Running Crazy

This is pretty much what it looks like to run in Cincy
lately, except we have more hills. Image source:
Patrick Nijhuis on freeimages.com.

Running metaphors tend to make me a little stabby, not because they're (necessarily) untrue, but because geez, surely there are other ways to encourage humans to live life as it comes or take it one day at a time without resorting to "It's a marathon, not a sprint!" Running metaphors date at least as far back as the apostle Paul. Let them go, y'all.

So it's a little crazy-making when I catch myself thinking, "You don't have to go fast, you just have to go," or similar platitudes when I'm running. And then I waste valuable energy being annoyed at myself for not coming up with anything better than clichés to pep talk myself with. It's not that they aren't true; it's that I, as always, want more words. Or at least different ones. Because it's my intention in life as well as running to be here for the long haul, which will take all the words and energy I can muster.

Yeah, half marathon training is going great.

What's making you crazy today?

Will It Grow? Secret Garden, Round Two

I do not consider myself particularly lucky, especially when it comes to critical life moments like choosing a checkout queue at the supermarket or finding a good parking space, but sometimes, some really great times, I'm the luckiest person alive.

Signed by (top to bottom) Jason
Forbach (Albert Lennox), Jared
Michael Brown (Lieutenant
Wright), Maya Maniar (Ayah),
& Henry Baratz (Colin Craven).

I had one of those great times when I got to return to D.C. only a couple weeks after I saw The Secret Garden to see it a second time. My show ticket and place to stay were provided by other kind and generous folks, making this trip both awesome and affordable. Thank you, kind and generous folks!

This show closed in D.C. last weekend, but if you're in Seattle, you're in luck--they're coming to you soon. Don't miss it. Please don't miss it. If nothing else, you'll get to see it in the spring, which is obviously the correct season for a show that includes a song called "Winter's on the Wing."

Spoilers after the jump.

Heat It Up

Y'all. It's cold outside.

That being the case, I'm using up a lot of electricity. And I'm betting you are, too, even you lucky folks in Austin, who I've heard have also been a mite chilly lately.

Once upon a time in the depths of environmental bloggers past, Crunchy Chicken used to run a Freeze Yer Buns Challenge. (She may still, from another platform where I don't follow her.) I'm a person who is cold all summer long because air conditioning, so being cold all winter long just makes me sad. Alas, that's how winter works.

So! If you want to be green and save some green at the same time, it helps if you can put your thermostat as low as you can stand it. Age-old strategies like wearing sweaters in the house and curling up under blankets still work just fine. And wrapping your fingers around a mug of hot tea, cocoa, or coffee always helps. (Decaf only after 9 AM for me. I know, so boring!)

You're gonna need a bunch of these.
Image source: Dr. Manhatthan on freeimages.com.

A couple other strategies I use that are more "move the energy around" than strictly "saving energy": I turn the thermostat down for the house and carry a space heater from place to place with me. If you're doing this, please don't dig your 20-year-old one out of the attic. For safety's sake, get a newer one with all the up-to-date safety features. Thanks to considerable advances, this is one appliance where older is not better.

I also had a brainwave before Christmas and asked for an electric blanket, thus making my Grandma's shopping easier and my own nights more pleasant. This does make it harder to get out of bed in the morning, but that's better than shivering all night, methinks. And when my electric bill comes, heating up just me does turn out to be cheaper than heating up all of my square feet.

What do you do to keep your electricity (or gas) use under control during the winter?

Because I Can Never Say Enough Things About Libraries

It was a very bookish trip to D.C. this time around (the more so if I count The Secret Garden under "books"), with visits to Folger Shakespeare Library, the Library of Congress, and Politics and Prose bookstore.

I landed at Folger Shakespeare Library first, where I was met by a docent at the door who asked, "Are you here for the tour or the exhibit?" Naturally, I said, "Can I do both?" and she agreed that that was a terrific idea.

The exhibit at the moment holds various folios have have travelled around the US during 2016 so that folks across the country could have a look at some of the Folger collection, which was pretty cool, but no matter how amazing the exhibit is, it can't hold a candle to the Folger tour. (Not that candles are allowed. That would be dangerous with all the old books.)

If you're even a little bit interested in theatre or Shakespeare, and you think you may ever visit D.C., put the Folger Library on your list and be sure to take the tour. The docents are incredibly knowledgeable, anxious to answer as many questions as possible, and just all-round fun, as you can imagine from people who spend their professional lives around Shakespeare's words. (Their social media team is also fantastic & worth a follow.) Whether you can visit the library or not, the Folger editions of Shakespeare's plays are helpfully annotated and good choices for reading/homeschooling/keeping on your shelf/etc. Although if you're teaching your kids Shakespeare, please please PLEASE be sure to see the plays onstage, too. That's how they're meant to be experienced!

It's possible I may have been humming "God, I Hate Shakespeare" from Something Rotten through the whole tour. Maybe. It could have been someone else.

Top row: theatre inside the library, Hamlet, Puck, Romeo and Juliet.

One down, two to go. Next up was the Library of Congress, and I bet you've already guessed what I'm going to say next: GO! The artwork alone is worth a trip, but then you get a peek into the main reading room (and have to take a break to get over fits of jealousy for people who're allowed in there), and the Jefferson Library, with quite a lot of his original books still intact and on display (not in use, of course), and whatever exhibits are in season.

I was there for the final week of the "America Reads" exhibit, which showcases American authors who've shaped the country with their work. Obviously, that's a pretty wide range of folks, so it's probably just as well that I wasn't responsible for deciding which authors and books were included. God bless librarians who are capable of making those kinds of tough choices.

L to R, top row first: Christmas tree; Jefferson Library; stairs to the reading room;
Jefferson Library entrance; two of the many quotes near the ceiling;
building front; one of many pretty parts of the ceiling.

And finally--Politics and Prose Bookstore. They were listed in an article about bookstores worth travelling for that someone sent me recently, and since I was already travelling, I took a train and a Capital Bikeshare out to have a look. And then wished I'd started there.

While I have a running list of favourite bookstores on the planet*, my real favourite is usually whichever one I'm standing in. And Politics and Prose is delightful. First of all, I'm fairly convinced they use a Charles Rennie Mackintosh font, although I've not been able to find confirmation on this so far (but it sure looks like it).

It's a beautiful store, with lots of friendly staff and happy (at least when I was there) patrons. And a fantastic cafe downstairs. While I of course want you to visit, I'm a book person. I just want you to go to whatever bookstore, or library, or provider of books is near you. No airplanes required.

I own three copies of Les Misérables and don't need a fourth,
so I settled for taking a pic of this gorgeous, amazing cover.
Just looking at it again makes me sad I left it behind.
What I didn't leave behind: This beautiful picture created out of the early chapters
of The Secret Garden. And since I was in D.C. to see Secret Garden onstage,
it wasn't a hard decision.

What's your favourite book place? (And if you want to spend some relaxing and entertaining time on Twitter, I have a list of just book places.)


*In approximate order of current love: BookPeople, Austin; Strand Books, New York; Bookmamas, Indianapolis; Caledonian Books, Glasgow; Hester Books, Lubbock; Booksellers, Cincinnati; Books & Brews, Indianapolis. Politics and Prose will have to fit in there somewhere.

Rolling Right Along: Capital Bikeshare and Pennsylvania Avenue

I went to D.C. twice in December. Not on purpose.

Well, okay, yes on purpose, but while the first one was planned a few weeks ahead of time, the second one was a surprise that I willingly said 'yes, please!' to and had a lot less time to make plans for.

Anyway. Y'all know my life is basically about books, bikes, and buses, right? With some (frequently book-based) theatre on the side? Those are also what my two days in D.C. were all about on trip #2. I navigated the city via train (instead of buses, and it was very easy. For a tourist, anyway. I might be less pleased if I lived there all the time), with a couple breaks in the middle to take a spin on Capital Bikeshare.

It's going to be a while before I get tired
of looking at this pic. Pennsylvania Avenue
bike lanes, with the Capitol in the background.

Naturally, I chose the bike lanes that run between the White House and the Capitol via the middle of Pennsylvania Avenue for this adventure, although the D.C. bikeway network is growing, and I definitely want to check out more of it in the future. Due to some nightmare construction or upgrages or whatever at DC Metro, Capital Bikeshare has a one-way $2 fare right now, in addition to the $8 day pass or other memberships, which is meant to help commuters cover their first and last mile needs. I wasn't planning to ride all day, so $2 for a one-way zoom through the nation's capital was a pretty good deal. (Although I did not zoom. As I told my friend Scott, I rode as slowly as possible to savour the trip while it lasted.)

I did not take a picture of my bikeshare bike, for reasons passing understanding, but I did at least stop for a quick Periscope, and I think there's a glimpse of the bike in there. I haven't rewatched it, and I was pretty excited, so there's no telling what gibberish comes out of my mouth in that video. Ye be warned.

I managed another quick trip on Day 2, this time to complete a literal last mile between my train stop and the bookstore I was headed to. Just as I experienced in D.C. (and in Austin, and in Cincinnati), researchers have found over and over again that bike share works best when it's integrated into the public transportation system. And D.C.'s current $2 promotion to help bridge some gaps in the transit network is a great step in the right direction. I'm so glad I got to be a part of it, even if it was for one short day.

What's a cool/exciting/out-of-the-ordinary thing you've done lately?

Reading Challenges Update: December

I finished all of my reading challenges for 2016!

Will you do that again? No, I don't think so. Most of them I forgot to check in on more than once or twice all year, and therefore I didn't technically fulfill the challenge requirements. It was fun, but I'm ready for different fun now.

What, no challenges at all for 2017? Well, let's not go that far. I've signed up for the Goodreads Challenge again. Of all the challenges from 2016, my favourite was probably the Woman Challenge, so my plan is to make sure at least half the books I read in 2017 are written by women.

What's your Goodreads goal? I'm glad you asked! I like reading over 100 books in a year, because it gives me things to think/tweet/talk about all the time. However, setting such a high goal makes it rough to tackle longer books, and since I have a few of those on the to-read list I'm setting my goal lower--52 books--in the hopes that I can get through some longer ones without feeling like I'm failing at an arbitrary challenge.

Any other suggestions or ideas? I'm thinking over my favourites from 2016 and will share those next week! Another thing I'm planning to do in 2017 is read a few things that I wouldn't normally pick up--I'm hoping to choose at least one book per month from Goodreads friends' lists that make me say, "But why?" to find out what the fuss is all about. Particularly people with short lists--those are much easier to peruse. (And that being the case, my apologies to all my Goodreads friends for the excessive length of my lists. By the way, are you on Goodreads? Let's be friends.)

So here's December. As always, links are to and images are from Goodreads, where all my reviews are written.

I Love Libraries Challenge CHALLENGE COMPLETED (53/50 books)
Black Man, White House: An Oral History of the Obama Years, D.L. Hughley
Make Good Art, Neil Gaiman, Chip Kidd (Designer)
This is a Book, Demetri Martin
Sweater Quest: My Year of Knitting Dangerously, Adrienne Martini
The Scribe: Silas, Francine Rivers
How to Sleep Alone in a King-Size Bed: A Memoir, Theo Pauline Nestor
Real Artists Have Day Jobs: (And Other Awesome Things They Don't Teach You in School), Sara Benincasa
A Family on Wheels: Further Adventures of the Trapp Family, Maria Augusta von Trapp & Ruth T. Murdoch


Read It Again, Sam CHALLENGE COMPLETED (6/4 books)
The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett (Read this ahead of seeing the musical!)
Dash & Lily's Book of Dares, Rachel Cohn & David Levithan


Woman Challenge CHALLENGE COMPLETED (61/20 books)
The Wednesday Sisters, Meg Waite Clayton
Sweater Quest: My Year of Knitting Dangerously, Adrienne Martini
The Scribe: Silas, Francine Rivers
Bronze, Kerri-Anne Weston
How to Sleep Alone in a King-Size Bed: A Memoir, Theo Pauline Nestor
Real Artists Have Day Jobs: (And Other Awesome Things They Don't Teach You in School), Sara Benincasa
A Family on Wheels: Further Adventures of the Trapp Family, Maria Augusta von Trapp & Ruth T. Murdoch


Mount TBR Challenge CHALLENGE COMPLETED (51/48 books)
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Benjamin Franklin
Bronze, Kerri-Anne Weston
The Buttersmiths' Gold, Adam Glendon Sidwell
For 91 Days In Idaho, Michael Powell, Jürgen Horn (Photographer)
The Canterville Ghost, Oscar Wilde
Walking, Henry David Thoreau


Goodreads Challenge CHALLENGE COMPLETED (112/100 books)
The Wednesday Sisters, Meg Waite Clayton
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Benjamin Franklin
Black Man, White House: An Oral History of the Obama Years, D.L. Hughley
Make Good Art, Neil Gaiman, Chip Kidd (Designer)
This is a Book, Demetri Martin
Sweater Quest: My Year of Knitting Dangerously, Adrienne Martini
The Scribe: Silas, Francine Rivers
Bronze, Kerri-Anne Weston
The Buttersmiths' Gold, Adam Glendon Sidwell
How to Sleep Alone in a King-Size Bed: A Memoir, Theo Pauline Nestor
For 91 Days In Idaho, Michael Powell, Jürgen Horn (Photographer)
The Canterville Ghost, Oscar Wilde
Walking, Henry David Thoreau
Real Artists Have Day Jobs: (And Other Awesome Things They Don't Teach You in School), Sara Benincasa
A Family on Wheels: Further Adventures of the Trapp Family, Maria Augusta von Trapp & Ruth T. Murdoch


What are you reading?

Crawling Might Be Faster

Remember how I said I'm running the El Paso Half Marathon? Yeah, well, it's now six weeks away, heaven help me, and Cincinnati is a frigid place to be running in. I'd be lying if I didn't say I'm looking forward to the warmth of El Paso almost as much as I'm looking forward to seeing my friends who live there. One of those warms the cockles of my heart; the other warms my numb fingertips so I can feel them again.

Because I don't know this city well yet, my long runs have been a bit of a challenge. I'm trying to stick to straight lines as much as possible until I have a better map of the city in my head, because while getting lost is a wonderful way to fill in the gaps in that map, getting lost while in the middle of a 9-mile run in 25-degree weather is not my idea of a good time.

We happened to have a warm (55°) but rainy day last week, and that's when I decided to head out for my scheduled 8-miler. And I decided to go downtown to run near the river. Great ideas so far, right?

Well.

Try not to look too closely at my speed. This is going to be a slow race.

My neighborhood is on top of a hill. Downtown has a river running through it (hence the low & flat, once I got there). Why the hill back up looks more gradual than the hill going down I don't know, because it was the exact same hill, and I barely dragged myself up it. If a bus had been coming by while I was trying to get through that last quarter mile, I probably would have gotten aboard. And then dripped all over everything, because I was soaked through from the rain. I think I got drier when I got into the shower.

I know, some of you live in hillier places than I do and manage to go out and crush your runs. Please don't tell me about it. It's depressing enough thinking about doing this one again. But, another one finished, another day closer to my next half.

What are you one day closer to?

New Year, God Help Us All

Source: Pinterest.

Yes, I willingly join in the general discontent with The Year That Must Not Be Named And Has Finally Gone Away, Praise Pope Gregory XIII. Not that I have much hope for 2017, because my high degree of cynicism/crankiness has only been enhanced by the personal and societal turmoils of the last few months.

However! I'm going to pretend that I'm the Cheery Su some of you once knew, if only for the sake of resetting, in a "fake it til I make it" kind of way. Since my 2016 kind of fell apart, I didn't do any regular checking in on my 2016 goals, so this is about to be as much of a surprise to me as it is to anyone:

1. Run the Indy Mini in May. Done. 
And scheduled to do again in 2017.

2. Eat the correct nutrients to fuel the running/riding/etc. Disaster.
I'll try a bit harder on this one in 2017.

3. Arrive everywhere early enough to get in at least five minutes of writing. Maybe half done?
I may arrive early, but that doesn't mean I automatically use that time to write. Sometimes I read, sometimes I talk, sometimes I stare into space. Also, if I continue this into 2017 (haven't decided on that yet), I'm going to have to exempt work from this. Being in the office=no writing is being done, no matter how much extra time I give myself.

4. Write every day. Nearly done.
To say I wrote every day is untrue, but I wrote most days. Probably 300 out of 366 days included some writing. Some days included a lot, some days a little. Continuing this into 2017.

5. Take on some writing I wouldn't normally do. Done, but not as much as I'd like.
I even tried writing some Little House on the Prairie fanfiction a few months back (I haven't posted it anywhere yet). So I'm continuing this one. And, since I start a new job next week, I'm sure more new writing will be coming my way.

6. Read 100+ books. Done.
More about this coming on Tuesday, with my final Reading Challenge update from 2016.

You can try and stop the hands of time
But ya know it just can't be.
Image source: André Montejorge on
freeimages.com.
(Words are from "You Can't Stop
the Beat," from Hairspray. Yes, I
can sometimes quote musicals that
aren't Les Misérables.)

New Goals for 2017:

1. Get my running in.
I have a few more weeks of a half marathon training plan in the lead-up to the El Paso Half Marathon, and then I'll take a week off before plunging back into training for the Indy Mini. After that... ?? I have no more races planned for 2017, but since I only had two planned for 2016 and ended up doing five, I'm sure something will come up. Regardless, running is too important for my physical and mental health for me to ignore it.

2. Go outside every day.
I know this sounds crazy, but I have a tendency to hide inside all day long on days off or cold days. And especially on cold days off. Having a new job should help, since my weekdays will be filled once again, but I hate to waste my weekends locked inside when there's a big world out there waiting for me to go look at it.

3. Remember that this is my life now.
After a couple years of upheaval, some of it my own doing and some of it inflicted upon me by outside forces, I have a hard time some days remembering that this is where I live and these people are the ones around me now (the temptation to live online and not make any in-person friends is way strong). Maybe I need to cross-stitch a sampler to hang by my bed that says something like "You live in Cincinnati. Try not to forget."

4. Learn how to write a real review of anything.
I review books. I review musicals. Most of my reviews are variations on a theme of "This is so fantastic!" which is not particularly helpful to others. I don't necessarily want to learn this to get paid, although that would be great. I just want to do it well enough to have a reason to continue doing it.


No super-ambitious goals for the year, but I'm good with small ones. What are your goals for 2017?

Small Forest, Slightly Processed

There's some book news doing the rounds this week (two Facebook friends have already sent me links to two different articles, so at least I know I'm known for being bookish as well as bikeish) about a library in Florida that created a dummy account to check out books, so that less-checked-out but still-beloved books wouldn't be culled based on a software algorithm.

Y'all. Can we talk about how crazy this is? Librarians are highly skilled professionals in a competitive field--if they aren't good at what they do, they don't last long. Why on earth would you hire someone with that much knowledge and then use automation instead of their professional judgment? The article I linked above makes a comparison to teachers, to which I can only say: Yes! Let's get back to treating experts in their fields as experts in their fields and stop second-guessing them every step of the way until they throw up their hands in frustration at not being able to do the job they were trained and hired to do.

That's not actually what today's post is about. Instead, I want to praise libraries more generally, for the earth-friendly, budget-friendly, people-friendly intuitions that they are. I'm sure it's no secret that I love libraries even more than I love theatres, and utilize their services a lot more frequently. (Although I've never once asked a librarian for an autograph. Clearly, I've been doing it wrong.) Support your local library, y'all. PLEASE. The range of services that a library offers is invaluable, and I started to make a list of just the things I've done at the library this week but it got too long for one sentence. Suffice to say, they've been invaluable in both my job search and my sanity preservation for these last nine months especially. And I'm just one person--multiply my experience by millions of people using these spaces every day. We need our libraries.

And, of course, since it's earth-loving day here at Cheekyness, keep in mind that me sharing one of 10 copies of a book with the other 300,000 folks who live in Cincinnati requires far fewer trees than every one of us running out and buying a copy. Multiply that by every library in the country and that's a lot of forest-saving.

I know there are many folks who prefer to own every book they've read. If that's you, fine. Thanks for supporting authors this way. But if you can't buy a copy of every book you want to read (and I can't!), you know who else supports authors by buying their books? The library. And when you check a book out, you're letting them know that you like that book and they should keep it in circulation, and perhaps buy more copies. No less a person that John Green says so.

Speaking of circulation--one final thing before I go, and it's a thing I just learned this week. It's not just about books that are checked out, it's also about ones that are read in-house. So, if you pick up a book off a library shelf and read it without checking it out, don't put it back on the shelf! Put it on one of the carts designated for that purpose throughout the library, so the library staff can note it was used before returning it to its proper spot. This helps with their funding and their justification to keep a book that may seem like it's not getting a lot of action. If you put a book back, the library has no way of knowing how many pairs of eyes were on it.

See the full Tumblr post here.

In short: Libraries are vortexes of awesome innocently plunked down in the middle of neighborhoods. If you haven't been to one in a while, it's time to find out what you're missing. Let's show our libraries we have their backs as much as they have ours.

On the Twelfth Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

A somewhat stylized version of the visit of the Magi.
Image source: Bartek Ambrozik on freeimages.com.

"We Three Kings"

By: John Henry Hopkins, Jr

Written in: Williamsport, Pennsylvania, 1857

I have thoughts: First of all, what kind of a ridiculous word is "twelfth," am I right? English is goofy. No wonder it's so hard for folks to learn it as a second language; plenty of people have trouble learning it as a first language. (The number of times I've said to my father, "How do you even come up with a sentence like that? You are a native English speaker." Apparently, he speaks some unknown dialect of Indiana English that is incomprehensible to even his own children.)

Where were we? Oh, yeah, the three kings. So, tonight is Twelfth Night, when the Three Kings visit children and leave presents (some families celebrate both Christmas and Three Kings Day, while others just choose one) in various cultures around the world. Tomorrow is Epiphany, when people will celebrate with King's Cakes, family dinners, and (for those of us who stick with tradition) taking down the Christmas tree. It is the final day of Christmas.

This is quite a sweeping overview I'm giving you, and doesn't even begin to capture the historical importance of Epiphany to the Christian calendar, so if you want to know more, the Wikipedia article is long and detailed and contains links to sources.

So, what better song for Twelfth Night than "We Three Kings"? Most folks will note that in the Biblical account there were three gifts, not three visitors, and that three gents undertaking such a journey without a big crowd with them is pretty unlikely. It's a song that draws heavily on legend and tradition, since we don't have a lot of information about these travellers.

Verse: The three middle verses describing the gifts, naturally, since those tend not to be sung much.

Born a king on Bethlehem's plain,
Gold I bring to crown Him again,
King forever, ceasing never
Over us all to reign.

Frankincense to offer have I.
Incense owns a Deity nigh.
Prayer and praising all men raising,
Worship Him, God on high.

Myrrh is mine: Its bitter perfume
Breaths a life of gathering gloom.
Sorrow, sighing, bleeding, dying,
Sealed in a stone-cold tomb.

Watch: Because I'm not turning down singing Hugh Jackman. Australians sure know how to party. Especially that bit toward the end when they get a bit prophetic about Hugh's future and start marching like it's "One Day More." (In case you're wondering--I did, so I looked it up--yes, Hugh Jackman is left-handed.)



And that brings this fun little series to an end. I hope you've had a delightful holiday season, no matter which day you chose to stop celebrating. Tomorrow we're back to my usual books, bikes, and buses.

Sources:
Wikipedia
Metro Lyrics

On the Eleventh Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

Chains shall he break, indeed.
Image source: Sigurd Decroos
on freeimages.com.

"O Holy Night"

By: Words by Placide Cappeau, music by Adolphe Adam. The translation we most often sing in English is by John Sullivan Dwight.

Written in: Roquemaure, France, in 1847

I have thoughts: So much love for this song. It's gorgeous. The third verse, my favourite one, is so spectacular and still so resonant in today's culture that I get a bit annoyed when people only sing verse one a couple of times and call it done. No, you're not done; break open that hymnal and give us the third verse, dangit. I wrote about the third verse to this song quite some time ago, and unfortunately I still say today what I said then: we aren't keeping our end of promise of the third verse. Chains shall HE break, yes, but "in His name all oppression shall cease."

Not to give in to despair, but when I look around me I all too often see a society that jumps at the chance to forge chains on others or break ties of friendship. Who is my brother or sister? Not the people who disagree with me, that's for sure. In fact, let's get on Facebook and call the other side dumb and complain about how they just don't get it and be sure to unfriend people who raise any objection. Facebook is the chosen battleground for airing why everyone else is wrong, it seems--people who I know for sure know better are drawing lines between one another that Jesus never drew, and it's heartbreaking.

Chains shall He break, everyone is a brother or sister, and oppression shall cease. Let's make that our goal for 2017, please?

Verse: The second verse is less well-known, but the third verse is my favourite, so today you get both.

Led by the light of Faith serenely beaming,
With glowing hearts by His cradle we stand.
So led by light of a star sweetly gleaming,
Here come the wise men from the Orient land.
The King of Kings lay thus in lowly manger;
In all our trials born to be our friend.
He knows our need, to our weaknesses no stranger,
Behold your King! Before Him lowly bend!
Behold your King, Before Him lowly bend!

Truly He taught us to love one another;
His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains shall He break for the slave is our brother;
And in His name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,
Let all within us praise His holy name.
Christ is the Lord! O praise His Name forever,
His power and glory evermore proclaim.
His power and glory evermore proclaim.

Watch: I asked for "O Holy Night" and YouTube gave me Hadley Fraser and Rosalie Craig. YouTube really gets me. (Although they don't sing the whole of the third verse, either. Grrr.)



Sources:
Wikipedia

On the Tenth Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

Image source: Davide Guglielmo on
freeimages.com.

"Dona Nobis Pacem"

By: It's part of the Latin Mass

Written in: A long time ago indeed.

I have thoughts: Okay, you caught me. This song doesn't so much have verses as one sentence that's repeated many, many times. What can I say--I wanted at least one in Latin, this is my favourite, so here it is. Plus, it's not like praying for peace has ever passed out of necessity, and we need it today as much as we ever have.

Incidentally, I learned this song from M*A*S*H, and while the entire clip from the episode ("Dear Sis") doesn't seem to be hanging out on YouTube, the cast singing the song is on the first part of this video.

Verse: This is an easy one!

Dona nobis pacem, pacem
Dona nobis pacem.

Watch:



Sources:
Wikipedia

On the Ninth Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

This photo is called
"Papai Noel de Bicicleta."
Y'all know I'm not about to
walk away from that.
Image source:
Juliana Castro on freeimages.com.

"The First Noel"

By: We don't know, but a bunch of folks had their hands on getting it to the form we sing today.

Written in: It was published in Cornwall in 1823, so... before that.

I have thoughts: I'm running out of ways to say "I love this song!" Although I suppose even that is redundant, because it's not like I'd include a song I hate in this little series, is it?

Verse: Verse five is the one I don't know, so here it is:

Then entered in those Wise men three
Full reverently upon their knee
And offered there in His presence
Their gold and myrrh and frankincense.
Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel
Born is the King of Israel!

Watch: (I've never heard of Aldrich and James until I went looking for a video for this song. Holy smokes. Definitely want to hear more of them!)



Sources:
Wikipedia
Metro Lyrics

On the Eighth Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

In the Biblical account and every dramatization I've ever
seen, the sheep remain remarkably calm throughout
the whole "angels in the sky" thing. Makes me wonder if
they'd met the angels before. "Oh, yeah, Gabriel.
 He likes these dramatic announcements. Gives him
a reason to wear his fancy angel robes."
Image source: A Berg on freeimages.com.

"Angels We Have Heard on High"

By: We don't know. The most widespread English translation is by James Chadwick.

Written in: We don't know that, either, except that it was in Languedoc, France, sometime before 1862. (There seem to be a great many things about Christmas carols that we don't know, which I suppose is appropriate for a holiday that was appropriated from a pagan feast in an unlikely season for Jesus to have been born, and which is presided over by a jolly and chubby version of a 4th century saint.)

I have thoughts: I love, love, love this song, not the least of which because it's great for altos to sing. We have our own melisma (I'm delighted there's a word for that!) in the chorus, which alternates with the sopranaos' more well known melismas. Also, I just love the tune in general. There are some Christmas tunes (see also "O Little Town of Bethlehem" or "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear") that seem haunting, more evocative of the long road that Mary and Joseph traveled and more foreshadowing of the lonely road ahead for Jesus. And this is one of those for me. Your mileage may vary, of course.

Verse: In the excellent film The Trouble with Angels, Mary Clancy is stuck at the convent over Christmas break and she sneaks into Christmas Eve Mass to watch the sisters. Reverend Mother sees her, of course, because Reverend Mother sees everything, but leaves her alone to watch instead of sending her away. This is the verse they're singing (if I recall correctly) during that scene. It's the third verse. (Incidentally, The Trouble with Angels is on my very short list of movies that I prefer to the books they're based on.)

Come to Bethlehem and see
Him Whose birth the angels sing;
Come, adore on bended knee,
Christ the Lord, the newborn King.

Watch:



Sources:
Wikipedia
Metro Lyrics

For as Long as We Both Shall Live

Today would have been my 15th wedding anniversary. (If that's already too sad of a beginning, come back round this afternoon for today's 12 Days of Christmas post. It's much happier.)

Among the many things that no one tells you when your spouse is alive and well is that one day, your anniversary will change. What was once "our anniversary" will be just another day of pain, one that's been overshadowed by The Deathiversary--the happiest day of your life displaced by the worst day.

There were plenty of people at my wedding who aren't here any longer. My grandfather, my great-grandmother, my grandmother, an aunt, an uncle, an bunch of my grandparents' friends I'd known my whole life--they all lie buried now, no longer here to witness the world still turning without them. And so does the groom.

And there were a bunch of
people at my wedding who are
still here, like these two, who are
part of the group I collectively
call "the baby cousins."
They're 15 years older now
but no less cute. Chadwick & I
didn't see a lot of their
growing up years, but we both
love(d) this pic.

People often tell me, still, "he's still with you" or "he's watching over you" and I don't know how I feel about that. On the one hand, having an animated conversation with my dead-but-still-here-husband in public is a good way to keep people on the street from asking me for change. On the other hand--I still don't want him watching me feel sorry for myself. Or having fun without him. Or trying to have fun without him and not succeeding. If the burden can't be made lighter by us sharing it between us, then I don't want to share it, not even in my imagination. Down that road lies more heartache than I can bear.

So for obvious reasons I no longer celebrate today, not the least of which is that the marriage that we once celebrated no longer exists. Death has parted us. All that remains is the memory of what was.

But. I've come through two Christmases, four birthdays (two of his and two of mine), a bunch of other holidays, one deathiversary, and one anniversary already still standing--or at least, having gotten back up after being knocked to the ground. I can do another day.

On the Seventh Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

I'm fairly certain this is not the gentleman from the song.
Image source: Luca Cinacchio on freeimages.com.

"God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen"

By: We don't know.

Written in: We don't know that, either, but it was before 1760.

I have thoughts: It took me a long time to understand this song, because in my head when I was a kid I kept putting the comma in the wrong place, which as we all know changes the meaning of the phrase. As a result, I spent many years wondering how, exactly, one rested merry, and not only that, but how one could be object of this resting merry instead of the agent. I imagine I'm not the only weird kid who had this problem.

One of my favourite Christmas parodies of all time is based on this song. Keep scrolling; I stuck it at the end.

Verse: It's the rare short(ish) Christmas carol! Verse three seems the least familiar to me.

"Fear not, then," said the angel,
"Let nothing you affright;
This day is born a Savior
Of a pure virgin bright,
To free all those who trust in him
From Satan's power and might."

Watch:





Sources:
Wikipedia
Metro Lyrics

On the Sixth Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

Image source: EveBlackwood on
freeimages.com.

"O Little Town of Bethlehem"

By: Lewis Redner

Written in: 1868

I have thoughts: There's nothing I don't love about this song.

Verse: Verses one, two, and five are the ones I usually hear sung, so here's verse three.

How silently, how silently,
The wondrous gift is given;
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of His Heaven.
No ear may hear His coming,
But in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive Him still,
The dear Christ enters in.

Watch:


Sources:
Wikipedia
Hymns and Carols of Christmas

On the Fifth Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

These bells. Not the little dinky ones.
Image source: T Austin on
freeimages.com.

"I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day"

By: Words by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Music (for the tune in the video below; there's more than one version) by John Baptiste Calkin.

Written in: 1863

I have thoughts: This was the song we sang in church that made me want to do this little series. I thought I knew the whole thing and then they threw a couple verses I didn't recognize at me.

Verse: This is verse three.

Till, ringing, singing on its way,
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime,
A chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Listen: The song starts at 6:03. Before that is more background about the song's origin.



Sources:
Wikipedia
Hymns and Carols of Christmas

On the Fourth Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

As a Doctor Who fan, I'm a bit nervous of angel statues,
but what else could I possibly use for this song?
Image source: alberto cavazzano on freeimages.com.

"It Came Upon the Midnight Clear"

By: Edmund Sears

Written in: 1849

I have thoughts: I chose this one for today because today is my grandfather's birthday (he would have been 91). Not that Grandpa particularly liked this song; I don't know how he felt about it. Here's what I do know: there was a made-for-TV movie by the same name that came out in 1984, when I was six. He and I watched it together.

In the movie, a man dies a week before Christmas but protests when he gets to heaven that he needs more time with his grandson, so they give him until Christmas Eve. (That's what I remember. IMDB has more details.) At the end of the movie, the man dies for good, having spent his final week making his grandson's Christmas amazing. Also at the end of the movie, Grandpa and I were both crying.

So this song has made me think of him ever since, even though we never talked about that movie ever again. Isn't it amazing how I manage to make every freaking thing sad? Quick, name a happy thing and I'll see if I can sad it up for you.

Verse: I couldn't choose between verses three and four, so let's do both.

But with the woes of sin and strife
The world has suffered long;
Beneath the angel-strain have rolled
Two thousand years of wrong;
And man, at war with man, hears not
The love song which they bring; –
O hush the noise, ye men of strife,
And hear the angels sing!

And ye, beneath life's crushing load,
Whose forms are bending low,
Who toil along the climbing way
With painful steps and slow,
Look now! for glad and golden hours
Come swiftly on the wing; –
Oh, rest beside the weary road
And hear the angels sing!

Watch:


Sources:
Wikipedia
Hymns and Carols of Christmas

On the Third Day of Christmas

For the 12 Days of Christmas, I'm sharing second, third, or otherwise not-first verses of popular Christmas carols.

Before we start, it's my dad's birthday! He's old. Happy birthday, Dad!

Image source: Phillip Rothe on
freeimages.com.

"Do You Hear What I Hear"

By: Noël Regney and Gloria Shayne Baker

Written in: October 1962

I have thoughts: I've never sung this song in a choir or caroling group or even in church. I'm kinda bummed about that.

Verse: I'm pretty sure all the verses in this song are well known, since it tells a story and if you leave a verse out the whole thing makes a little less sense, but let's go with the one Tim Hawkins made fun of (video of that is below the song down there. Just keep scrolling; you'll find it).

Said the little lamb to the shepherd boy
Do you hear what I hear
Ringing through the sky, shepherd boy,
Do you hear what I hear
A song, a song, high above the trees
With a voice as big as the sea
With a voice as big as the sea

Watch:




Sources:
Wikipedia
Lyrics Mode