My brother wrote a song recently and within it exists my childhood. With the opening lines, memories flood into my mind's eye in soft dappled light. The song starts soft and beautiful and my childhood is quietness and melody. The windows of Illinois graduate student housing and screened doors that lead out to porches overlooking cornfields. German walking paths and a trampoline. Learning to say prayers and goodnight songs singing the ABCs. I see four heads, my siblings and I together. Moments on the couch, in the woods, in the back alley - shades of brown descending into blonde, blue eyes melting to brown.
And then chaos breaks loose and the memories move in rapid motion. Movement is everywhere and childhood becomes one large scream that contains all of the joy and anger of growing up. I am throwing rocks at my siblings, afraid of their togetherness against my isolation. We are playing tag and catching fireflies in summer evening hours. We walk the dog endlessly around neighborhood blocks. I am left at the table to eat food I don't want. Roller blades, scrunchies, and beaches. The American landscape whizzes by outside a minivan window, there and back and there again. We try to learn to listen to each other as we're told to do, but tears, depression, anger, yelling, and fear are so much of what we hear. Porch swings and thunderstorms. Junker cars and flat tires. Teasing about early romances, helping put the pieces back together when the heartbreak comes. We have each other’s backs at school dances. We compete with each other and it hurts. But always pride, pride, pride for the wins of each individual. And then at the 3:45 mark my mother's hands appear in a benediction over us. The chaos of life parts and over us is spoken a blessing. Sanctification works itself out in painful and brutal slowness. But she is there, speaking peace and kindness. A moment of silence, a pause in the storm, and my father's bass breaks through to push us all ahead, deeper than we knew we could go. With my mother's hands over us and my father's bass keeping us in motion, we four go forward into the world and see what lies therein. It is terrifying and amazing, a beautiful melody and a chaotic reality entwined together. And as we embark on transcontinental visits, weddings, and graduations, we four stay banded together. There are long distances and years of ache, but I see the dappled light go with us and we four still descend from brown to blonde, from blue to brown. Welcome, delicate Lives unknown by fame. And it’s tempting to hope In the dream that caught your eye But it’s left your heart undone. These shoes are all worn out From chasing flawed designs And they’ve left me alone. Now I’m bold enough to trade Ambition for some rest. Welcome, beautiful Hearts restored through shame. I envy your peace. There’s nothing left to lose When all your pride is gone. The simple things in life Are all that’s left to do When you realize your heart Has hope for something more Than all your dreams can give. Welcome, sanctified Souls unseen by time. Now it’s waiting for you, The life you’ll have again When this sorry world is gone.
~ Hannah
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Well, I'm thirty years old and I have finally succumbed to a love for Taylor Swift. I've tried desperately to avoid such an admission for years, but alas, I can dodge it no longer. I'm a Swifty.
The long descent started two years ago. I was visiting Pittsburgh and Ruthie had just purchased Red. She insisted on blasting its best tracks and singing along with my youngest brother Josh. I threw out repeated snide remarks, but my sister was insistent - Taylor Swift was good and if I didn't agree, the problem was with me and my inability to enjoy the simple things in life. I don't quite remember why or how, but at some point over the next year, I cautiosly opened Red on Spotify. I think one of its tracks had been stuck in my head and as is my common strategy in my life, I tried to confront the despised music head on. I was set on finding all of Taylor's musical flaws. I had been deriding her Hollywood persona for years, so now it was time to really take a listen to how bad her music must be. I listened to it and while she really can't sing, and it was sappy in many places, and it was definitely much more girly than I considered worthy of my attention, I found myself humming the songs over and over again. Slowly I kept reopening Red for a listen. I never went older than Red. Those glittering ball gowns were just too much. But eventually, more quickly than I liked to admit, Red became a solid fixture in my music stream. It didn't take long for me to choose my favorite tracks and learn them by heart. My husband was shocked to come home and frequently find me singing along while cooking dinner. For a long time after that, I considered Taylor Swift my secret love Mr. Darcy style. Whenever she came up in conversation I still rolled my eyes and laughed. What a joke. Even though I loved her music, I still couldn't get past her personality in the media. When I was bored, I found myself watching her music videos, clips of performances, and interviews. It was so painful. I just couldn't reconcile the awkward, annoying, studied personality on the screen with the warm and delightful music she created. I kept thinking I would find that one video or clip in which I would think, ah, I do love Taylor, but it never came. I was a schizophrenic fan. Listening to her music, I thought she was the best thing ever, but as soon as anything involving the woman herself appeared, I want to cringe and hide my face. Around this same time, Jennifer Lawrence bursted into our awareness and everyone commenced on a frenzied obsession with the woman. Everyone wanted Jlaw as their BFF and that included my sister and I. We loved the Hunger Games, we loved Jlaw's falls on the red carpet, we loved her interviews, we loved just about everything this new wonder-woman did. She was just so... fun. In the midst of all this buzz, I happened across a red carpet interview of Taylor Swift. (Don't ask me how or why I follow all of this stuff so closely. It's terrible.) I say it was a Taylor Swift interview, but really that's what it was supposed to be. What it turned into was a Jennifer Lawrence interview. Basically what happens is that Taylor Swift is being total Miss Tay Tay - big beautiful dress, over the top speeches about the most ridiculous things, super poised, breathtakingly beautiful, in short, everything Taylor Swift ever is. And all of the sudden Jennifer Lawrence sneaks up behind her, surprises her, and then proceeds to take over the interview, outshining and making fun of Taylor in every way possible without Taylor even really knowing what was going on. Typical Jlaw. Typical Tay Tay. The first time I watched it, I thought it was the funniest thing I'd ever seen. In my mind, Taylor Swift had got her up and comings. It proved that she can't be the center of attention all of the time, that there are better and smarter women in the glitterati. I hadn't been able to find a video in which I actually liked Taylor, so at least I found one that made a total fool of her. And then somehow, on the third or fourth viewing, I realized something. I realized in the grand scheme of things, I really actually identified with Taylor Swift far more than Jennifer Lawrence. I've never been that cool girl, a la Jlaw style. I've never been the girl who can effortlessly be the center of attention, radiating beauty and confidence while everyone looks on and blesses me with laughter. If anything, I'm a whole lot more like Taylor Swift, needing to study and premeditate how to act and what to do when eyes are upon me. If I were in their shoes, I would totally be the Taylor Swift, having to try very hard to be poised and delightful for all of America. I'd probably even be prone to live in an illusionary daydream the way she does. And that's when I started to realize that despite all of her true ridiculousness, make-believedness, and glitz, Taylor Swift is one of my favorite women in show business. She is studied. She is awkward. She is fru-fru. And yet who can blame her? She has a phenomenal product to sell - her music - and she is smart enough to do what needs to be done to sell it. And that gets back to her music, the first true crack in my dam of resistance to all things Swifty. All of this soul searching I've done about Taylor Swift herself is pretty superficial, but the peace I've made with her music is anything but. And this is where things get personal and very subjective. The primary gift Taylor Swift's music has given me is the ability to take myself less seriously. Just as much as Taylor herself has to take herself all too seriously in order to survive show business, her music blesses me with the reverse. It's just so girly. That was the primary thing I hated about it for so long. When music is a badge we wear to signify to others who we are, Taylor Swift didn't really seem like a great choice. I first realized that my music choices could make people think well of me when I was in high school. I started listening to a lot of stuff, exploring different genres, and cultivating the musical image I wanted. My music somehow represented me and I wanted to people to think highly of my taste. I wanted to believe I listened to the things I chose solely because I liked them, but really the careful cultivation of an idea of my own serious taste was never far behind. None of it was girly. Of course there were quite a lot of female artists in the mix. But they were serious artists, people who communicated my own seriousness. The older I've grown, the more I've realized just how little I have indulged my girly side. Somewhere along the way, girly things became associated with weak things, with "unserious" things. And since I wanted to be great, those weak and unserious and girly things had to be done away with. The music that replaced them were either serious or sexualized versions of femininity. Taylor Swift realigns those categories altogether. Somehow she is girly, but she is by no means weak. Her music is full of sentimentality and wishful thinking, but I'm no longer convinced those contradict the serious things in life. The older I grow, the more I embrace the girlish bumble gum daydreams of life. As a woman, I find increasing relief in these things compared to the other images presented me. In a world where women are increasingly represented by either pantsuits or Beyonce, I prefer the image of woman who tries just a little too hard to create beautiful things in order to celebrate girliness. ~Hannah I used to tell people that autumn was my favorite season, but I've come to realize in the last couple of years that really isn't true. There's a certain romance to the season that I can't escape. But it's also always a dark time for me. As I've come to realize that I'm very much impacted by the season and lower light, I've also learned to cling more strongly to God's promises when my spirits are low. My brother wrote a song last year and the first time I listened to it, I cried and cried. It perfectly captures my feelings in seasons like this one. The words are Tennyson's and the melody all Daniel. Siblings are a mysterious thing - they are so oddly similar to you. The good thing about it is that when my brother expresses his soul though music, a medium I'm not gifted in, it sometimes feels like he is sharing my heart as well. So on a dark, autumnal day, I hope you enjoy these words and this music as much as I do. I find a certain refuge in them and I hope they bring you solace, as well. "Be near me when my light is low, When the blood creeps, and the nerves prick And tingle; and the heart is sick, And all the wheels of Being, slow. Be near me when the sensuous frame Is Life, a Fury slinging flame. But what of that? My darken'd ways Shall ring with music all the same; To breathe my loss is more than fame, To utter love more sweet than praise. Behold, we know not anything; I can but trust that good shall fall At last―far off―at last, to all, And every winter change to spring. Forgive what seem'd my sin in me; What seem'd my worth since I began; For merit lives from man to man, And not from man, O Lord, to thee. Ring out the want, the care, the sin, The faithless coldness of the times; Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes, But ring the fuller minstrel in. Ring in the valiant man and free, The larger heart, the kindlier hand; Ring out the darkness of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to be." ~Hannah I found some new music recently that I think you all will enjoy. I don't know much about her and hadn't heard any of her stuff until I listened to her do an interview on the radio. But she is soooooo good. Her sound is kind of old-school pop, but in the best of ways. Heavy on vocals, very soulful and romantic, Jessie Ware's music is just really beautiful. So far my favorite tracks are "You & I (Forever)," "Say You Love Me," "Keep on Lying," "Champagne Kisses," and "Desire." Ok, so that's half the whole album, but it deserves a good listen. Don't just put it on in the background, but sit an enjoy wherever you best can. Check it out. Jessie Ware's Tough Love. ~Hannah Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! I've made a mix every year since 2004, but have lost all the song lists older than 2011. But... here is this year's mix and I've included the last two as well. All tracks can be found on Spotify. Enjoy!
Valentine's Mix 2013 1. Sunday Kind of Love - Etta James 2. Too Busy Thinking About My Baby - Marvin Gaye 3. Something In The Way You Are - Kimbra 4. This - Ed Sheeran 5. I Won't Give Up - Jason Mraz 6. It's Alive - A Fine Frenzy 7. Baby, I Love You - Aretha Franklin 8. Paris Nights / New York Mornings - Corinne Bailey Rae 9. Young Blood - Birdy 10. A Rockin' Good Way (To Mess Around) - Dinah Washington, Brook Benton, Belford Hendricks 11. Sweet Lover - Aretha Franklin 12. The Walk - Mayer Hawthorne 13. Two Way Street - Kimbra 14. Now Is The Start - A Fine Frenzy 15. Lego House - Ed Sheeran Valentine's Mix 2012 1. Saw You First - Givers 2. Laundry Room - The Avett Brothers 3. Closer Than Yesterday - Renaissance 4. Desire - Ryan Adams 5. Roses and Wine - Diego Garcia 6. Sea of Love - Cat Power 7. We Found Love - Boyce Avenue 8. You're The One That I Want - Angus & Julia Stone 9. My Funny Valentine - Over The Rhine 10. Poison & Wine - The Civil Wars 11. If There Was No You - Brandi Carlile 12. Nothin' On You / My Love / Rocketeer - Boyce Avenue 13. Northern Wind - City and Colour 14. Tomorrow - Ryan Adams 15. Home - Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros Valentine's Mix 2011 1. I Don't Know - Lisa Hannigan 2. Lay Me Down - The Frames 3. Twice Today - Pearl and the Beard 4. The Curse - Josh Ritter 5. We Still Bleed - Val Emmich 6. Part One - Band of Horses 7. My Little Girl - Jack Johnson 8. Sideways - Citizen Cope 9. Runaway - The National 10. Waiting - Norah Jones 11. Lost in Singapore - Pearl and the Beard 12. Lille - Lisa Hannigan 13. See How Man Was Made - Josh Ritter 14. Between Two Lungs - Florence + The Machine 15. Mistakes - Pearl and the Beard 16. Your Face - The Frames 17. Aaj Mausam Bada Beimann Hai (Today The Weather Plays Tricks On Me) - Mohammed Rafi ~Hannah This post will be short and probably not altogether coherent, but these thoughts have been floating around my mind so I'll share them. The shower is an amazing place. My most lucid thoughts seem to come to me in the shower. I don't know why I was thinking about teachings on wives submitting to husbands (I'm careful to avoid saying "female submission" because there is nothing Biblical about the idea of general and broad submission of one gender to the other), but I was pondering it while showering the other day. It suddenly dawned on me that particular words and their grammar are really important. I think all Western women within Christianity struggle with Paul's admonition for wives to submit to their husbands. What female hasn't seriously questioned her and her sisters' places within the kingdom because of it? I have long made peace with this issue and actually find much joy in it, but I continue to ponder it every so often. What particularly struck me about Paul's admonition to wives was the nature of the word "submit." I have been studying vocabulary for the GRE, so perhaps that brought about my thoughtfulness concerning wording. But I digress. "To submit" is not a passive verb, but rather a verb of willful choice and action. The women Paul speaks to are the perpetrators of the command, not the recipients of its action. As daughters of the 21st century, I think when we hear "submit," we often think "subjugate." But these words have very different meanings. Subjugation is an act of the strong against the weak who have no will or rights. WIthin subjugation, women have no voice and are not addressed. If Paul were really calling for the subjugation of women, he would not have spoken to them, or if he had, it would have been to say wives must be passive as they are acted upon by their husbands. Instead the grammar calls women to act out themselves whatever this thing is called "submission." If Paul's command read "Wives be subjugated by your husbands," he would be restraining us. Rather, he speaks to the use of our individual wills, telling us to do a specific action. As much as women might react against Paul's words towards wives, we should recognize that submission as Paul talks about it is an act of a wife's own will, not the act of her husband's will. It seems to me there is a lot more that could be added and discussed here, but since I do not have the voice of a wife, I'll close my thoughts with the voice of Alicia Keys. I don't consider Alicia a particularly deep lyricist, but I do like her a lot one of her songs caught my attention around the same time I was pondering the definition of submission. I think some of what Paul talks about is deeply rooted in our hearts so that it bubbles through even in completely secular contexts. Both Paul's command to wives to submit and his command to husbands to love sacrificially are about using our wills to put the other person first. So let's indulge in a great 90s pop version of this idea. Enjoy! ~Hannah You can read this for yourself. If I wrote anything about it myself, all that would come out is a long line of expletives. And then I would sound not too different from the subject of my anger.
********************************************************* Who says female corpses aren’t sexy? by Melinda Tankard Reist (http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/42078.html) Two dead women in lingerie swing back and forth from the ceiling from a chain around their necks. Two young women are slumped on a silk-sheeted bed, like corseted lifeless mannequins. A man advances on them. His intentions are clear. Another woman in fetishized clothing lies spread-eagled on a table in front of a man eating a huge plate of raw meat. Have I been exploring the far reaches of online torture pornography and snuff movies? Was I checking out necrophilia genre? No. I was watching rapper Kanye West’s new video teaser for the single Monster, from his new chart-topping album My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. With contributions from Rick Ross, Nicki Minaj and Jay-Z, the Monster preview is a mini horror movie – with all the horror suffered by women. The men don’t seem horrified at all by the female corpses littered through the haunted mansion, the apparent victims of a serial killing. In fact, they seem to quite like it. It seems to turn them on. Some of the descriptions of the sneak preview video mention ‘bodies strewn around’. Yes, there are bodies. But they are all women’s bodies. As far as I could tell, there are no dead men, just dead women. This is gendered violence. It’s not depicting just any old corpse but a clearly female one and then, clearly eroticised. Dead women a turn off? Not at all. Kanye West, on the bed with the two young white dead women, shows no hesitation. He moves the lifeless arm of one onto the leg of the other, before cupping the porcelain like face of the first woman to kiss her. Hanging from the rafters in stiletto heels, standing rigid in lingerie, expired on a bed. The white women in these scenes are depicted as subordinated to the black man, reminiscent of the pornographic representation of black men who love to ravish white women, to tarnish and spoil their ‘pure’ bodies. Limp, floppy, rendered powerless these doll-like bodies retain their seductive, sexual allure. Sure, they might be dead. Sure they can’t consent. Sure they wanted it. I wonder who thought of this scene? In the ‘Behind the Scenes’ YouTube clip for Monster, another rap artist, Rick Ross, is seated at the head of a table. Before him is a plate laden with large slabs of raw red meat. Also on the table, a dead woman, in underwear, her stockinged legs spread-eagled on either side of the plate. Perfect viewing for the royal Ross as he tucks into the meat and wine (her flesh and blood?). In another scene, Ross reclines on a long couch, nonchalantly smoking a cigar while women hang dead and slightly swaying, from chains around their neck. The only two living women seem to be a maid and the black female rapper (often likened to a black Barbie doll) Nicki Minaj. They may be alive. But they are still subordinated. The maid genuflects to Ross as she serves him. Minaj is on all fours baring her teeth like an animal about to be attacked. Her backside, swathed in black lace, is in the ‘presenting position’. As one of the YouTube preview clips describes it: “This is a 30 second sneak peak of Nicki Minaj's HUGE ass.” This representation continues the legacy of the fetishization of black women’s ‘booty’. As to the lyrics, there’s the usual repetition of ‘muthaf***er’ and bitches and the obligatory references to oral sex ("Head of the class and she just want a swallowship"). Then there’s these lines: “I put the p-ssy in the sarcophagus” (which, in case you’re wondering, is a flesh eating coffin) and “rape and pillage a village, women and children”. The clip is not only interested in fetishizing female bodies – it revels in fetishizing female pain, female passivity, female suffering and female silence. The ultimate female is the quiet, passive female - a mannequin - who accepts violence, abuse and suffering while remaining hot and sexy. Expect to hear boys singing along to it soon. This is the message they are imbibing: Women are slaves and bitches who can service a man’s sexual needs, even in death. Men are brutal and dominant, and have no empathy for women. Men enjoy dead women as sex and entertainment. The female body is to be devoured, reduced to the same status as meat. Female bodies should be displayed before men as a great feast for their consumption. And the creators of this feast of violence will probably win a ton of awards and commendations and sponsorship deals from major companies. Just watch. ~Hannah One of my new favorites! Read up on them and listen! There's a place in the darkness that I used to cling to
That presses harsh hope against time. In the absence of martyrs there's a presence of thieves Who only want to rob you blind. They steal away any sense of peace. Tho' I'm a king I'm a king on my knees. And I know they are wrong when they say I am strong As the darkness covers me. So turn on the light and reveal all the glory. I am not afraid. To bear all my weakness, knowing in meekness, I have a kingdom to gain. Where there is peace and love in the light In the light, I am not afraid To let your light shine bright in my life, in my life There are ghosts from my past who've owned more of my soul Than I thought I had given away. They linger in closets and under my bed And in pictures less proudly displayed. A great fool in my life I have been Have squandered 'til pallid and thin. Hung my head in shame and refused to take blame For the darkness I know I've let win. So turn on the light and reveal all the glory. I am not afraid To bear all my weakness, knowing in meekness, I have a kingdom to gain. Where there is peace and love in the light In the light , I am not afraid To let your light shine bright in my life, in my life Can you hear me? Can you hear me? I've never been much for the bearing of soul In the presence of any man. I'd rather keep to myself all safe and secure In the arms of a sinner I am. Could it be that my worth should depend By the crimson stained grace on a hand? And like a lamp on a hill Lord I pray in your will To reveal all of you that I can. So turn on the light and reveal all the glory. I am not afraid. To bear all my weakness, knowing in meekness, I have a kingdom to gain. Where there is peace and love in the light In the light , I am not afraid To let your light shine bright in my life, in my life There's a place in the darkness that I used to cling to That presses harsh hope against time. - Jennifer Knapp |
