Classical Music Forever!

Before television took over as the main source of entertainment, radios were the center of attention. Now, television has mostly replaced the radio in our culture. Many radio options are often tailored to our specific desired genre, with technology like Pandora or Spotify. Stations like "country", "oldies", or "modern" are still doing well.

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But sadly, St. Louis (my city) lost the one radio station that meant the most to me and a lot of my friends: the classical music station. I knew several of the radio hosts there and have performed more than once on air. I would have the station on constantly, in the car and in my home, so when the station went off the air a few years ago, it was devastating. Chris and I listened to the final broadcast, which was Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, with tears in our eyes.

Our lives, ever since we were both very young, have been involved with classical music in some degree. Chris began playing piano and I began playing classical guitar when we were eight years old. We both went to college for classical music degrees. We have been performing classical music for almost two decades. As dramatic as it sounds, we've seen the decline of classical music appreciation over the years in our general society so that it sometimes feels like we are participating in a dying art. Orchestras are being disbanded across the country. Music programs are being dropped in public and private schools everywhere due to lack of funding (yet the sports programs seem to be thriving). One in a hundred high school students might admit to listening to classical music for enjoyment occasionally, but their numbers are dwindling fast as teenagers become addicted to whatever is newest and loudest. Chris and I have sought to support other musicians like us as much as possible at concerts, trying to ignore the empty seats and lack of young people in the audience. So, as classical musicians, the loss of St. Louis's only classical station meant the disappearance of one more pillar of support for our passion.

The station then became a modern Christian music station... don't even get me started with how many reasons that infuriated me.

But today there is a victory.

The classical music radio station is coming back!

Today, at 10:00 a.m. St. Louis will hear the sounds of classical music again coming over their radios at 107.3 FM, HD 96.3 FM, and streaming online.

My friends and I are rejoicing.

Feeling very blessed today.

If you want to listen along online, visit http://rafstl.org/listen/

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This Moment

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor, and remember. 

If you're inspired to do the same, come share your moment with me in the comment section!

Joining with Soule Mama on this first April Friday!

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Wednesday Wanderings

Today I am over at my other blog, Life is the Teacher, with a great assortment of online links that explore various education topics.

Warning: some of these articles and quotes may challenge what you believe about education, our school systems, and how children learn. I am constantly pondering different ways of thinking when it comes to education, because there is much that I don't know, and my explorations often take me far away from what we would call "traditional" learning models. Please keep an open mind as you join my journey!

With that being said, come on over and join me!

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Beauty Found Anew

There are many reasons I follow the teachings of Christ. By follow, I don't mean perfectly obey, but rather that I find glorious hope and grace to change my selfish ways. 

This Easter was another beautiful celebration of Christ's resurrection. Rejoicing with my family and church, we had a delicious breakfast together, watched the little children have an egg hunt on the lawn, danced in the street (my favorite part!), and worshiped. Music and dancing are two of the deepest ways I am able to express my emotions, so using them in praise of God on Easter seems very fitting. 

I'm not much of a girly-girl, but my heart melted a little (a lot) at the sight of my Bug in an adorable dress. She is working on walking while holding on to furniture or our hands. Today she even let go of me to take two wobbly steps over to the couch!

My favorite photo of Harmony

Of all the things I've read and heard this weekend about the resurrection, this has stayed with me the most. The lovely woman who blogs over at Journey Mama meditated on the story of Mary Magdalene, the woman who saw Jesus first after he rose to life, and imagined how Mary's reaction might have been. Reading these words reminds me again of why I follow Him: because He Himself is so beautiful.

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He may have been the first person ever to see value in her, to love her. She was left unloved, without him. She had been out of her mind, before. A used-up, broken woman who talked to herself in the streets. You know the type, you've seen them. He healed her. She traveled with his followers. She stayed with Him to the end.

And she went to the tomb to prepare the body, but then her heart went crazy! He was gone. This was the absolute end of her. She only wanted to care for the broken, empty body. And it was gone.

There was a lot of running. Running to find the men, the disciples, running back to the tomb. (Cool air of the morning, sun rising in the hills.) The men saw that she was right, ran off again.

And from Mary, weeping. Despair. Anguish and the worst kind of loneliness.

I want to truly find that moment, capture it, live it, when he identified her and she knew him. After she mistook him for the gardener, all he said was her name, "Mary." And she knew him.

"Rabboni!"

Anguish to beauty. She would never be unloved again.

Although I'm sure she always had to remind herself of that. And that is what I am doing this morning in meditation. The garden, the cool of the morning. The dust under her feet, the rocks sticking out of the earth. The earth under her knees, her despair, and then Him. His face. His radiance.

In my life on this earth I have been asked so many times, why I follow Jesus. Merely stating that I do is enough reason for people to tell me why I shouldn't. They tell me of the travesties that have been done by Christians, they tell me of historical inaccuracy, of relativism, of how mistaken I am. I have loads (heaps!) of thoughts about all these things. I can talk, I can discuss, and I do.

But there is only one real reason that I follow Jesus. It is because of him. Because of his radiance, his gentle beauty, the sweetness of His WHOLE Being. My Guru, my Master. "Rabboni!" Mary said. This moment is overlooked sometimes, but is one of the most important of his whole life on earth. No other god, no other teacher compares.

Because in his most triumphant moment, finally justified as the One who could destroy death, the first thing he did was comfort a girl, a broken ex-prostitute who nobody cared about. It was the first thing he did.

~ Rachel Devenish Ford, at Journey Mama

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This Moment

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor, and remember. 

If you're inspired to do the same, come share your moment with me in the comment section!

Joining with Soule Mama on this Good Friday.

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Wednesday Wanderings

Who better to teach us about inspiration than Dr. Who?

Want to be an autodidact? I bet you do. This article was written specifically for men (since it's from the blog "The Art of Manliness") but it applies to everyone, I think! Check out why you should become a life-long learner.

This is the best advice I've ever read on how to eat in the most healthy way possible. If you want to change your diet to eliminate junk food, lose weight, or just enjoy good food, then you will want to read this!

For you knitters out there, here is the most ADORABLE hat ever! What's that, you say? Free downloadable pattern?! Yes please!

As some of you may or may not know who read this blog, I have synesthesia. My synesthesia is associated with words/letters = colors, music = colors, people = colors, time/calendar = colors. As I've aged, the synesthetic responses have faded a little, so some things that used to be completely overwhelming as a child are a little easier to handle now, thankfully. If you're curious to know more about this interesting neurological condition, read this article from NPR. Then hop over to see what Vladimir Nabokov had to say about his experience as a synesthete.

I'm not sure what to think about this article called "The Touch-Screen Generation", which explores how the youngest children are growing up with instant access to immediate gratification games and "educational" apps on the iPad. What do you think?

Tolkien Day happened this week! Woohoo! If you're a die-hard fan of his, then take this quiz to see how well you know Tolkien's writing. It was more difficult than I thought!

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Daring Greatly, Even When I am Afraid

Compassion. Trust. Connection. Vulnerability.

These things can make us extremely uncomfortable. We all want to be treated with compassion, but giving compassion means being vulnerable on our part, being willing to step forward with open arms to those who are hurting. Having our arms open prevents us from putting up defenses. That's where vulnerability becomes important.

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I first watched Brene Brown's TED talk on the power of vulnerability several years ago. It spoke volumes to me then, and it continues to give insight and wisdom to me now. Now I try to watch it every few months. Here are a few of my favorite quotes:

"Courage, the original definition of courage, when it first came into the English language-- it's from the Latin word "cor", meaning "heart"-- and the original definition was to tell the story of who you are with your whole heart."

Do I live with my whole heart? Sometimes. But not often enough. I let fear, worry, and busyness get in my way. My life so far is riddled with mistakes where I shut down and shut people out.

"... you cannot selectively numb emotion. You can't say, here's the bad stuff. Here's vulnerability, here's grief, here's shame, here's fear, here's disappointment. I don't want to feel these... You cannot selectively numb. So when we numb those, we numb joy, we numb gratitude, we numb happiness. And then we are miserable, and we are looking for purpose and meaning, and then we feel vulnerable...  And it becomes this dangerous cycle."

At the hardest points in my life, I've tried to pretend that I was not sad, or afraid, or angry. That didn't work. It just covered up the awful feelings with layers of dirt, only to have them emerge later even bigger and uglier than before. You have to take the good and the bad in life and learn how to deal with them all.

"... as it turns out, we can't practice compassion with other people if we can't treat ourselves kindly."

Oh so true. How I view myself will directly translate into how I treat others. But all of this, treating yourself with compassion, treating others with compassion, learning how to be vulnerable... if I didn't see myself as being worthy of any of it, then I wouldn't have any reason to give it to anyone else. 

Jesus said, "As my father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love." If I am loved by Christ as much as he was loved by God the father, then that is truly being loved.

Jesus was an example of loving the lowest of the low, the tax collectors, the prostitutes, the swindlers, the morally broken, the diseased, the downtrodden. He knew where his worth came from and he could freely give love to those around him because of it.

That's the way I want to be.

I want to freshly dare to be vulnerable, to love others because I am loved, to be compassionate because I have been shown great compassion, to dare to tell my story, to feel the good and the bad and learn from my mistakes and have gratitude for the blessings.

Join me?

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