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Hear me sing

~ MaryG ~ 19 Comments

What’s a song that changed your life?

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First, I want to thank Stephanie and Rojie for heeding my request to post a Vote Blue message for the midterms. Please read both of their posts, which are so heartfelt and powerful.

Second, I blogged about my performance of the song “Anthem” from the 1980s Broadway musical Chess at a cabaret night at my church last spring. In the show, it’s sung by a Soviet chess player who is thinking of defecting, but the song became newly meaningful to me in light of rising authoritarianism in my own country. These are the lyrics, with one change that I made:

No man, no madness
Though their sad power may prevail
Can possess, conquer, my country’s heart
They rise to fail

She is eternal
Long before nations’ lines were drawn
When no flags flew, when no armies stood
My land was born

And you ask me why I love her
Through wars, death, and despair
She is the constant, we, who don’t still care
And you wonder will I leave her
But how?

I cross over borders but I’m still there now

How can I leave her?
Where would I start?
Let man’s petty nations tear themselves apart
My land’s only borders lie around my heart

I’m not a professional singer, so I wasn’t gonna post the video, but in support of our imperiled democracy, here it is. I hope you can hear in my somewhat nervous voice how meaningful the song was/is to me:

Finally, please get to the polls and VOTE BLUE tomorrow. Let’s start to take our country back from this lawless administration.

And if you’re in Maine, Michigan, Iowa, Texas, Alaska, Ohio or Kansas please be sure to bring ten friends. Sometimes people just need a ride to the polls. That’s an easy way to make sure they vote.

Vote.org

“This (election) is not a choice between flavors of ice cream. This is a choice between ice cream and poison.” ~Heather Cox Richardson

Arithmetic

~ MaryG ~ 15 Comments

What’s the most underrated life skill?

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This article from the Washington Post focuses on better listening, which is an important life skill. But I feel like everyone knows that listening is important. (That doesn’t mean they do it well, but they know they should.) The main tip in the article comes from therapists, but it works for everyone: “If someone is upset, try to listen to what they’re saying and paraphrase it back to them.” It’s called reflective listening.

In terms of underrated skills, I feel like math gets overlooked. And by math, I don’t mean calculus or geometry or even algebra…I mean arithmetic. You know…adding, subtracting, multiplying, dividing and doing percentages in your head. You really shouldn’t need a calculator to figure out what 20% of your bill is in order to tip your hairdresser or server.

For a year or so, I was doing a daily brain-enhancing app that had both language and math exercises, but it wasn’t free and I didn’t renew it. Still, I’m surprised how much of the math stuck with me.

I worked the jewelry table last Saturday at my church’s country fair. Although we had Venmo set up, most people paid cash. I had to figure out lots of sums and then make change for lots of people quickly—all in my head. Honestly, not to brag or anything, but I nailed it 😉. I was just as good as the other lady working with me—and she’s a high school math teacher. I think it was the app.

I need to go find another math (arithmetic) app to keep practicing all the little tricks that make it come fast and easy, when you need it. It’s good “rip off protection” too. You’re harder to scam or take advantage of when you can do arithmetic in your aging head.

This photo is from the jewelry booth at last year’s fair. We had a lot more people this year, including many “hoverers”—women who just couldn’t pry themselves away. My sense was that this was a year to “treat yourself” to some cheap used jewelry because everything else in life is insanely expensive. And we know who to blame for that: 🍊🤡 & his GOP enablers.

If you’re American, for the love of GAWD, make sure you’re registered to vote in the midterms: IWillVote.com