constantly for a stretch in early 1981, when my happiness seemed fragile, and I was always projecting ahead to loss and regret, which would indeed soon enter my world.

What makes a song take root in your soul? To me, it’s, more than anything, where you are in life when you hear it. My prime time was late 70s and early 80s. I can hear any number of songs from that era and be propelled right back. Pure Prairie League’s “Amie,” for instance. When I was a young hostess at an Atlanta restaurant, the singer in the lounge had a big crush on the manager, a guy named Jamie. She’d always sing the song as “Jamie.” Not sure if it ever had the desired effect, but I hear it now and remember my hostess uniform, and trying to fit in a grownup world.

I adore classical music, and a good bit of jazz as well—even some country has appeal. And I do associate certain sonatas and symphonies with life passages. But for some reason, the soft rock of Dan Fogelberg and his contemporaries has the most consistent emotional clout.

So when I mentioned Fogelberg one evening at home, and Sheridan said, “Who’s that?”  I felt terrible. It was as if I had neglected to tell my child about one of the most important times of my youth. As a teacher, Sheridan has immersed himself in older pop and rock music in recent years, and has in turn shared it all with his high school music students. I hastily sent him links to my favorite songs, and hope he enjoys them enough to share with a new generation.

Nowadays, popular music has exploded in quantity, with such enormous numbers of songs and artists that I have no clue how kids keep track of it all. But amid the massive output of tunes vying for attention, I am so happy there is still space for a gentle soul from Peoria, who poured out his heart about a long-ago Christmas Eve.

RIP, Dan. Your music lives on.

Same Old Lang Syne