Hectic Eclecticism

I will certainly breath a happy sigh come Sunday when all this lovely mishigas is past this week, but it will be a sigh of both relief and wistful parting as this fruitful time comes to a close. 

First and foremost this week:  music.  Sunday I rehearsed with the band, Unclaimed Freight, where I am part of the horn section.   Tonight (Thursday) we’ll be going into the studio to record a demo CD.  Tuesday night I rehearsed with members of my synagogue, Temple Ohabei Shalom, for the annual fundraiser coming up Saturday night, May 4th, Songs of Peace, Love and Understanding.  I’ll be in the horn section backing up some of the singers from the temple as well as members of Soulf’ege, a fine Afropolitan band.  

Add into the mix that I am training two new hires at my day job in about 2-1/2 days whereas I usually do one new hire in about 2 weeks.  This is a new experiment in high speed training that I hope works out well.  The two new guys, Tom and Steve, are eager and knowledgeable, and their considerable previous experience in the door hardware industry will serve them well.  They will be working from home and will be supported by coaches chosen from among the other salespeople. 

At the same time at Eye On Life we have new poetry up by Donal Mahoney and Robert Fabre.  Keep an eye out also for new work from Mariam Paracha that will be published over the weekend. 

Whew! It is a wonderful hectic time.  You know, if it was like this all the time I’d be fine with that. 

In Gratitude for Light

In gratitude for light
Warming with the inference of caress
Not direct expression but a gesture
Objectified
Almost tender
Unless one remembers
The carelessness
Of radiant generality

One should not take personally
A bomb left in a trash bin
As the warmth of the sun
Falls equally
An IED is indiscriminate
Everyone has an equal chance
Except those deliberately absent

Our calls paralyze the network
Until we find our own
Make sure they are safe
Yes everybody’s fine we
Assure out of town relations

But it is a lie
We are not fine
Someone took some of our limbs
And a few of our lives
To make the anonymous political statement
That we are not safe

But this is not news
And we did not need it told us this way

Today I bask in the universal warmth
Knowing it does not judge
But shines on everyone
No matter what they’ve done
And I dream of a time not yet come
Of the warmth of peace and freedom
The light of gratitude

Reflections on the bombing of the Boston Marathon, Boston, Massachusetts, April 15th, 2013

Change

Change is life.  Embrace life.

Currently I am experiencing rapid changes.  I am grateful.  It means I am certainly alive.  But one significant change is the amount of time I can spend online, which has been greatly reduced.  Still, although I have been busy in the ‘real’ world I have not be idle in the virtual.

As one might suspect from my last post the winners of the annual Eye On Life Poetry Contest have been posted, and since then other fine poetry has found a home at Eye On Life as well.  So I hope you’ll stop by The Poetry Locksmith and check it all out.

I also published a brief article about the Golden Rule if you would like to read it.

My music has been all off line so I have nothing to share at this time, but I have lots and lots of ideas.    Also my offline music has been most rewarding as the band in which I am a member, “Unclaimed Freight”, has been gigging more.  I am experiencing growth as a simple trombone player working with a trumpet player to enhance rhythm and vocals.   Sometimes we produce a fine synergy.

Anyway I just want to stop by, kind of sheepish about not being around as much as perhaps I should.  So thanks for stopping by.  I’ll be back when I have new things to share.

Turnings

Practicing detachment, life’s changes become positive points of interest rather than negative points of stress.  One can observe with innocence and wonder as changes manifest, as if watching a living thing grow and change in time-lapse photography; or one can watch with horror as the people and things one is attached to transform themselves into other people and things before our very eyes.  It is a choice, though a difficult one, to decide to let go of what and whom we love, although as we contemplate life we see it is really not a choice between clinging and letting go, because everything and everyone changes whether we cling to them or not.

Current changes for me – besides the usual changes of aging and time – are a much bigger work load at my day job and the ebb and flow of the tides of playing music.  Our band, Unclaimed Freight, that plays popular music is busy now whereas the Klezjam Jazz Project and Klezjam, the Klezmer band are both temporarily shelved.   This gives me a chance to play tastier licks to Amy Winehouse and B.B. King covers instead of my original stuff and pieces like Miami Beach Rhumba and I Can’t Get Started.  Interesting.  I played a pretty good solo the other night.  I’ll see if I can get permission to share it with you.

In poetry, Erren Geraud Kelly is back at Eye On Life this week as the annual Eye On Life Poetry Contest 2013 closes competition on January 31.  Winners will be announced in February.

Fifteen Days Left to Enter the EOL Poetry Contest

I’ve been very busy so have been a bit remiss in my huckstering of our great small poetry contest at Eye On Life Online Magazine.   Great, because contestants have a great chance to win the $100 First Prize, $50 Second Prize or a book of poetry for Third Prize.   The small is what makes it great, because as contests go, there are relatively few contestants in ours, hence the great odds.  Small great, great small, it’s all good to me.

Elsewhere I’ve been doing a lot of music with the Klezjam Jazz Project sessions.   We are doing a lot of different – and I mean different – kinds of music there.  One example is this Sephardi-Jewish-North African-Arabic love song called Chihlet L’Ayani.  We do some swing stuff and Latin stuff, too.   I’ll probably have some more to post later.

Ultimately I’d like to do something like the salsa I recently wrote, but that’s down the road a bit.

This week at Eye On Life we have new poetry from Diane Webster  and Donal Mahoney.  Stop by and read their work.  It’s good.

Winter Holidays

As I have paid more attention to the details of life as they occur I am finding my emotions and feelings magnified in my surroundings.  For example, seeing my work as ‘hellish’ brought something to make it more so:  a cold.   The thought of my work being ‘hellish’ is laughable to me, since it is indeed exactly what I wished for.  Like so many things one wishes for, once one has them they rapidly lose their shine and my work is no different, yet I know I have much for which to be grateful.  In fact is that I am incredibly fortunate to be exactly where I am and will make it a point to ‘thank my lucky stars’ every day.

Elsewhere I have said that the holidays are a time of extremes.  Both the best and worst of humanity tends to show itself during this time.  Looking closely at exchanging gifts for example, one can see the entire spectrum of negative and positive ranging from jealousy, entitlement and unworthiness to genuine selflessness, charity and caring for others.

For me what works best is to focus on the positive and ignore the negative as much as possible.  Life seems much more pleasant when one looks for happiness, kindness, and goodness in others and does their best to ignore their perhaps less attractive attributes.

So have yourself a happy Hanukah, merry Christmas, sensational Solstice, quintessential Kwanza, or winter holiday of your choice.  Be healthy, happy, needful of nothing and surrounded by the infinite love that is in the universe.

We have some Christmas poems actually up at Eye On Life by the way if you’d like to stop by.

Home By Myself Publishing Poetry

This week at The Poetry Locksmith we are featuring the work of Nina Sokol – a poet new to Eye On Life.  She begins with the poem, Everything on Earth Pulls You, that is an expression of her fascination with the comparative gravity of Earth (vs. other planets) and its effects on us.

All you poets, be sure to enter the fourth annual Eye On Life Poetry Contest – First Prize $100, Second Prize $50 and a couple of Third Prize books of poetry to be awarded to the talented winners.  Check out last year’s winners, Peggy Trojan, Jim Davis, Amye Nicole Bird and Olivia Arieti if you would like to be inspired or scared away, whatever.

In other news, as promised, I have recorded my new song, Home By Myself, for your listening, uh, pleasure.  I do a passable job at the vocals I hope you’ll agree, and avoid sounding too too bad on the trombone solo.  While in retrospect transposing the piece one step up may have had a salutary effect, minimizing the weakness of my lower vocal range, still the piece is written in the voice of a stupid old man, so perhaps it is the truest to itself as is.   Also, I loathe retakes.  My next goal is to assemble a group of musicians to do at least an instrumental version live someplace.  That would be fun.

The Klezmer Band that I play with, Klezjam, will be playing at the “Klezmer Konquest Hanukkah Concert” at the JCC in Worcester, Massachusetts on December 2nd, 2012.  Admission is free.  We play a killer hora set so come and work up a sweat with us.  Will see who has to sit down first, eh?