Better Love

Whew, last night was a tough night. I went to bed nice and early in anticipation of an early morning practice -- My alarm was set for 4:30 and I was asleep by 9:30 pm -- but I woke up at 1:30 am (!), and I knew when I woke up that I wouldn't be getting back to sleep. I was triggered. Worked up. Unsettled.

I wasn't sure exactly why, but some of the thoughts churning through my head were about teaching the night before, where I'd attempted to hold a discussion on an incredible book that grapples with some tough topics: Between the World and Me. Did I give everyone an opportunity to be heard? Did I push my views on the students or allow space for them to form their own views?

But even after only four hours of sleep, I had a really great practice. Like I felt freedom in my body that I'd never felt before. My ribcage felt like less of a cage.

I talked to my boyfriend about it and he said that feeling that hard stuff may be difficult but it is also productive, and I reckon he's right.

I heard this song for the first time on my way back from practice this morning, and I knew who the artist was as he sang the very first note:

I once kneeled in shaking thrill
I chase the memory of it still, of every chill
Chided by that silence of a hush sublime
Blind to the purpose of the brute divine
But you were mine
Staring in the blackness at some distant star
The thrill of knowing how alone we are, unknown we are
To the wild and to the both of us
I confessed the longing I was dreaming of

Some better love, but there's no better love
Beckons above me and there's no better love
That ever has loved me, there's no better love
Darling, feel better love
Feel better love

And I've never loved a darker blue
Than the darkness I have known in you, own from you
You, whose heart would sing of anarchy
You would laugh at meanings, guarantees, so beautifully
When our truth is burned from history
By those who figured justice in fond memory, witness me
Like fire weeping from a cedar tree
Know that my love would burn with me
We'll live eternally

Cause there's no better love
That beckons above me, there's no better love
That ever has loved me, there's no better love
So darling, feel better love
Cause there's no better love
That's laid beside me, there's no better love
That justifies me, there's no better love
So darling, darling, feel better love
Feel better love

Feel better love
Feel better love
Feel better love

Cause there's no better love
That beckons above me, there's no better love
That ever has loved me, there's no better love
So darling, feel better love
Cause there's no better love
That's laid beside me, there's no better love
That justifies me, there's no better love
So darling, darling, feel better love
Feel better love

And I do feel like I am experiencing a better love than ever before. For one thing, I'm showing up differently. But he's different too, and I'm feeling that better love. Hopefully soon, I'll also be feeling better -- not just in my ribcage -- but done with this dang cold or whatever virus it is...

Boob Spelled Backward is Boob

Today's important event: this girl's birthday!

Ahhh, Facebook. You waster of time. You loyal reminder of life's important events. You sharer of life's sorrows and joys.

Today's song comes from the latter category:

I imagine that I'm floating on a gentle river
I'm moving fast down a waterfall
And I'm falling, falling to my end

Never forget the good things in life
Like candy, life, eating, having fun
Because the end all that matters
All that matters is you

I am dreaming I'm a leaf on a tree

I'm swaying all around in the breeze

But then a crow jumps out and I fall

I get covered in weeds

Never forget the good things in life
Like candy, life, eating, having fun
Because the end all that matters
All that matters is you

Boob spelled backwards is boob
Boob spelled backwards is boob
Boob spelled backwards is boob
It's boob

Yes, Archer (songwriter and son of Mom with breast cancer), it is. You're pretty awesome for writing this song, the musicians who recorded it for you are pretty awesome too, and the most awesome news of all is that your Mom is still with you.

Thanks for deepening my already deep gratitude for the joy and privilege of motherhood. I've had a rich, varied and interesting life so far, but being a Mom is far and away the greatest thing I am and the greatest thing I've ever done...

Someone New

This song has been stuck in my head for days:

Don't take this the wrong way,
You knew who I was with every step that I ran to you,
Only blue or black days,
Electing strange perfections in any stranger I choose.

Would things be easier if there was a right way?
Honey, there is no right way.

And so I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new

Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. I like Hozier, and the concept of falling in love with someone new is now both warming and welcome, even though what he's talking about here has nothing to do with love and everything to do with finding a way to numb the pain of heartbreak:

There's an art to life's distractions,
To somehow escape the burning weight, the art of scraping through,
Some like to imagine,
The dark caress of someone else, I guess any thrill will do

Would things be easier if there was a right way?
Honey, there is no right way.

And so I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new

I wake at the first cringe of morning,
And my heart's already sinned.
How pure, how sweet a love, Aretha, that you would pray for him.

'Cause God knows I fall in love just a little, oh, a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new
I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day

Love with every stranger, the stranger the better
Love with every stranger, the stranger the better
Love with every stranger, the stranger the better
Love with every stranger, the stranger the better
Love with every stranger, the stranger the better
Love with every stranger, the stranger the better

But I'm definitely not in that place -- though I have been there -- when the one night stand kind of stranger is at all appealing. So I choose to hear it more as a message of hope about a real love that is on its way:

I fall in love just a little, oh a little bit every day with someone new

To Be Alone

Yesterday was just plain hard. I have the sense that I have to keep pushing through this discomfort -- showing up to it -- instead of covering it up again. But it sucks. Before I went to sleep last night I just yelled F*#% as loud as I could, which was pretty damn loud, given that I was alone in the house and it's winter so my windows and my neighbors windows are all closed. In fact I yelled it a few times. It just really seemed to perfectly express what I was feeling.

Once again, I woke up to an early morning, internal alarm in the form of the chorus to Take Me to Church playing in my head. And again I felt confusion about the message. So I employed the same frustration routine I'd done just before going to sleep last night, and that helped a little.

I also tried just being as gentle and loving toward myself as I possibly could. And that helped a little bit too, as did dragging my ass out of bed to go to practice this morning.

When I got home, it occurred to me that maybe the message isn't literal - - that it's time for me to go to church -- maybe it's an invitation to find out more about the artist. So I did some poking around, and I found another Hozier song that seems to express what I'm feeling right now:

Never feel too good in crowds,
With folks around, when they're playing
The anthems of rape culture loud,
Crude and proud creatures baying
All I've ever done is hide
From our times when you're near me
Honey, when you kill the lights, and kiss my eyes
I feel like a person for a moment of my life

But you don't know what hell you put me through
To have someone kiss the skin that crawls from you
To feel your weight in arms I'd never use
It's the God that heroin prays to

It feels good, girl, it feels good
It feels good, girl, it feels good
It feels good, girl, it feels good
Oh to be alone with you

There are questions I can't ask
Now at last the worst is over
See the way you hold yourself
Reel against your body's borders
I know that you hate this place
Not a trace of me would argue
Honey, we should run away, oh someday
Our baby and her momma
And the damaged love she makes

But I don't know what else that I would do
Than try to kiss the skin that crawls from you
Than feel your weight in arms I'd never use
It's the God that heroin prays to

It feels good, girl, it feels good
It feels good, girl, it feels good
It feels good, girl, it feels good
Oh to be alone with you

And for now, for better and for worse, I get to be alone with me, and try to do what may be the very hardest thing to do: kiss the skin that crawls from me. It's soooo much easier, for me at least, to attend to those outside of me...

Take Me To Church

This song came to me in the wee hours. It was the chorus I heard -- I actually thought it was Elton John when I heard it this morning, but when I got up I realized it was decidedly NOT Elton John:

My lover's got humour
She's the giggle at a funeral
Knows everybody's disapproval
I should've worshipped her sooner

If the heavens ever did speak
She's the last true mouthpiece
Every Sunday's getting more bleak
A fresh poison each week

'We were born sick, ' you heard them say it

My Church offers no absolutes
She tells me, 'Worship in the bedroom.'
The only heaven I'll be sent to
Is when I'm alone with you—

I was born sick,
But I love it
Command me to be well
Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

I love the way he sings amen. Here comes the Elton John like part:

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

If I'm a pagan of the good times
My lover's the sunlight
To keep the Goddess on my side
She demands a sacrifice

Drain the whole sea
Get something shiny
Something meaty for the main course
That's a fine looking high horse
What you got in the stable?
We've a lot of starving faithful

That looks tasty
That looks plenty
This is hungry work

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins so you can sharpen your knife
Offer me my deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

No Masters or Kings
When the Ritual begins
There is no sweeter innocence than our gentle sin

In the madness and soil of that sad earthly scene
Only then I am Human
Only then I am Clean
Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

A lot of times I know what the message is when I wake up with a song in my head. Or at least, I figure out when I read the lyrics. This time, I'm really not sure. Did I worship like a dog at the shrine of someone's lies? Maybe. Kinda. Sorta? Or is it suggesting I turn control of my life over to the God of my understanding? I dunno.

Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life

I do know that today I didn't feel nearly as upbeat as I did yesterday and the day before that, but when I was talking to my friend tonight I told her that I have faith that I am going to get through this grieving process. I'm gonna come out the other side. I have no doubt about this now. And that's something, even if it was hard to drag my ass out of the house to go to a party tonight. Fake it 'til you make it. That's what I have to keep doing, and having faith that eventually it's going to lead somewhere good helps even on the rough days...