circle games...

its raining today in mississippi. i think the whole state has seen scattered showers and will see them all weekend.

ive always had this kind of love affair with the rain. when we were little momma had an old record that she would put on that had thunderstorms on it and we would cry and scream, but we loved it! there was something about that feeling of your heart pounding when the thunder would crash and then the sweet comfort of minda's little hand in mine with that wild look in her eyes. we also loved it when daddy would put on our hap palmer record. what a wonderful thing on a rainy day when we could not go out to play! we'd laugh and sing along with sweet hap as he sang the "opposite song" and we played the "circle game." safe from whatever threatened outside because Daddy was watching us from where he was studying in the next room.

frederick buechner has said that he loves the rain for how much more cozy it makes the indoors feel. i think i am in love with the rain for this reason too. to lie in bed on a lazy afternoon or during a thunderous night is just about the most wonderful thing i can think of. blankets never feel so warm. pillows never feel so soft. and a book is never quite so good. even music is better when its raining outside. haven't you ever seen dirty dancing? the part where they go running inside to patrick swazye's little cabin to beat the downpour and then dance to soloman burke's, "cry to me"! that would not have been nearly as romantic if it had not been raining. i am convinced. (only here in my little world will you get dirty dancing and buechner in the same paragraph!)

today on my lunch break i drove over to the cemetary where my great aunt evie is buried. its a beautiful place with large live oaks and little ponds with ducks and geese. it was a crazy day at work and i could not think of a better place to get away to for a moment and clear my head.
the rain in those big old trees was so calming. i think if there is anything i love almost as much as the rain, it is trees. they are such an example to us as humans, don't you think? anyway, it was so nice to stand there for a moment under my umbrella with my friends the trees, with evies wind chime sweetly singing beside me, drawing strength from she who walked before me. it just occured to me how precious a thing death can be when a life has been well lived. what i mean to say is that the death of a person who has lived such a great life can become a catalyst for those who come after. like there is this void that is almost instanteously felt when a person passes that calls out for the next generation to step up and carry on. we do a lot of that as humans, don't we? carrying on. its a circle we all draw over and over together with our families and friends. maybe the rain should be a reminder to us that the heavens and the earth create thier circles too and that the Father is always there. watching over us as we play our circle games.


today i am listening to:
patty griffin--rain--1000 kisses
louis armstrong--what a wonderful world--what a wonderful world
hap palmer--the circle game--getting to know myself

today i am watching:
its always sunny in philadelphia

today i am reading:
frederick buechner--a sacred journey

poem of the day:
The Lightening is a yellow Fork
From Tables in the sky
By inadvertant fingers dropt
The awful cutlery

Of mansions never quite disclosed
And never quite concealed
The Apparatus of the Dark
To ignorance revealed.
--Emily Dickinson