Category Archives: Character

Books and other Soul Food, Character, Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Holidays and Traditions, Metaphor, Relationships, Uncategorized, Write

All I Want For Christmas

Leave a comment

All I want for Christmas

All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth. Well, actually, I got that wish way back in 1963 when I exited third grade. However, time has run its course and I did have all my front teeth filled and sheathed in early 2020. It was one of the gifts I gave myself this year.

All I want for Christmas is you? Frankly, my dear, having you under the Christmas tree would only complicate things. It has been a wonderful year of innovation and self-actualization. Not like the year I hung the mistletoe in a prominent arch and waited – for two years – without result. In that case, the gift I tried to give was not reciprocated. I’ve learned to live without kisses – just as many have learned to live without hugs this year.

Mostly, my grown up Christmas wish list is still intact.

No more lives torn apart
That wars would never start
And time would heal all hearts
And everyone would have a friend
And right would always win
And love would never end…This is my grownup Christmas list – and I wish it particularly for the families and friendships that have been damaged and distanced in this vicious and heinous election year. It is not worth it, friends. In the end you alone cannot control the outcome of world events by your rhetoric. But you can make it your business to love your mother, your father, your sister, your brother; to love your neighbor as yourself – and to never, never, give up on your children.

What do I want for Christmas? In the course of the year I have provided for myself a washer, a dryer, bass amp, power drill and driver, a down sleeping bag, down vests, smart wool socks, a kayak, and some smart wool underwear. Once I get waterproof winter hiking boots I will be better equipped than ever before to get outside and keep myself healthy; physically, mentally, emotionally and especially spiritually. 

Even though I don’t need my two front teeth or someone or something wrapped and under the tree; I’ve been thinking a lot about gifts this December. 

A few years back I was traveling with my daughter in the Rocky Mountains. Snow still lay on the ground so it was probably April, my typical vacation time. We parked at the lovely rock chapel of Saint Malo Retreat. We tried the door. It was unlocked. Empty chapel. Available piano. I sat and played a chorus; Ode to Joy. Other tourists passed in and out. A mother and nine-year-old daughter stood behind me and watched. “How does she do that?” whispered the daughter. “Darling, it is a gift,” replied the mother. This simplistic answer irked my daughter who had just completed college with a minor in music. It niggles in the back of my mind this Christmas season as I contemplate gifts and all I want for Christmas. 

A Gift takes you nowhere unless you receive it, open it up, and use it. The drill I bought myself in October? If I leave it in the tool bag on the shelf in the laundry room, it does nothing. I have to get it out, insert a drill bit or driver tip, practice, actually apply it to the antique furniture it was bought to bolster. The genetic gift of a good ear and predisposition for music is nothing without application and practice. The unquenchable urge to write – to be heard – is nothing but a constant emotional battle for me if I attempt to squelch it due to fear or embarrassment. 

This year I gave myself permission to be about my bucket list with full confidence. My time on earth grows short. The ghosts of Christmas past may try to haunt me, yet I will align myself with Christmas present! I will climb every mountain. I will paddle every lake and stream. I will sing and make music on eighty-eight keys and six strings and four strings. I will write the books that have simmered on the back burner for three decades. I will find my voice and be heard. How about you? What do you want for Christmas?

The Cemetery Wives, by Cherry Odelberg. Full cover art for The Cemetery Wives, created by Courtney V. Harris – available as an ebook on Amazon
The Pancake Cat by Cherry Odelberg, Cover art by Andrea Shellabarger, Available to order wherever books are sold
Books and other Soul Food, Character, Fiction is Truth, Goals and Dreams, Write

The author’s confession part 2:

Leave a comment

She never intended to write Christian Women’s Fiction – or Christian anything. She wanted to write mainstream fiction. She wanted to be able to use some words she was not allowed to use in Christian fiction. She wanted to explore some concepts, some doubts, some gray areas that were not allowed by Christian publishers. She wanted be frank about sex and frank about challenges – to be a normal writer, not someone with an evangelistic agenda or a one-size-fits all Band-Aid. True, the writer is advised to “write what you know,” and she did know Christian women’s fiction. She grew up on it. She knew it all too well. She wanted something more. There was an emptiness. She wanted something that was not as cliché as the man always being right because he was a man, nor as trendy as being comically wrong because he was a man. She wanted a story where women were neither subservient or stupid, rebellious or dependent – unless they wanted to be -where the story didn’t end just because the heroine got married. She knew better. The troubles were only beginning when the heroine married. She also knew something about seminary life and the unrelenting grind of an impoverished marriage. So, she wrote a story about a woman married to a seminary student. By and by, she had opportunity to pitch the first five chapters to a bona fide literary agent. And the agent told her his publisher wouldn’t even look at it with a title like that. Apparently there is something inherently sinister or ghoulish about a cemetery and therefore evil or occult about the two words, “wife” and “cemetery,” coupled together. But the author didn’t feel that way. She knows it is customary to consider several title choices for a work in progress, but in this case, there was one title and only one that would work for the plot. Another agent didn’t like the timeframe crucial to the climax. She knows, how well she knows, that you must often give up the lines you most cherish in order to move forward. In this case, giving up title and timeframe is to give up the entire story. And so, she has written a very unconventional love story, chock full of scripture and seminary speak, and religious thought and tragedy and the triumph of Providence or Fate or Destiny or the Universe or God by whatever name you call him or her. And who will it offend? Only the most hard-hearted of biblical legalists; the ones who fault her for not having an agenda.

She never, never intended to write Christian Women’s Fiction

The Cemetery Wives will release on Amazon as an ebook before the end of November, 2020

The book cover will look something like this. The cover, also will be released from the artist by the end of November.

Character, Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Hiking and outdoor beauty, Metaphor, River, Spiritual Well Being

River Reprise

Leave a comment

When the Universe speaks, I try to listen. Winter cometh. I offer this reprise:

A Trickle or a Flood, June 7, 2016 She sat on the banks of the muddy San Juan, in the shadow of a bighorn sculpture and watched the river roll away lazily to the Southwest. It made her long for the beach. That is where the river was headed, after all – to join the mighty Colorado at Lake Powell and finally empty into the Pacific Ocean.

But she knew something the river did not yet know; it would never make it to the ocean. It was headed for the beach, but along the way destined to recreate, irrigate, hydrate, relax and refresh millions of people. Somewhere, 50 miles or so short of the Gulf of California, the river would trickle to a stop.

So she pondered this truncation, this travesty, this unavoidable change of plans people foisted on the river and she asked herself, “How are you doing on your own bucket list? Are you headed for the beach? And whether you ever make it to the beach, will you restore and refresh and recreate and relax? How much of you will be absorbed and diverted into the schemes and needs of others? How much of the landscape of your life will you beautify along the way?”

Live. Love. Laugh. Learn. You do not know if your end will be part of a cataclysmic flood or simply trickle away.

San Juan River, Bluff Utah, May 2016

Character, Emotional Health, Health and Long Life, Hiking and Outdoor Beauty, Travel, Uncategorized

What Are You Doing The Rest of Your Life?

Leave a comment

What are you doing the rest of your life?
She was the up-lake, district interpretive ranger and had been a back-country ranger in Bullfrog for many years previous. We had several interactions during the three years I was with Glen Canyon Conservancy. Valerie and I were not close, but I knew her well enough to attend her retirement party last fall. It was there I heard long term officemates sing her praises. What a varied and adventurous life she lived!
Valerie died on September 15 of this year. That knowledge has shaken me and made me reexamine my goals. Why? Valerie would have been 66 in October. She is four months younger than I. Valerie had only ten months of retirement.

Looking at my maternal line, I figure I have roughly 20 more years of life at most. My mother died this spring at the age of 86 outliving her older sister by nearly three years. Their mother died at 65. I’ve already outlived grandma and great grandma before her. So what will I do with that remaining fifteen or twenty years? What would I do if I knew I had only a year? I would retire. I would throw my efforts into the things I love to do and long to do. I would hike every day. I would write. I would make music. I would spend time with those I love and like. I would travel. How about you? What are you doing the rest of your life? Let’s do it!

Character, Emotional Health

Shut up and sing

Leave a comment

She was nine years old; blond-haired, blue-eyed, well-fed and dressed in her Sunday best. At the moment she was hiding under the check-in table and tattling loudly. The music teacher recruited as Sunday kids choir director sighed and surveyed the chaos. Would they accomplish anything that morning? The musical was six weeks away. Obstructing the distance between teacher and the piano, two eight-year-old boys were wrestling on the carpet.

“He’s calling me names!” shouted Goldilocks from beneath her 2 X 4 and Formica hideout. “Make him stop!” she demanded, “He said I always got my own way! He said I was spoiled!” “Well, are you?” Asked the music teacher reasonably. “No!” shouted the girl. “Then I wouldn’t much worry about it,” replied the teacher.

In the shocked silence that emanated from under the table, the teacher strode to the piano and called out, “Okay everybody, let’s sing. Here we go! The Secret of My Success!” She sounded the introductory chords with a good deal of forte and began to sing. Voices joined in. The majority of practice minutes were saved.

An afternoon walk into town reveals a good amount of chaos and tattling at this time in history. Campaign signs sneer from every yard. Paid ads flood Facebook. Mailboxes burst with political literature from every party, addressed to every known resident for the past four years. Placards and cardstock scream sentiments loudly. “He’s a socialist! She’s out of touch! He’ll sell us to the communists! She’ll take away your constitutional rights!” The music teacher, now retired, sighs as she walks by each yard.  The translation is always the same; The entire demise of the world is laid to your blame if you don’t see it my way! Would they accomplish anything this November? The elections were weeks away. She wants to look each of the candidates in the eye and ask, “Well, is it true?” She wishes she could reason with the most vocal of her friends and ask, “Is it the end of the world if you don’t get your own way?” She wants to calm the anger and anxiety. “God only knows, so I wouldn’t much worry about it.” But mostly, she thinks, please people, quit tattling and just sing.

When they lay down the weapons of argument and attack us with musical notes, what can we do? – US elections of 1840; Harnessing Harmony; Election Day; American Heritage History of the Presidents).

It is 2020 – let’s make some music!

 

 

 

 

Character, Emotional Health, Health and Long Life

It is Fall and She Wakes

Leave a comment

She awoke yesterday with the distinct knowledge that it was fall, fall 2020; an end to the record setting heat and the beginning of joy and vitality for fall is her favorite season.  Never mind the calendar says fall will not arrive for another eleven days. Her body, her mind, and especially her spirit knows it is fall. Her favorite season. The season of her bloom. Did she know it was coming? Of course. As regular as the herald of any season, she smelled it on the breeze one day in August and then it retreated, faded again into the obscurity of 90 degree temperatures in a mountain town of nearly seven thousand feet where homes have no air-conditioning because repeated days of summer heat are not expected. She heartily believes in global warming because that is what the earth does. It warms, it cools, more regular than present day clockwork, though each heave and undulation spans more eons than her lifetime.

It is fall and life is perfect. Perfect outdoor temperature for hiking any hour of the day without overheating or freezing. Perfect indoor temperature for baking. Perfect weather for pairing shorts with sweaters. Perfect time for scorched dreams and waning energy to resurrect and move forward. Genius simmers on the back burner. Dreams and schemes once withered in the summer heat are urgently planted like fall bulbs to take root under the snow. The promise of spring again seems a possibility.

It is fall and she has escaped so far the fires, the hurricanes, the murder hornets, homelessness, starvation, and covid19.

It is fall. She will squeeze every last drop – like cider from an apple – until the freeze of winter. And then she will cozy up by a fire and reminisce.

She wakes and it is fall.

Or, more accurately said:

it is fall and she wakes.

Character, Emotional Health, Family, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Holidays and Traditions, Home and Hearth, Relationships, Spiritual Well Being

Why We Weep at Weddings

Leave a comment

We attended a wedding yesterday. Yes. We suspended our Saturday busyness and took baths in the vintage claw foot tub, dressed with care in garments chosen from the special events side of our closets –seldom used of late – and Zoomed in and attended the wedinar. It was a very early wedding for some of the guests. 9:00 AM Mountain Daylight time for those of us in Colorado. God forbid you woke on the west coast this morning and had to be washed and dressed and in attendance by 8:00 AM.

It probably seemed a late wedding for the principals who have known each other – known this was the one – for three years and who have been waiting, waiting for COVID19 to clear. Late or not, it was a beautiful wedding. 11:00 AM in Cambridge meant the bride looked fashionably appropriate in her street-length, flare-skirted, professionally tailored, white wedding dress and elbow length veil. The ceremony took place in a lovely, huge, Presbyterian church complete with pipe organ, vestments, linens and vessels of communion; and empty pews. Fortunately, both bride and groom are musically astute so they obligingly sang the congregational hymns. But most of all, the bride and groom are intelligent and wise. We loved them for their integrity. We applauded them for pulling this off in the midst of a socially distanced pandemic and in such a way that we could be invited and included- something that would not have been possible from a distance of 2,000 miles in more traditional times.

And we cried. Not because of Coronavirus and because these kids can’t have a regular wedding with hundreds in attendance. No. We cried for all the reasons guests usually cry at weddings. We cried because they are young and idealistic and have perfect plans for their lives. One of us is old and disillusioned and knows what too often happens to idealistic plans. So she wipes her tears and smiles and says in her heart, may theirs come to fruition! The other of us is still young and idealistic and listens to their vows with rapt attention and thinks, it finally happened for them. Will this ever finally happen for me? We listen to the bride’s parents extol her virtues. She is literary and loves to hike and camp. Sigh. She is a perfect woman. We weep. Like women of any age and any era we look over the groomsmen in Zoom thumbnails and try to decipher who is most eligible. In the plus column, we see that all have beards. Wonder of wonders, they are quoting C.S. Lewis in their wedding speeches. What riches! What intelligence! We have found our people! Briefly, we cry again for joy. Where have all the young men gone? We also see companions in the thumbnails; family members in the guestbook photo gallery. Ah, most of the wedding party have found their people and are surrounded by wives and toddlers. The best woman (aka sister of the groom) is planning her nuptials That is good! The world is unfolding as it should. And again, we weep.

Not one tear do we shed for social distance. We are happy to be invited and attend virtually. In no other way would it be possible to be present. We didn’t have to wait until cake was served. You can have your cake – and eat it too, and your popcorn or chips anytime you feel like it at a virtual wedding. You can run spontaneously to the kitchen for chips and juice to take communion with the un-crowd. I even answered a phone call from the other room.

So yes. It is August of 2020 and we went to a wedinar yesterday. We laughed. We were inspired and comforted. We wept. What makes you cry at weddings?

IMG-5714CherryAndreaFrederickwedding

Books and other Soul Food, Character, Emotional Health, Fiction is Truth, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Hiking and outdoor beauty, Metaphor, Poetry and Prose, Write

Wherein Life is a Beach

Leave a comment

Let me tell you a story; Let me spin you a yarn; Let me relate how my life has been going; And you can write back and share yours!

I’ve been patient and impatient; Happy and sad; But mostly my life has been fabulous; When I remember not to dwell on the bad.

My box of books finally arrived! Originally printed in 2009, The Pancake Cat was rereleased June 24, 2020 with an all new cover featuring the artwork of Andrea Shellabarger. Four new illustrations grace the inside chapters along with content updates.

Did I say released on June 24? Though the book has been available at Amazon, Barnes Noble and Target since that date – and now even Books A Million, Indie Bound, Powell’s, and Walmart – I did not hold an actual copy in my hands until yesterday, July 31, 2020. Thirty-seven days is the embodiment of line five of that little ditty above: I’ve been patient and impatient.IMG-5595

Patient and impatient I may have been, but I have not been idle. Oh no. During that time I have been working on a fresh new professional website. It’s been coming along swimmingly – and about as fast as running through knee deep water. But then what is life if you can’t feel like you are at the beach? We all like to float away now and then. Anyway, I was running through thigh deep water, spending hours and hours with Youtube tutorials and I added Woo Commerce and opened a web store complete with T-shirts and book bags and books. I have lots of experience selling T-shirts and books so it seemed like a good idea. And then, I fell flat on the beach and was immediately buried in sand and the tide came in and washed over me. The new amateur looking web store completely over wrote the three professional looking pages I had just given six weeks of my wonderful life in the mountains to establish.

I did the only sensible thing a woman in my position can do: I took a fast-thinking hike. In fact, I took several fast thinking hikes. I slept on it for a couple nights. I contemplated retail therapy – I believe a kayak is in my future. My good health and sanity demands I get on the water. And then I called my web host and retrieved the professional pages and dismissed the new experiment. We are not completely starting over. We only have to go back a few paces.

Meanwhile, I finished an eight-minute slideshow – complete with four old hymns piano tracked by myself- for my mother’s upcoming memorial service. And then, the instructor for the virtual choir class I am taking assigned me to re-record some tracks. Apparently I am supposed to sing doot doot doot as opposed to doo doot doot – or, heaven forbid, dooT dooT dooTT.

My Dad is wondering why I don’t come see him more often now that I am retired and COVID is keeping me from a steady job.

Actually, my life is pretty fabulous when I remember to eat right, sleep right, hike, make music and let it go. How about you?

IMG_5364

IMG_5455studiosheetmusic

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Character, Emotional Health, Family, Health and Long Life, Uncategorized

What Massive Changes Time Has Wrought

Leave a comment

Let me tell you how time flies – how things change really fast. You see; it seems like only yesterday I was singing with friends in a Sweet Adelines quartette. It’s been eight years. Four years ago I was playing in a band. Four years ago my mother was still driving and walking and she and dad came to an outdoor band concert. That same fall, they drove three and a half hours to share Thanksgiving dinner at my post in the Needles district of Canyonlands. That was after knee surgery for my Mom and she was recuperating nicely. I didn’t even go back for Christmas that year. Instead, I drove from Natural Bridges National Monument to Durango to spend a few days with my daughter. By the time another year rolled around, I was meeting my parents in Monticello Utah to deliver a mobility scooter to my mother. Three years ago Mom was still driving. And she could still drive well. Dad would back the car out of the garage, pull it up by the ramp and Mom would navigate down the ramp with walker or scooter and step into the car. Dad would then load the scooter on the rack to the rear of the car and they were off. 17 months ago Dad had hip replacement surgery and we realized at that time Mom could no longer drive or live alone. We had to nearly lift her into the car. She sometimes got stuck in the bathroom. She died 15 months later after having been dependent for a year and bedfast for two weeks. Just last year I was living and working in Page AZ. Just last year we had no suspicion of Coronavirus. Just one year ago my son purchased my childhood home from my parents and embarked on a remodeling project-completely upgrading the existing 55-year-old house and finishing the basement and garage. Just last Thanksgiving, I drove to Durango to share Thanksgiving with my daughter in a threadbare and minimally furnished apartment. Three months later I became the roommate in that apartment and was almost immediately solitary due to Coronavirus. During these past four months my mom passed. My daughter returned to our apartment after two months of care-taking for my Mom. I am singing in a vocal group again – albeit virtually – and our apartment is more than adequately furnished.
What massive changes time has wrought. Changes, not just in my life, but globally. We will host Mom’s memorial service in early August but we will host it virtually – likely with greater attendance on Facebook Live and Youtube Live than can be achieved in a socially distanced church building. But through it all-whether online or in person-music-lots and lots of music. Times have changed massively. Our enjoyment and dependence on music for entertainment and comfort has not changed – only the method of delivery.

Character, Emotional Health, Health and Long Life, Metaphor, Music and Theatre, Musical resolutions, Uncategorized

The Naked Vocalist, aka Grandma Godiva

2 Comments

She took a class. Because she is a life-long learner. Originally, she wanted to learn how to record and edit virtual choir. It seemed like a logical next step for one who has sung in choirs, worked in studios, directed voices young and old, recorded original song demos and cut rehearsal tracks. Like the model who becomes the photographer or the ingenué actress turned aging producer, it was the next step. She followed up. Signed up. There was no class available for the engineering of the thing. But participation often lays the groundwork of understanding, so she was game.
What you must know is, she is not a diva. She is not one of those luscious voiced, coloratura soloist girls. No, this is the girl who prides herself on being a most excellent second fiddle. She loves to sing harmony, and she is actually very good at it. She needs others. She can be the backbone, the support, and keep 40 other voices on pitch if necessary – but she rarely stands alone. She loves singing shoulder to shoulder, elbow to elbow with other vocalists. She loves leaning in and hearing the harmonies and blend. But pandemics require distance. And pandemics are also great incubators for virtual choirs.

She reads notes. She has paid her dues, honed her skills, and gently exercised her voice back to what it used to be before 60 – or so she thinks. Like the good girl she has always been, she does her homework. But this week’s homework was to record an audio cut, raw, straight, with no effects – just her part – one voice out of eight, naked, exposed.

Don’t get me wrong. She’s not a microphone or smart phone virgin. It’s not like she has never sung before. But always with her clothes on, so to speak. In fact, the thing she loves about the recording studio is the way her voice sounds when the engineer works with it. She can land a spot-on tone, and then she lets the engineer dress it.

So there she was, Grandma Godiva (her long, long hair, falling down about her knees), her voice perfectly naked, exposed for the world to hear. The engineer will gild the lily later. Attach and press send was the most humbling thing she has done in a long time. Truth be known, she’s always been a little insecure about the things she loves most.

Naked. That’s pretty much how it feels to be single sometimes, or standing alone – the only one raising a voice about any given issue. So here’s to you, all you naked vocalists. Be strong. Be brave. I don’t care if you are 30 and single or 65 and alone. Dare Greatly. Don’t quit on your music – whatever it is that makes your heart sing.

Sometimes you’ve got to go it alone – naked. And pandemic is one of those times.

IMG_5282 copy 2