Monday Morning: The Aftermath

I don’t like the word “blessed,” but there’s no other word for it.

Twenty years of One of the Girls looks like this.

I have been rereading Ciaran Carson’s fabulous little book, LAST NIGHT’S FUN. He was an itinerant musician before he settled into being a poet. It’s a charmed life, to be sure. The way he writes prose intrigues me to no end. I love the circles and cule de sacs. He lets dead ends be while flowing from one thought to another. I dream of writing like he does.

The book is about being a musician and how the tunes echo in his imagination. And I agree that the songs are important and worth remembering. One should let them work on you. They have important work to do. But for me, it’s the people. The band. The audiences. The pubs in which we gather and play. That is everything to me.

This weekend I had the incredible good fortune to be surrounded by people who call one another beloved. Again, the band of miscreants that is One of the Girls is a collection of creative geniuses (and myself) who happen to have stumbled into one another over the course of years to become a collective. The fans are our friends for the most part (though, we do have actual fans and that just messes with us). We have sat down and eaten with these folk. We have worked and played with these folk. We love these folk. They love us, too. It’s a goddam miracle.

I feel…blessed right now. I use that word sparingly. I’m uncomfortable with it. But I cannot find another word for what it is to be surrounded by such generosity. I am grateful. Simply grateful. And blessed. God has been so good to us over the years. God has given us opportunities to make friends and to find love again and again. It’s astonishing. And weekends like this one are an essential reminder for when we are separate from one another. I fly back to Virginia later today, but not before sharing breakfast with more friends and, later, coffee with another. As one friend said to me on Saturday, “Calvin was right. I don’t deserve any of this, but God is good. Grace overflows anyway.” That’s what it feels like.

Today’s Franciscan Nugget: “Day Eighteen - The Second Way of Service, cont'd - As well as the devotional study of Scripture, we all recognize our Christian responsibility to pursue other branches of study, both sacred and secular. In particular, some of us accept the duty of contributing, through research and writing, to a better understanding of the church's mission in the world: the application of Christian principles to the use and distribution of wealth; questions concerning justice and peace; and of all other questions concerning the life of faith.”

Music and faith are not yet done with me. Being human, the divine path itself, is not done with me. The academy is not done with me. Now, am I done with them? That’s the important question. I’m working on that one. But this weekend has taught me what matters and what I will let define me.

So fill to me the parting glass
And drink a health whate'er befalls
Then gently rise and softly call
Good night and joy be to you all

Y’all be excellent to each other.