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Still plugging away

I just made an interesting discovery, which has left me uncertain whether I should feel really bad (because I’m not doing any better than last year) or kind of relieved (because — hey! I’m not doing any worse than last year!).

Basically, I was doing a quick review of blog posts from last December to see if I had already written about a particular topic. And this is what I found for December 27, 2019, exactly one year ago today:

Well, it’s turning out to be “one-of-those-years”…when the Christmas to-do list is still incomplete three full days after Christmas. And when you realize you still haven’t sent any sort of card or greeting to some of your nearest and dearest friends.

Sigh.

You know they’ll understand, but still…

I’m definitely having a “the more things change, the more they remain the same” kind of moment. Or as somebody once said: “Déjà vu all over again!”

However…! Tonight Ramesha and I finished viewing/reading all twelve of our beautiful Jacquie Lawson e-card greetings, so we really are making some progress!

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Feeling the aftereffects

It took a while but I finally found a photo that expresses my day.

I’ve most definitely been holed up in recovery mode, but I hope to be ready to rejoin the world tomorrow.

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Christmas greetings (slightly belated)!

Last minute technical difficulties caused us to spend a fair amount of time today redoing our Christmas greeting and the little “gift” we created to share with friends and family.

(If you read yesterday’s post you won’t be surprised to learn that — as usual — it all came together in the last few days before Christmas!)

So, yes, this is slightly belated, but we send our warmest Christmas blessings to one and all!

(Visit musiclifejoy.com/christmas-2020 for our greeting, a little gift, and link to an update letter and Christmas playlist!) 🌟

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The more things change…

As an undergrad at SF State University final exams for the fall semester would frequently end sometime between December 19-22. So Christmas had to “wait,” with pretty much all buying of gifts and wrapping of presents and holding of parties getting crammed into those last few days.

[Interesting to remember that w-a-a-a-y-y-y-y back in those olden days there was no such thing as online shopping; you shopped in-person at a store — end of story.]

I took a break from college for a few years and worked as a waitress. Christmas was a time of extra shifts with big crowds and you didn’t even imagine you could take time off unless you had a ton of seniority.

During my years at the SF Conservatory I had already started freelancing and December was by far my busiest time. Orchestra holiday concerts; office parties; background music in shopping malls; and lots of church gigs. For years and years Christmas Eve was spent in a church, for my financial — not spiritual — wellbeing.

But then I became consciously aware of being on a spiritual path and my priorities started to shift. There finally came a Christmas Eve when I had to leave my church’s beautiful and deeply inspiring service early in order to perform at a church where the service meant nothing to me and felt totally lacking in inspiration. And I said, “no more!”

Which worked for a few years, until I got more committed and more involved and eventually started helping with the music ministry and even working on staff. And…you guessed it! That tendency has stayed with me through all my years with Ananda.

For years now my “personal” Christmas tends to wait until after the concert, after the pageant, after whatever else calls for music. So that Christmas inevitably finds me scrambling to catch up on gifts and wrapping and cards and socializing. At this point, I can’t imagine the holidays any other way.

But despite feelings of overwhelm and moments of stress — which I might occasionally mention to my spouse 😂 — I really wouldn’t have it any other way.

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A walk down memory lane

My title really should be “a climb down memory lane” because what I’m remembering is a visit to the Frasassi Caves back when I was living in Italy in the early 2000’s.

I hadn’t thought about it in years and years, but Andrea Bocelli just did a Facebook Live event in the caves and seeing that brought the memories flooding back.

The virtual tour video (above) will give you some sense of the immensity of the experience. I’ll never forget how small and insignificant I felt as we climbed down and down and down, moving through chamber after chamber of the caves — each larger and more fantastic than the last.

I also remember the constant dripping; the almost eerie stillness of the standing pools; and how cold it was compared to the warm weather aboveground.

I feel blessed to have had the opportunity to see such wonders, but I don’t know that I could do it again. I don’t consider myself claustrophobic, but I did find that I got rather uncomfortable the deeper into the earth we went. I had to work really hard to keep my imagination from dwelling on just how much dirt was sitting above our heads or wondering what would happen if there was an earthquake!

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The Christmas Mystery

Thrilled to finally be able to share the Ananda Worldwide Virtual Choir version of this beautiful, beautiful song by Swami Kriyananda! It was part of our Christmas concert, but is totally worth sharing on its own as well.

I remember how puzzled I was when I first heard this song, because it seemed to be a “classic” traditional carol and I couldn’t understand how I had never heard it before!

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One united ray

The Christmas concert was beautiful and also extremely well-received. There were many high points, but the highest high point for me is still the virtual choir singing The Christmas Mystery.

I’m not yet able to share just this one song with you, but as I looked at the radiant faces of all the singers, I was struck once again by how very global and yet united we are as a spiritual family.

And that gave me the idea to simply list (to the best of my knowledge) where each person lives currently, as well as their country of origin (if it’s different). Not sure I got everyone right, but most of them. And it was fun!

India, Italy (born in Germany), California, California, India, New Zealand, Colorado, Italy, California, Hawaii, Italy, Israel, California, California, Italy, India, California (born in India), India, India, California, Texas, California, Texas, California, India, California, California, Missouri, India, Florida, India, India (born in California), California, India (born in Japan), California, California (born in Africa), California, India, India, California, California (born in Turkey), Hawaii, California (born in India), California, California, California, India, California, California, California, Texas, Washington, Oregon, California, California, California, India, California, California

So very diverse and yet all of us drawn together by our love for God and Guru. 🙏

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Feeding two birds with one seed

We wanted to create a beautiful ambiance for Ramesha’s holiday kirtan, so this afternoon we pushed ourselves to finish decorating the tree; rearrange the furniture; and establish order in the living room.

End result? The kirtan was as beautiful visually as it was musically AND our home is finally looking like Christmas is less than a week away!

By the way, isn’t that quite an impressive set-up? Getting a good quality livestream is way more involved than one would think. Luckily I don’t have to understand the technology in order to be of assistance; my job was to monitor the comments and answer any questions that came up! 😊

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Christmas bells are ringing

I just learned about something that sounds really fantastic! This is from the article my friend sent me…

“The Worldwide Christmas Eve Jingle is a simple idea that started with one woman in a small town in England and has since spread across the Earth. On Christmas Eve, at 6 p.m. (your local time), families around the world will stand on their front steps and simply ring a bell. Organizers are hoping that the sounds on that still winter night will travel all the way to the North Pole to help guide Santa on his way. But more than that, the sound will lift the hearts of those near and far who are doing their best to keep the Christmas spirit alive in these very challenging times.”

Now, doesn’t that sound lovely?!? I’m definitely going to spread the word here at the Village, as well as to friends and family and other Ananda communities.

A psychologist commented on how an event such as this can give people who feel isolated a chance to connect. I’m also enjoying the inspiring comments that I’ve been reading in a number of articles about it from around the world. Such as…

“We all need it, it’s been a very very long year and a lot of hardships for a lot of people and we’d like to sort of celebrate the end of the year with the bells.”

One organizer expressed her hope that the sound of her bells this Christmas Eve will make others around her feel less alone. “They might hear those bells and have a little joy,” she said.

The original Facebook group for the campaign, created in late October, has more than 434,000 members.