Sunday Scribblings - My Name Is...

My grandmother called me Sugar, my dad sometimes called me the Queen of Sheba, my husband called me Sunshine. My friends call me Becky, my colleagues, Rebecca, and here in cyber space, I'm Becca (of the Byline). All these appelations bear some truth about my essential nature. Yes, I am sweet, as my grandmother recognized. Sometimes I do feel entitled to royal treatment, though I'm generally content to spread warmth and joy into the lives of those I love. I am a bit Old World, as the ancient history of my Hebrew name would suggest, but I'm willing to sample modernity when the situation requires.

I'm also a baby boomer, I was once a stay at home mom, and I'm now an empty nester. I float somewhere in the nether world between mid-life and senior citizen.

None of these nametags tell you very much about the essential Becca - the one who's all about family and home, fairness and honesty, simple pleasures and lasting love, enjoying life and honoring your gifts. Or the Becca who was once afraid of stairs and is still afraid of spiders.

From my simple introduction, you would never know that I love the water, but can't swim, or that I've always harbored secret dreams about ballroom dancing and race car driving. That I've been drinking coffee since I was three years old, and it's my drink of choice for most any situation. Or that I'm an only child, a child of divorced parents, and wandering through the world with a very tiny, precious number of people who share my blood. Unless you know me well, you wouldn't know how conflicted I sometimes get about my music and my writing (never good enough!). How much I worry about what will happen in the future~where will we live, will we have enough money, what will we do for health care. You wouldn't know that many mornings my eyes pop open at 4:00 am and all these worrisome thoughts invade my mind, poking and prodding, agitating me until I surrender and get up to make myself hot cocoa to soothe my pounding head.

I can now readily walk up to people, offer my hand, and say "Hi, I'm Becca. Have we met?" But I was once painfully shy, and rarely spoke unless spoken to first. I now realize the really interesting part comes after that simple introduction, where I get to know the person behind the name, and share a bit of my own essential self with another human being. That's what keeps us human, isn't it? The sharing of our stories, the offering of little bits of ourselves.

But it all starts with a name.

My name is Becca...have we met?

for more introductions, go here

Friday Feast #161 (But #1 for Me!)

AppetizerWhat is your favorite type of art?

I love the Impressionists - Monet, Renoir, Cassat. But I also love artistic photography, like Ansel Adams

Soup When was the last time you got a free lunch (or breakfast or dinner)? Who paid for it?

Today, as a matter of fact. My mom treated me to lunch in the dining room at Macy's Department Store - a real old fashioned "ladies who lunch" place, where we had our favorite~ Maurice salads

Salad

On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being highest, how emotional are you?

Ten years ago I would have anwered 8. Now, I'd say 5 or 6. I don't know whether I'm hardening with age, but I rarely cry about anything anymore. I sometimes cry after visiting my mother in law at the Alzheimer's facility where she lives. So many people with once vital, busy lives, now existing as shells of their former selves. Breaks my heart every time.

Main Course Approximately how long do you spend each day responding to email? Very little time. I don't receive a lot of email. I spend a great deal more time commenting on blogs -probably an hour a day. Dessert To what temperature do you usually set your home’s thermostat? Winter is coming, and the thermostat war will soon begin! I like it at 68, my husband likes it 70, so we're always sneaking around adjusting the thermostat on each other. Terrible for energy conservation, I know.

to sample other feasts, go here

It's Been a Hard Days Night

Thursday nights are choir nights at our church, and we've started off the year with a very ambitious project~we're mounting a production of South Pacific, not the full show, but a slightly revised version. It includes all the songs, and a good bit of the dialogue. Tonight was our first full rehearsal. The show goes up in two weeks.

That's right. Two weeks.

If you've ever been involved with any kind of musical production, you'll know that's slightly ludicrous. But our church has a long history of doing full out musicals, so most of the people in the choir are used to this kind of thing.

However...

Our choir director "invited me" to play the second piano part of the accompaniment, which is scored for two pianos and...well, two pianos. That's it.

Okay, I've played lots of musicals before, and this isn't terribly hard music. Our regular organist will be playing the other part, and she's a phenomenal musician.

However (and you knew there would be a however)...

We don't have the music yet.

The show is in two weeks.

There are 42 songs.

"The music's been shipped! They promised me it would be here tomorrow!" our choir director assured me tonight. Hmmm...I think she told me that last Thursday night.

My friend Sandy, the other accompanist involved, gave me "the look" that says, "Don't you just love being taken completely for granted?"

A few years ago, I would have been completely freaked out about this situation.

However, perhaps it's because I'm older and wiser, or perhaps it's just hormones (remember, I blame everything on hormones these days), I'm really not terribly worried. I figure, que sera sera - I'll do the best I can. After all, since it's for church, I'm hoping God will guide my fingertips.

Even if it is South Pacific.

A Whole New Grind

You all know how much I love my coffee, and I've developed quite a discerning set of taste buds for my favorite brew. For many years I've been ordering coffee from the Gevalia Company, whose traditional blend has just the right full bodied, smooth taste for me. But whether it's my age or my hormones (which I tend to blame for everything these days), I've noticed lately that my cup of Gevalia occasionally has a bitter aftertaste. Yesterday I tried organic coffee for the first time, and I was hooked immediately. Cafe Britt Organic is a dark roast, smooth tasting, slightly sweet flavored coffee, that is full bodied without even a hint of bitterness. And even better, it's harvested from plantations that use 100% organic materials - no pesticides, no chemicals - and are completely dedicated to fair trade practices. So I have lots of reasons to feel good about drinking it. As an added bonus, my new addiction is available at First Cup, a brand new coffee shop located just a mile from my house. I'm so thrilled that my neighborhood finally has its own coffee house, complete with art gallery showcasing local artists, poetry readings and - wireless internet. I've already made friends with the owner, a lovely woman from Lebanon, who is completely dedicated to serving all certified organic foods. I think I may have found a new hangout. I know I've found a new coffee.

I Love My Rut

There's something very comforting about my routine. I suppose I might as well admit it - it's really just a rut. And perhaps I'm a dullard for loving it, but I do. Following a simple, pleasurable pattern, slipping into regular habits like a well worn pair of slippers, eases my mind and relieves the stress that has become such a part of everyday life. I love my morning routine most of all. Waking early, the coffee freshly ground and dripped just minutes before our classical radio station clicks on, I pour coffee for both of us and bring it back to bed, where we bolster ourselves with pillows and pick up the books we've nodded off over the night before. This reading together every morning is a new habit, and one we've both come to love~snuggling in bed (with Magic and Molly still lost in doggy dreamland), companionably sharing our books together, is a gentle way to ease into the day, and well worth rising early to enjoy. When Jim reluctantly tears himself away to shower and dress for work, I move to the living room and my big green chair, where I take up my notebook and write those all important morning pages. I feel the sunrise over my shoulder, casting its warm glow on the paper in front of me as I let my thoughts spill across the page. When the pages are done, it's time for breakfast, which we usually eat together while watching one of the morning shows. If it's not a work day for me, I will often do some yoga, then end the morning with the all-important dog walk to the park. It's a simple, relaxed way to start the day, this quiet hour every morning. It allows space and time to prepare for entry into the busy world, time to connect with one another before we separate for the day. Probably everyone has their own daily routines that become almost sacred times and spaces in their lives. I've been re-reading some of my favorite Madeleine L'Engle books, and came across this passage from Two Part Invention, which prompted me to so lovingly consider my own daily rut. She writes of her afternoons with her husband Hugh Franklin... "When we are together we enjoy each other's company fully. Our routine is simple and pleasurable. In the late afternoon I read the mail, then play the piano for an hour. At seven Hugh comes in to me, clinking a glass, while our dog barks with joy, and we repair to the kitchen to cook dinner and talk over the days events, in our lives, in the world. At dinner we light the candles and sit in the dining room, often quietly, kything, rather than talking. Then we take the dog for a walk in Riverside Park, come home, and prepare for bed. "Several times Hugh has said, 'I love our rut.'" "So do I."

How about you? Do you have a simple routine that means the world to you? A rut you love?