I'm like a pencil;
sometimes sharp,
most days
well-rounded,
other times
dull or
occasionally
broken.
Still I write.
j.g. lewis
is a writer/photographer in Toronto.
Month: December 2019
Those of us who celebrate the date do so with traditions we adhere to, learn, or create.
Above all else, Christmas is tradition.
It shows itself beyond gifts or cards lined up on the shelf. It is felt more deeply than religion or faith. It is the simple belief that this day is what we were once told.
It keeps us believing.
Tradition is found within a mother’s needlepoint, or a song she sang. Maybe now you do too. It is remembering your sister as a child, as you see her child as she was about that age. This is, and has always been, time marked by family love and lore.
Tradition is in the stories we tell, or told.
Traditions keep us close to what we knew.
However you celebrate, if you celebrate, I wish you a Merry Christmas.
May your memories – the one’s you hold or the ones you make – be as warm, as loving, and as generous as mine.
Deep peace
-j-
share
what you can
share
what you might
your purpose
your patience
your wisdom
and light
share
without question
delay
or reserve
share your peace
your presence
and the silence
you deserve
share
the love
you have
nurtured
or hidden away
share it freely
with those people
who get what you say
12/24/2019 j.g.l.
Posted on December 23, 2019 by j.g.lewisLeave a comment
It’s touching how the music of your past will cause you to wonder, or create newfound feelings.
I’ve been playing a lot of old vinyl lately, at random, for no other reason than to fill the silence with worthwhile noise. Nostalgia seems to have crept in.
Yesterday morning I played Hold On by Dan Hill, a popular Canadian folksinger/songwriter in the mid-70s. The album’s title track was, then, a big hit with its massive background choir, epic arrangement, and inspiring lyrics.
I enjoyed the song, then, in the ‘70s.
I was more touched by it yesterday, more than I was then. What I remember.
The words spoke to me differently, or they seemed to have a purpose I did not or would not have been able to comprehend then, in the ‘70s.
Still they affected me. Then.
And they did yesterday.
I don’t previously remember the lump in my throat, or my eyes welling up because the lyrics took on a new meaning. The words showed themselves as they hadn’t before, not as a teenager could imagine. Like, previously, it was conceptual, and I did not know how to read between the lines.
I believe good songs, strong music, or poetry and great literature will resonate with you dependent upon age, circumstance, or where you are in life geographically or mentally.
At times, art will take you back to remind you. Other times it will question the changes.
The art remains the same. You, or your interpretation of it, are different.
I should hope to be different than I was more than 40 years ago. I have earned the right to feel stories and songs through my own ears and not simply as they were told to me.
I have survived. I have been tested and I have tried. I have failed, and I have survived, and I’m still holding on to what I believe in.
And I still listen to the music, not to remind me, but to continue encouraging and inspiring me, as it did then.
As it did yesterday. . .
12/23/2019 j.g.l.
