I’ve just returned from a relaxing trip to Florida, where my family and I stayed with my sister and brother-in-law for a week. They live in Orlando, and we were never a few hours away from any of our destinations (most of them were mere minutes away from their home). We spent a day at the Magic Kingdom, a day in St. Pete on the Gulf, and the remaining days lounging around Orlando at Downtown Disney or at the pool. We were all reminded how much we miss being around family, and we’re planning a return trip as early as December.

We went down on a shoestring budget, yet we never worried about running out of money. Our entire focus of this trip was about living fully and not spending money. We did not get caught up in the trap of buying a lot of souvenirs and visiting a lot of high-priced attractions because this was our “premiere” vacation destination. Instead, my wife and I remained grounded in the what this trip was all about: family and giving our children experiences to understand what living a meaningful life is all about.

And maybe that’s what I take from this trip: Living fully is not about living in the material world. At home, our children desire the material goods more out of boredom than out of any real necessity. While we were on vacation, they did not crave electronic gadgets to pass the time; instead, they focused on spending as much time as possible with their aunt and uncle. They craved experience and love, not iPods and Playstations.

All this tells me that we’re doing something right. Living fully is about the experience, especially with others. It’s not about the desperate attempt to fill our four walls with the latest inventions and gadgets that always leave us feeling an even greater desperate need to buy more.

Maybe this purchase will make me happy. . . .

No. It’s about priceless purchases of time with family and friends. To me, that’s what living fully is all about.

So I offer these five original tips to help you on your own journey toward happier living. Let me know if you are already living by any of them and, if you are, the strength you’ve gained in your journey.

1. Know where the sky begins. I was raised to reach for the stars, to believe that many, if not all, of the greatest things in life are just out of our reach, high in the sky. But I’ve realized recently that, just like the ocean begins at its first little licks on the sandy shores, our sky begins in the blades of grass at our feet. We no longer need to believe that all of our dreams are waiting for us in some far-off galaxy of stars. When we stand tall, we are already immersed in our skies, where our dreams are already within our reach. We cannot live our lives thinking that greatness begins in some great future. Greatness is here. All around you. Begin realizing your dreams, because you are already among the stars.

2. Live Small. Our lives are so busy and hectic that we need to remind ourselves to slow down and refocus on the finer aspects of what’s in front of us. When we were driving down to Florida, we enjoyed the colorful landscaping of the median areas separating the north and south directions of I-95. From a distance, the blends of oranges, reds, yellows, and whites contrasted the golden green grasses nicely. It wasn’t until we were in the Magic Kingdom where I was able to savor the beauty of the single bloom and all of its intricacies. Like an impressionistic painting, both views serve a worthwhile purpose. Stand back, and you see the beauty of the finished product. Look more closely, and you see the unique qualities of the individual colors, as if they are living a life of their own among the thousands of other dabs of colors working together to form a bigger, as-beautiful picture. Look for the small all around you: the flowers, the friends, the everything. Discovering beauty within beauty guides us to inner fulfillment, and it never costs a dime.

3. Make small commitments–and keep them. We live our lives doing our best to uphold the big commitments we’ve made, but when we find ourselves being anything less than perfect, we automatically feel as if we have somehow failed, and the pressure we (and others) put on ourselves can be catastrophic to our health and well-being. While we strive for perfection in these areas, we cannot be so harsh on ourselves that it compromises all other aspects of our living. One sure way to help us through those challenging times–and to keep us afloat the rest of the time–is to make small commitments that we know we can keep. And, upon fulfilling them, we feel better about ourselves. I keep a rolling list of 10 things to do, and at least half of the items on that list is to help others in some way. Just yesterday I learned that my childhood neighbor’s mother passed away about a month ago, and so I added to my list: Write encouraging note to Bruce and mail it. It doesn’t take much time to buy a card, write a brief encouraging note, and stick it in the mail. It’s a small commitment that I can keep that will help a friend through his grieving while keeping me immersed in fulfilling commitments. These are the things I can control. These small commitments keep me focused on achieving the small so I can continue achieving the big, even during challenging times where I might have mis-stepped a little. I look at it this way: fulfilling these little commitments is like feeling the pulse of my own beating heart; they are the reminders that, in this moment, I am alive and am very aware, and there is much to celebrate in that simple fact.

4. Establish your anchors and lifelines. We need constant reminders to slow down, savor the moment, take the time for ourselves and for others. We do this unconsciously in many ways, from choosing bumper stickers that define who we are, to putting our best friends on speed-dial or on IM so they are just a click or two away. But we need to make a more conscious effort to keep that focus, because too often, we are looking desperately for anchors or lifelines when we are at the end of our rope. We need not wait that long. In fact, we need not wait at all. My anchors are my daybooks, my cross necklace, a few books (Tao te Ching, the Bible, Walden, and others), a handful of photos, and small items that I’ve collected, both from my childhood and from my parents’ estates after they died. They are reminders of what my life is all about and what is most important. I test the strengths of these anchors nearly every day, and they never fail me, for they are rooted in love. I have lifelines extended to various people in my life for various reasons. I used to hesitate to reach out to them because I thought that it made me seem weak, or that I was becoming a burden on them with my troubles. The truth is, I now see myself as no more a burden as I view others who come to me with needs. I like the lean, the give and take we offer each other in this world. It reminds me that we are not alone, and we sometimes need a friend to just listen to us, to be there to hold our hands and comfort us until clarity comes once more. Do not be afraid to set your anchors and establish your lifelines. They are the lights in our tunnels when we feel as though our fall into the abyss is neverending. All we need to do is open our eyes, reach out our hands, and have a little faith.

5. Create experiences. We live fully by experience. We live deliberately, as Thoreau writes, to corner this thing called life and see if we have yet lived. We suck the marrow out of life by immersing ourselves in the experience and making things happen. It doesn’t have to be a 2,100-mile trip to Florida and back, where you see gators and ducks as you never imagined. It doesn’t have to be a well-designed, fully choreographed excursion to another country. While it can be any of those things, it can also be the experience we make in walking outside and studying the wild overgrowth in a once-loved butterfly garden, or a walk around the block where you find yourself waving hello to neighbors you’ve seen only in passing cars. It doesn’t even have to be a physical experience. Try something different that you’ve never even imagined yourself doing. Paint, draw, construct, build, take apart, design, write, watch. Remove yourself from the mundane and place yourself outside of your comfort zone. Immerse yourself in experiences and then talk about them. Share them with others. Or, at the very least, write about them. And then build upon them. Stretch that comfort zone, experience by experience, and be aware of what you are doing, why you are doing it, the entire time.

Lose yourself in the magnificence of the moment, and you will never look back on your life and ask, “where did the time go?” It’s far better to look into your life and realize that the time didn’t go anywhere; it’s right here, right now, and it is absolutely, breathtakingly beautiful.

Hi, folks.

I’ve posted a new story of mine on a separate page of my blog. You can access it here. It’s called “Immortal Footprints,” and it’s a unique piece because the writing spans a 20-year period. The fresh piece is the revised version that follows the original. I encourage you to get through the tough parts of version one to better appreciate the significance of the revision.

Enjoy (I hope). I had fun writing this in the last few days.

I just spent the last few hours reading over my first official “daybook,” penned twenty years ago, exactly. The pages are filled with dreams, good intentions, philosophy, devotions to God.

In other words, they’re penned with the same dreams, good intentions, philosophies, and devotions that I have written in my latest daybook, twenty years later, exactly.

What I’m supposed to be doing right now is working on a personal piece for an anthology of original work written by 19 of the best teachers I’ve ever had the pleasure to know. I had this epiphany today that my contribution would be a braided piece combining the first and last daybooks of my involvement with this 6-credit graduate course. In 1989 I was a Fellow in the program. In 2008, I am team-teaching the course for the fourth time in the last six years.

Looking over the daybook, though, made me realize a horrible string of coincidental tragedies that have plagued me while involved in the Institute.

In 1989, I was still wiping the dirt from my father’s grave; we buried him in April of that year.

In 2003, the dirt stains were more prevalent; I had just buried my father-in law two weeks’ prior to the start of the program.

In 2005, I buried both my aunt and uncle a few months before the Institute; both died in tragic circumstances.

In 2007, just weeks before the Institute began, I buried both my mother and my mother-in-law.

Now, in 2008, I am hopeful that I will end my run with teaching this course on a very good, upbeat note; preferably, I will make it through next week without any tragedies.

Reading over the 1989 daybook, though, initially struck a melancholic note within me. I wasn’t necessarily pleased with the similarities between the two books, separated by 20 years. I felt like I hadn’t learned anything, I hadn’t grown or matured at all.

In fact, I felt like I was still the same person I was 20 years ago. That upset me greatly.

But in letting that settle within me a little, I’m beginning to look at this latest epiphany in a different light.

This is who I am. I will always be a little disorganized, I will always believe in a love that is greater than mere words, and I will always make somewhat unrealistic goals that, honestly, I simply won’t fulfill. I’ll beat myself up over it, eat a pint of Ben and Jerry’s Phish Food, get over it, plan to develop a better plan to thwart my inability to follow through, and set new unrealistic goals–and genuinely believe that things have changed.

And maybe they will for a few days. In the long run, though, I bet the farm that I’ll be writing a daybook entry in 2027 (God willing) about how I need to organize my life a little better, set new goals, write some new pieces (and submit them for publication, of course!), and believe that world peace is possible in my lifetime.

I sure hope they’ll be making Phish Food then. I hate to mess with routine.

Direct from Judge Carla, editor of Maryland Voices:

….the sister.
….the cousin.
…the daughter.
…the director.
…the hero.
…the student.
…the non-believer.
…the friend.
…the southern girl.
…the viewer.
…the listener. (what an appropriate way to end the list)

…the girl who knew she had this contest in the bag.
Catherine B., congratulations! I thought that I would have to pore over the submissions all weekend, but after reading all of them, yours immediately stood out to me. The subtle comment about your outdated iPod mini didn’t go unnoticed, either. :P
Organizing your 99 songs by different aspects of yourself was a great way to personalize your list and make it a story in song of the WHOLE you. Your personality truly shone through, and your witty, insightful annotations were a pleasure to read. 

Thanks also to others who submitted their99 playlists. We’ve all got some serious downloading to do on iTunes!! ~~Carla

Congratulations, Catherine B! I will be in touch with you in the next 24 hours to ship you your gently used iPod!

And thanks to everyone for playing along. I think that, each Independence Day, I will make a meme of some my99 variation to make us take stock of our lives through music, books, art….we shall just have to wait and see!

Love to all,

Rus

My Life Playlist, Part Three (Please scroll down to see Parts One and Two)

This is the final installment for my list. Thanks all for playing! Carla will be reviewing your stories over the weekend, and we’ll post the winner on Monday!

Dancin’ In The Streets:
The Reflex (Dance Mix), Duran Duran and
Straight Up (Ultimix Mix), Paula Abdul (If I had the room, I would have added “Dancing With Myself” by Billy Idol here. You see, I had a closet fixation with dance music, but I could not, in any way, dance. If you have seen the Seinfeld episode where Elaine dances, then you can get a mental picture of just how wretched my writhing was on the dance floor. I’m not exaggerating. I was once kicked off a dance floor by some woman in a dark red skirt at a place called Rascals, now a stately Hooters restaurant/bar in Towson. With that said, I got wonderful vibes from some of the remixes of the top pop hits of the eighties. Two of them were The Reflex and Straight Up, which later became workout songs (yeah, that’s right. I used to work out). Last autumn I put together a reunion slide show with songs from the seventies, eighties, and nineties. When I revisited these songs, I could feel the urge to dance rising through me. Luckily, I was home alone, and no damage has been inflicted on my wife or any of my children. I plan on keeping it that way, too.)

NOTE: I’m going to post the rest of the songs now, with a few more annotations. I hope to return to them in future posts to tell you the stories behind these songs. I don’t want to leave you hanging with my 99, though, for the next three weeks. So here they are….

Just Rus: (These songs have helped define who I am today)
Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, Elton John/Bernie Taupin
Vincent, Don McLean
Roxanne, The Police
Pictures of You, The Cure
Fade Into You, Mazzy Star
Sweetness Follows, R.E.M.
Break It Down Again, Tears For Fears
The Impending Death of the Virgin Spirit, William Ackerman
Silent All These Years, Tori Amos
The Promise, Tracy Chapman
I Will Not Take These Things For Granted, Toad the Wet Sprocket
Orion in the Sky, Shawn Colvin, with David Crosby, Live
Donizetti-L’Elisir d’Amore-Una Furtiva Lagrima, Aria performed by Tito Schipa, from the Lorenzo Oil soundtrack
Variations on the Kanon by Pachelbel, George Winston
All I Wanna Do, Sheryl Crow
Principles of Lust [(A) Sadeness, (B) Find Love, (C) Sadeness (Reprise)], Enigma
Prologue, John Williams, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
Sugaree, Grateful Dead, 4/30/77
Dear Prudence, Jerry Garcia Band, 2/29/80

Walkin’ Man: (I section-hiked much of the Appalachian Trail and spent a year on a farm and another two years in a log cabin before I met my wife. The songs that follow chronicle those years after college.)
You Can’t Always Get What You Want, The Rolling Stones
Appalachian Morning, Paul Winter, Songs for the Earth
We, The Roches
Tweeter and the Monkey Man, Traveling Wilburys
Gaia, James Taylor
Proud Mary, Credence Clearwater Revival
The End of Innocence, Don Henley

Stage Center: (Theater has always been an important part of my life, from playing vinyls of Andrea McArdle on my sister’s player to writing full-scale productions for a k-12 school, I’ve done and enjoyed it all.)
Maybe, Andrea McArdle, Annie
Comedy Tonight, Jason Alexander and Company, A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum
Magic to Do, Ben Vereen and Players, Pippin
What I Did For Love, Original Cast, A Chorus Line
Moonshine Lullaby, Ethel Merman, Annie Get Your Gun
Prologue, Andrew Lloyd Webber, The Phantom of the Opera
Prologue, Leonard Bernstein, West Side Story
For Good, Idina Menzel & Kristin Chenoweth, Wicked

Road-Trips with T-Light: (We drove north on two-lane roads looking for bullfrogs and all-night diners; we taped the various sounds of zippers by ponds at 4 in the morning; and we sought out the greatest duck-crossing sign in the mid-atlantic and brought it home, fearing the entire ride back for the lives of the little duckies that no longer had the protection to cross safely. Our road trips were unique, spontaneous, and always adventurous. How we have lived to tell their stories still baffles my mind.)
Suite-Judy Blue Eyes, Crosby, Stills & Nash
American Pie, Don McLean
If You Leave, O.M.D. (Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark)
Fast Car, Tracy Chapman
Everybody Wants to Rule the World, Tears for Fears
My Generation, The Who, Live at Leeds
Walking on Sunshine, Katrina and the Waves

Donnon, Just Exactly Perfect: (a wonderful spirit and friend named Donnon died on March 17, 2002, and when I went to his viewing a few days following, four of his friends went up to his casket and sang “We Bid You Goodnight” by the Grateful Dead. It was one of the most touching tributes I have ever seen. The next day, I went to Record and Tape Traders and found Nightfall of Diamonds, which had a recording of this song. I took it home and played it over and over, cherishing Donnon’s memory. I tried to listen to other songs from this band I knew nothing about (my roommate fifteen years earlier absolutely loved them, but I paid no attention at the time), but I just didn’t get it. Then, in 2003, I met another teacher, K-Man, who was into the Dead as much as Donnon was. He tried to turn me on to a few cds, but I still didn’t get it. Then, in 2005, he came into my room telling me about Jerry just tearing it up on Truckin’. He played the Estimated > St. Stephen > Truckin’ > Around & Around run, and I was hooked. Donnon is with me for every show I download and buy, and he’s helped me find a part of me that Kurt first led me to a long time ago when I was in high school. One final note about Donnon: On the six-year anniversary of his death, I went to his grave site to visit him and tell him how grateful I was for him, then and now. I got out of my jeep and let my iPod continue to play, even though I had turned off the ignition. I left Donnon a single Rose and a note that said, simply, Not Fade Away. I spent about 25 minutes at the stone, and when I returned to my Jeep, that very song was playing when I turned on the ignition. Do I believe in signs? You bet.)  
We Bid You Goodnight, Grateful Dead, 10/16/89
Estimated Prophet > St. Stephen > Truckin’ > Around & Around, Grateful Dead, 11/2/77
He’s Gone, Grateful Dead, Grateful Dead Movie Soundtrack, Disc 4, October 1974
Estimated Prophet > St. Stephen > Not Fade Away > Drumz > St. Stephen > Terrapin Station > Sugar Magnolia, Grateful Dead, 6/9/77

Writer’s Song: (The soundtracks that have shaped my writing)
Telegraph Road, Dire Straits
The Passion of Christ Soundtrack
Lorenzo’s Oil Soundtrack
Cristofori’s Dream, Lanz
Eleanor Rigby, The Beatles
Postcards from Carraway Station Soundtrack

Songs of Love: (The cornerstone of what I am all about; more on these later.)
Moonlight Sonata, Adagio Sostenuto, Beethoven
Borderline, Madonna
Paradise By The Dashboard Light, Meatloaf
Right Here Waiting, Richard Marx
On Your Shore, Enya
The Water Is Wide, James Taylor
Moondance, Van Morrison
Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic, The Police
I Will Always Love You, Whitney Houston
Watershed, Indigo Girls
Peaceful, Easy Feeling, The Eagles
Dawn, Pride and Prejudice soundtrack
Amie, Pure Prairie League
Melting, Tristan Prettyman
Turn On Your Lovelight, Grateful Dead, Ladies & Gentleman, April 1971
The Love Each Other, Grateful Dead, 6/9/77
All You Need Is Love, The Beatles

Ode To My Family (doo-doo doo-doo…): (Two sections here: one with Mom and Dad, ending with January Stars, which I played for Mom’s funeral, as well as for her sister’s a few years back. The second section is my family with my wife and children. I look forward to bringing these songs to life soon, as well.)
Pennsylvania 6-5000, Glenn Miller Band
These Boots Are Made For Walkin’, Nancy Sinatra
Harper Valley PTA, Jeannie C. Riley
I’ve Got You Under My Skin, Frank Sinatra, Live at the Sands with Count Basie
Spring Cloudburst, Dan Gibson, Harmony
January Stars, George Winston

A Whole New World, Brad Kane & Lea Salonga, Aladdin
Brown-Eyed Girl, Van Morrison
You’ll Be In My Heart, Phil Collins, Tarzan
Swept Away, Yanni, Live at the Acropolis
Shepherd Moons, Enya
God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, Sarah McLachlan and BareNaked Ladies
Baby It’s Cold Outside, Zooey Deschanel & Leon Redbone, Elf Soundtrack

The Spiritual Quest: (I am an extremely spiritual person who can’t nail down a single darned belief. These songs have helped define that rocky spiritual journey, one that I’m still on, trying to find my corner of the sky. Exactly twenty years ago this week I became a born-again Christian. Well, somewhere around 1998 I died again, and I’ve been struggling ever since with Christianity (Please God, let me heed the signs you’ve been sending me….). I end with Christine Kane’s “(You Don’t Have To) Say Goodbye” simply because it seemed like the perfect bookend to Donnon’s “We Bid You Goodnight.” That’s where I am in my life, feeling a change in the seasons, in this cycle. It’s exciting and terrifying, all in the same breath. But that’s where I am, and so I keep walkin’, I keep walkin’. . . .
Day By Day, Stephen Schwartz, Godspell
Corner of the Sky, John Rubenstein, Pippin
Life In One Day, Howard Jones
Secret O’ Life, James Taylor, Live
Summer Solstice, Susan Ashton
More Than Words, Extreme
With Imagination (I’ll Get There), Harry Connick, Jr.
All I Ever Have To Be (Live), Amy Grant
I’ll Lead You Home, Michael W. Smith
Wondering Again What’s Behind the Eyes, William Ackerman
Earthrise, Steven Halpern, Chakra Suite
Ripple, Grateful Dead, Reckoning, October 1980
(You Don’t Have To) Say Goodnight, Christine Kane, Live, 2000

My Life Playlist, Part Two (please scroll down to see Part One):
Wicked, Dude; Wicked
Like A Rolling Stone, Bob Dylan (These two junior-senior years in high school, 1981-1983, were wicked wonderful. I met a guy named Kurt through our theater program. Every third word was “Wicked,” followed almost always by a chuckle or some term of endearment that was not far from “dude,” if ever. He wore this floppy, pre-Indiana Jones leather hat with tie beads and a small feather tucked in the side. He was thin, terribly thin, always wearing long sleeves, jeans or dark cords with a stringy hemp belt that hung down his side like the tzitzis that Jewish men wear. And he helped me break free (a little) from that pressure to be somebody I’m not. We spent hours and hours in his bedroom, with psychedelic lights, hip music from the sixties and early seventies, talking about acting, life, love, and the endless pursuit of peace. On Christmas Eve 1981, I wrapped presents in my attic bedroom alone, listening to the last track on my Bob Dylan Greatest Hits vinyl, vol. I, side 1, track 5. Dylan sang through the scratched track of “Like A Rolling Stone” as I cried. I don’t know what it was. A longing for this feeling of peace to last beyond the night and the early morning? Or was it the realization that I was growing up and becoming aware of the hatred in the world? We had just finished a run of 24 shows in 25 days at various hospitals and nursing homes. We called ourselves The Smile Merchants, and we did our best to bring a little love and peace to children with terminal illnesses who would not be coming home for Christmas; to abandoned mothers and fathers in nursing homes who cried when they saw us—and sometimes not because we had made their holiday but because we reminded them of where they were in their lives, and that this might just be their last Christmas shared with anyone. It tugged at me that night, made me feel thankful and selfish and grateful and sad, emotions like the strings on Kurt’s belt, tangled and vulnerable, dangling there with nowhere to go. That night I got Bob Dylan, and I let him get me. Makes my holidays a little more important these days.)

The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy), Simon and Garfunkel (One of the many songs Kurt and I listened to. Our theater coach tells me that Kurt is very sick, and putting this list together makes me think that I should find out where he is. Let him know I’m thinking of him and hoping he’s okay.)

Little Deuce Coupe, The Beach Boys (Ah, yes. My first car. The Little Deuce Coupe was my 1968 Ford Falcon, sold (given?) to me by my brother Jim when I turned 16. The Smile Merchants used it for all their shows. I had replaced the factory-installed radio with a Panasonic boom-box system with bookshelf speakers in the back window. I also had to throw it in Park whenever we stopped at a red light to avoid stalling the car. With my foot on the gas pedal, I would drop it into Drive when the light turned green; most times, we made it through without stalling. This was particularly challenging after one of our holiday shows at Hopkins Children’s Hospital, where we then got lost in Baltimore City and drove for 2 hours, or 67 miles, if you prefer, before we reached the county line (a city driver I am not). One of the Smile Merchants, Faith, brought Deuce to life every season, decorating the interior (and sometimes the exterior too) with hearts, signs, Christmas ornaments, you name it. She’s a great spirit, Faith. I miss her terribly. Perhaps I’ll give her a call, too.)

You’ve Got A Friend, James Taylor and Carol King, Live (Brad, my best friend, gave me James Taylor’s Greatest Hits for Christmas in 1982. He signed, in blue ballpoint pen, “To Rus, My Best Friend. Love, Brad” in the top left corner. We met in Mr. Dwyer’s math class in our junior year, and immediately we became inseparable. Theater, music, show choir, we did it all together. We’re still extremely close today, despite a few arguments that left us in silence for varying periods of time. It doesn’t matter. We’ll never change, and we’ll always know that we’ve got a friend in each other. The version that I’ve chosen for my life playlist is one that I found rather recently on iTunes. It’s older than the version on the album Brad gave me, but it better reflects who I am now. Plus, it’s live. And by now you know that, for me, live is always better.

Imagine, John Lennon (I don’t think I could get through this one without losing it. This song, more than any other, has made such a profound impact on my life. The story I wish to share here (it is one of many throughout my life) is the one-year anniversary of John Lennon’s death. On December 8, 1981, the Smile Merchants all wore black to school with black carnations. We stuck together, pinned peace symbols and “Give Peace A Chance” to our clothes and bookbags, and played John Lennon whenever possible. We had a show that night—I can’t remember exactly where, but when I drove up to Faith’s house, “Imagine” came on the radio, and I lost it. The anger, the injustice, the killing, the everything that I was realizing about this world. Faith held me longer than the song, and it was many minutes later that I felt like I could make it home. By that time the rains had come, and I drove home in silence, wearing my black on black, not wanting to grow up anymore.)
Part Three will be posted soon!

Introduction to my life playlist:

Selecting the songs that define my life was much harder to do than I could have ever imagined. I decided to limit my choices to the songs on my iPod (about 10,000), and I was thrilled when my first round of choices narrowed the list to 353. From that playlist, though (titled “my99 possibles”), it seemed nearly impossible to cut 250 songs from that playlist. I felt as if I were excluding defining moments of my life, somehow negating their importance in the making of me. What made it even worse was, in the process of making those difficult choices, I thought of other songs that “absolutely” had to be on my life playlist. It felt as if the pool of choices never diminished, despite my final playlist creeping toward that magical number of 99.

After I selected my songs, I moved them over to a Word document and started arranging them in categories, or themes. The list that follows is the result of that arrangement. As “final” as I believe this list to believe, I look forward to revisiting it in a year to see what revisions I might make, or what new themes might emerge.

One final note: For the most part, the arrangement of the themes, as well as the songs that are listed within each theme, is intentional. The greatest surprise, I think, was that when I finished, I realized that I opened as most stories end, and ended as most stories begin, reminding me that the journey is not about beginnings and endings but about seasons and cycles, defining who we are along the way.
One song that didn’t make my final 99 was “Love the One You’re With”; maybe it’s the most important one to keep in mind for ourselves, though, because we must love ourselves, as no one else has been with us through all of those cycles and seasons.

Enjoy. I’m interested in hearing how many of my songs are on your life playlist!

The Origin of Rus:
Over The Rainbow, Judy Garland (Music has always been a part of my life, and I think it all started with Judy Garland singing “Over the Rainbow” in The Wizard of Oz. Those days in the early 70’s, before the invention of any kind of made-for-home video product (tape or digital), we had to wait for the classics to come on TV, and the biggies like Oz only came on once a year. It was such a big deal in our house. We all gathered together—even my father—and we made popcorn (yeah, over the stove; what in the world is a microwave???) with real butter melted and poured over top of it, still steamy in the big orange bowl.

I believed in every word Judy sang, I hid my head when Mrs. Gulch turned into the Wicked Witch while in the twister, and I cried when she melted at the end of the movie. I remember thinking that, for anybody to die in such a way, no matter how good or evil, was a horrible thing. Over the years, “Rainbow” has come to mean different things to me: hope, belief, and most importantly, love. it served as the lifelong catalyst for my already-strong optimistic outlook on life, and I’ll never stop believing that life and love are always possible, even in the darkest moments.)

Dream On, Aerosmith (When my oldest brother came to live with us when he was having troubles with his wife, he slept on the other side of the attic. Each morning, when his alarm went off, “Dream On” woke us both. To me, it was the theme song for both of us for where we were in our lives, twenty years apart from each other, but still dreaming of better days to come.)

Crocodile Rock, Elton John (My sister Cindy gave this song to me for Christmas one year, along with a black and white case to hold 45 singles. It was my first-ever 45 (that’s vinyl, for you younger ones), and I played it on this blue and white plastic turntable that, even at my young age, looked very, very old. It was one of the greatest gifts a big sister could ever give her baby brother—she knew how important music had already become in my life.)

I Think I Love You, The Partridge Family (I loved their bus more than their music.)

Funeral For A Friend (Love Lies Bleeding), Elton John (When this double album came out and my sister bought it, I used to play the songs non-stop on her (better) turntable in her room. I remember listening to the music through her oversized Pioneer headphones (my goodness did the music sound unbelievable), looking at the words to each of the songs and the somewhat risqué artwork that accompanied the lyrics.)

Venus and Mars/Rock Show/Jet, Paul McCartney & Wings, Wings Over America (This was our concert album that I played air guitar with and sang into tin-foil microphones with my neighborhood friends Bruce and Timmy. It was also my first introduction to live music, and I fell in love with the spontaneous sound and the love that flowed between the players in the band with the audience in the stands. I attribute this show to my lifelong love for the concert over the studio recordings.)

Black Dog/Whole Lotta Love/Rock n Roll, Led Zeppelin (The walls in my room in the attic were lined with posters of Robert Plant and Jimmy Page playing in a wash of oranges and reds, of Boston guitars in spaceship form taking off to unknown lands. I was never a 98 Rock kind of kid, but I loved the music of Zeppelin, Boston, Foreigner, Styx in my Junior High years. Absolutely loved all of it.)

Killer Queen, Queen (Simply this: Listening to music on WLPL, 92.3; this was always my favorite song to listen to.)

Jamming, Bob Marley (When I was 16, my parents allowed me to drive to Ocean City, MD to work the week before (and the weekend of) Labor Day at the Family Fish House. My brother was there on his vacation, and I was staying in a hotel room all by myself. To say the least, the trip was an initiation into adult living. This song played often that week after the dining rooms shut down and we cleaned up for the night. I had never heard of Bob Marley or reggae until then; now, it is a part of my life.)

For Unto Us A Child Is Born, Handel, Messiah (So many of my memories in high school and college (and beyond for another five years) were made with my best friend Brad, who opened his house to me even when I didn’t need it. We spent so much time there watching movies, ordering pizzas after midnight, and being loved by his mother and father in ways that were different from my own parents. I never saw them as replacements to Mom and Dad; they were my “second set” away from home, and I loved them both dearly. Brad’s father is still alive, but Mom passed away a few years ago. Brad was and still is passionate about classical music, and he had several variations of Handel’s Messiah. Each version, though, played this song beautifully. It transcended me in a very personal and spiritual manner that I never shared with him. The reason why I’ve listed it under this theme is because that transcendence could have never happened without his love or the love of his family. His parents planted a seed of faith in me that despite my greatest attempts at times, will just not stop growing inside of me. One Christmas Eve service at his church, Pastor Maack asked volunteers to join the choir in singing this song. I went, and my own mother was so proud to see me singing this song. The energy, the spirit that moment filled in me is still with me today.)

Christmas Time Is Here (Vocal), Vince Guaraldi Trio, A Charlie Brown Christmas (Just like the Wizard of Oz, A Charlie Brown Christmas was an annual event at our house. Such a celebration for a 25-minute animated show! However, it carried the same theme as Oz did, with a dash of spirituality thrown in. It was the best of all combinations for me as kid and now, as I look back on it, as who I am today. When I first started teaching, so many of my students shared their love of life with me. Two in particular would draw me a rainbow stemming from a cloud with the following quote: Keep Dreaming, Keep Believing, Keep a Rainbow in Your Heart.” Good words to live by twenty years later.)
Part Two will be posted soon!

Yikes!

Never realized how tough (and fun!) this is to select those top 99!

And how to arrange them! By year? Subject or theme? Emotion?

Oh, dear.

I may very well be posting my 99 on Friday as one big batch. Or my353…..!!!!

Hope you are all having as much fun as I am…Be sure to check the comments section of the original my99 post for those who are posting their lists already….. :)

Thanks to all for playing!

If we shadows have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended,
That you have but slumber’d here
While these visions did appear.

I’ve been having some rather candid conversations with fellow writers in Towson and around town about the importance of authentic writing. Repeatedly, the same troubling concern rises to the primary focus of these discussions: we do not wish to offend, yet we know that, invariably, we will.

Offend whom, you ask?

There’s a book that I refer to often. It’s called The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz. The message is simple and can be found in most “good book” manuals, from the bible to the cub scout handbook. But the simplicity with which this book is written makes the agreements themselves accessible.

One of the four agreements is to never take anything personally.

Good advice for both readers and writers, I think, when the latter is doing his job authentically.

On the reader’s end, authentic writing from a son, a father, a spouse, a friend, a colleague can be terribly enlightening, but often it brings contradictions to that “role” that the writer has played with that reader over, perhaps, many years. It took me a very long time to see my parents as individuals; they shared only a fraction of their true personalities to us when we were children. By no means did they not live authentically; I believe that, on many levels, they did, especially Mom. But I didn’t care about any of that; I didn’t know any of that even existed, to be honest with you.

It did exist, though. Despite my every attempt to keep them in their roles as Mom and Dad, much to my astonishment, they were Eileen and Charles, individuals, to the rest of the world.

I imagine it is the same for you, in some manner.

For those of us who do not write, it’s not as big a deal, I think. There are fewer chances for us to bare our true souls, put them on the stage for all to see in black and white. We find convenient ways to practice a “don’t ask, don’t tell” lifestyle where we keep our authentic selves from emerging.

We’re good. We play the game and, for the most part, choose our translucent masks from the jar by the door, where they mingle a little shyly with the others of varying thickness. We even find ourselves believing that we are the mask. It shows up in our actions, our words, our beliefs. We buy into these pop-fad crises of global warming and rush to buy our hybrid cars suddenly to save the earth. We are made to feel so good, our egos soothed by our acts, doing our part, living the good, right life.

I don’t mean to mock or offend. I don’t. It is me. This is my belief and it’s not about any one of you. It’s what I feel, what I think, what I believe. When I read that you are looking for hybrid choices, I applaud your efforts and want to know if you are free for a barbecue next Thursday. That’s your choice to make. That’s your place in this world, right here, right now.

I do not mean to offend. I mean to tell you what I think. Please, do not take it personally.

But as writers, we do this as well–we anticipate criticism that we will most assuredly take personally, and then censor our writing to make our audience members nod their head in agreement. That’s what we’re after, isn’t it? Approval? We sacrifice authenticity for approval. We sacrifice genuine honesty to protect the ones we love and to preserve the images they hold of us, near and dear to their hearts.

God bless us all for our efforts.

That’s not authentic, though. As writers, we’re faced with this dilemma on a daily basis. My blog is public. But my blog entries are personal. Do I wish to be conservative? Refrain from posting opinions that might offend? Censor my thoughts and censor who I am to save the ones I love from potential hurt because they choose to take my words personally?

We can’t help it, I know. It’s what we do all day long. We are trained away from seeing and sharing all things with love; we grow suspicious, concerned, filtering all that comes in, and all that goes out.

We are becoming the first generation of artificial intelligence (AI) life forms, higher-level thinking zombies, if you will, who walk through their days and surf in their nights playing the lifelong game of PC-Perfect individuals, never wishing to offend, never wishing to misunderstand.

So many of us wish to do neither. And yet, we do, and in so doing we feel terribly sad that our efforts to live and write authentically have somehow missed their mark.

Never take anything personally.

I know. I see myself doing it even now. It’s hard. So hard, when you know that your audience sees you in so many different roles: teacher, husband, father, friend, colleague. They bring those filters to my words and gasp, shake their heads, and maybe even do a little re-read to make sure they got it all right the first time.

Never before, though, have we lived such transparent lives for all our communities to see us so vividly. We’re all making choices, however conscious (or not) those choices may be. Some are retreating, staying low, under the public radar and wrapping themselves around popular causes to insulate them from the dangers of authentic living. It’s a genuine and noble drive, for sure. There’s not much awareness happening at this level, I believe; rather, there is much awareness happening for everything but who they truly are as individuals.

We’ve had our arts programs stripped out of our schools, we have our students practicing the art of hoop writing with perfecting the tricky craft of composing brief and extended constructed responses. We are regurgitating numbers and facts and formulas and processes at lightning speeds so that school systems can boast when the annual reports are published in the morning papers: We are in the XXth Percentile; we have many reasons to celebrate. So many other schools did horribly worse. Hoorah for us.

We are not celebrating the successes of our individual students in their desperate attempts to hold on to their individuality; we celebrate that, collectively, we play a better game of jump rope than half the other schools on our block.

When they graduate, those expert jump-ropers, what do they know of authenticity? Of individuality?

Perhaps that is why so many of them flock wildly to Facebook for a little breathing room, a little sanity where they can be a little dangerous with their words, say what’s really on their minds, and feel like they’re living authentically in a bead of water that rests precariously on a dewy leaf, overlooking the rushing waters of domestication and conformity.

Look, I know it’s hard. We both need to work on it, Reader and Writer. But maybe, just maybe, if each of us comes to the page with a little sensibility, doing our best to take none of this personally, then maybe, perchance, we will not have offended the other.

Just maybe.