Hi friends,

It's late on a Saturday night in April.  Today I worked around the house - cut the grass, weeded, cleaned toilets, took the wooden garage entry door off and worked on areas of rot/filler/new stain/sealant.  It felt good to do physical labor, to fix things, to use my latent carpentry skills (I learned carpentry from our DIY dad, and spent 2 years as a carpenter's apprentice in my mid-20's - thank you Jerry Reinford).  I thought often today of Val and what she would do today.  So, I also cleaned toilets, dusted a bit, vacuumed, did a crossword puzzle, read for relaxation, took a 20 minute nap (Val would have napped for 2 hours minimum), and then showered and went to an evening concert at a wonderful local venue - The Sellersville Theater.

Leo Kottke was in concert - https://www.leokottke.com/disc - and I have known of him for years as I play a Taylor guitar, and Kottke  has played Taylors.  Through the last 30 years, as I would read Taylor guitar publicity, I would read about Leo playing a Taylor 12 string guitar - https://www.12fret.com/instruments/taylor-leo-kottke-signature-model-natural-1994/    

So, Leo played without a set list - he played spontaneously, which according to my seat neighbor, Patti, he always does.  Patti was a blessing. She made written notes of what he played and her feelings about the songs, telling me that she is part of a 4 person group that love Leo and follows him and tells the others what he is doing/what they experienced at his latest concert.

I found myself in both familiar and new space.  That is,  in this season of grieving, loss, and  recentering my life, I have found music, especially musicians that embrace the spiritual/mystical/painful/doubt...as especially meaningful and enjoyable to listen to and ponder.  Allow me to offer some advice:

Friends, death and sorrow will come to all of us.  No matter what.  To some, it will come unbidden,  unwelcome, and premature.  To many, it will come in its time, for those that have lived good, influential, long lives.  We can't control it - death will come.  I have learned...be ready, prepare now...as macabre as that may seem, but I am just acknowledging an inescapable fact.  Prepare now.  Bless those that live after you by preparing, by discussing, by processing,  by planning your funeral, by purchasing your tombstone and graveyard plot or cremation...well in advance.  This seems morbid to some of you.   But you will all agree that we all will die.  I suggest you bless the living by preparing for what will inevitably will happen.

Minimally, I suggest that the living do this - The Five Wishes - https://www.fivewishes.org/

You can discuss and make decisions NOW to put in place your wishes for when you might be hospitalized, or lose some of your cognition or physical or mental acuity, or similar.  It's such a blessing to decide now, when you are healthy, what you want to happen when you are not healthy, or not able to make good decisions, or similar.  I am not a doomsayer...but I/we know that we all will die, and it blesses and helps the living...those that make decisions, those that love us, those that are family...to know what our wishes are before we lose the ability to make good decisions.

I leave you tonight with mystery and poetry.  A song from Leo, and a poem from Jan Richardson, from the  Cure for Sorrow .

 file:///C:/Users/Mike.MIKEFORDPC/Downloads/Blessing%20the%20Questions%20(Jan%20RIchardson).pdf

Leo sang many songs tonight that moved me.  One was just an instrumental song on 6 sting guitar...and it moved me to tears because it made me happy...I felt joy for a moment.  Those of us who lament deep loss know this...happiness is illusive, temporary...out there.  We miss a partner with whom we can never again discuss and have joy over what has passed in the many years of our lives together.  It is hard.  Tell me why?

You Tell Me Why
By Ron Elliot
Copyright 1965 Clears Music, Inc./Bmi
Recorded by Leo Kottke on:
1973 "Ice Water" (Capitol)

You tell me that I must not cry
You tell me all good things must die
You ask me why I get upset
You tell me that I will forget
Tell me why
You tell me I won't be blue for long
You say I'll find a love that's strong