As to your request ...so you don't have those long distance
charges.
The 2006 Happy Holiday Telephone wish from the Geography Department
at EOU.
See YOU On the Beaufort Sea. NEW Water
Boxes I have known.
A STORY AND A SONG For My Students Studying for Finals...here's a
little background music.
A True Junior High Love Story and the song Moon
River TAP ON THE LINE ABOVE for an audio file of a story and
the Henry Mancini Classic, from Breakfast at Tiffany's.Moon River.
Or tap on the control below
Me on vocal,,,, and Ed Gerghard and me on guitar.
Moon River from the 1961 motion picture,
Breakfast At Tiffany's.
This is one of my favorite songs...it brings back so many good
memories. Even recent memories....very recent. I tell a little
story on podcast recording that dates back to my junior high school
days in 1967...but before you check into the podcast here are
a few thoughts that prompted this addition to the wedding page...First
let me say that I appreciate all the e-mails over the last few
months asking for more stories, more thoughts, and monographs.
Well I've been a little down for awhile and have had to save up
some energy...but this is something to keep some of you going...it
just a little writing I call...
You Saved My Life
If you were that little crippled girl (like they called us back
then) and I would of been in school with you, I would have never
laughed at you...I would of taken care of you, I would have protected
you from those bullies at school and I would have smiled every
time I helped you in your wheelchair up the steps. I would
of taken care of you. I would have played with you, flown kites
with you, taken you down to that big river and fished with you
all summer long. And if you would of let me, I would have worn
your bracelet, and I would still have it on today.
But as it is, you saved my life! You found
me so depressed hanging by a thread over the dark rushing waters
of that river. There was no moonlight there was no starlight...just
darkness and that river below. You took my hand and as the wind
nearly blew both of us off that precipice I begged you, "please
let me go" but you refused. Now I have so many questions,
especially since you brought me back from a place where I didn't
matter and I didn't care.
I ask myself now as I look into your eyes and
touch your hand...is there a place in this world for someone like
me? Is there a person in this world for someone as disabled
as me? I now possess a broken heart with a wound that opens
daily and stains my soul with that dark depressing colour of pain.
I couldn't pass that pain on to you although now....you reach
out to me. You saved my life you know. Your smile, your laughing
eyes...it's no wonder the whole world wants to look at you. But
you looked at me! And you would not let me go!
If it were another time, once upon a time,
if the centre of gravity of our lives would have be shifted for
just a moment to the left or to the right, maybe then this experience
we share would tip in our flavour and we could both truly fall
into something that would go on for such a long long time.....
like mystical virtue, never ending. Oh how I long for that. But
if all I can do is simply view your essence through your castle
window, although I can be happy, I know that we would not. Yet
for now, maybe forever, I am satisfied with knowing that there
is someone who cares about me; cares whether I exist. That thought
keeps me safe.
Who are you? Are you an angel sent just to
me in the storm of this life? I look into your eyes and you predict
the weather for me... you can start the sun to shine with your
smile....and in the heat of the day you come to me with a cup
of cool clear rain water. Who are you? Are you from above the
clouds? Are you from heaven? You saved my life you know. Why do
you care so? Is this finally a real taste of mystic virture?
On Waiting, On Being Lonely
My first lesson learned about waiting for love
was inadvertent to say the least. It occurred in Mr. Smith's grade
7 English class. As I struggled through diagraming sentences,
in the class room right next to our English class was the choir
room. From our English classroom I could clearly hear the first
period concert choir practicing their songs. It was like junior
high school English with MUZAC. They worked on some classic tunes
back then like, Once Upon A Time, The Theme from Fiddler on the
Roof, songs from The Sound of Music...and one in particular, from
the movie Breakfast at Tiffany's....Moon River.
I had English and Reading for my first two
periods so as the first period choir was getting out, our class
took a break and I would go to the door and watch for a certain
someone to emerge from the choir room heading for her next class.
I can still hear that choir practicing like
it was yesterday....the piano begins, and through the wall of
that classroom my mind cues itself to a proper noun........ Moon
River...and instead of underlining prepositional phrases...my
mind starts to wander and I begin to mentally sing along......"wider
than a mile, I'm crossing you in style........some day.....oh
dream maker...you heart breaker, wherever you're going...I'm going
your way."
Now I ask you, weather girl, city girl with
the smile of sunshine, when will that day come for me? When will
I cross that river my sweet precious friend? Perhaps
at least for right now I can say that I am on its banks with
you, and you are holding on tightly to my hand. You tell me that
you want to protect me from the river's cold, raging current.
I look at you and feel very safe.
"Can we go play with my boat in the big river?" I ask
you.
"No" you say to me, "not now sweetheart, it's still
winter, but when the summer comes, then I'll take you down to
the river and we will play boats and swim and enjoy the warm summer
sun all day long. I promise you."
The cold wind blows in our faces. But I am not apprehensive, not
anxious because I know...someday the summer will come again. Someday
it will, because she said so and I trust her, she saved my life.
She would not let me go. She is my day dream now and and in it
I feel safe and secure and truly loved.
I hope you enjoy the music and the spoken true
story of a junior high school crush.
Have a good holiday break and I wish you all great final grades,
