Sweetness

I know it's mid-January, but there's part of me that is still basking in the holidays and I felt the need to post just one last insight from my holiday experience. Last year the holidays were a little somber for me, my Mom had just passed in November, and gratefully we scaled way back on the festivities. There were great moments, but admittedly I was a little numb. I had a lot of sleepless nights and reoccurring images of my mother in her last moments and well, it was just heavy stuff.

Anyways, fast forward to a year later. A much different picture, Harrison is the grand old age of 3 1/2 and well aware of the meaning of Christmas and so excited about everything that comes with that. So, in turn, I'm excited, the preparations were well under way early on and my ability to do these things was in a much better state. And I'd have to say I noticed a sweetness to this season that I haven't in any of my past Christmases. I'm sure that this had to do with my mother's passing and now, this year, my being able to accept this spirit into my Christmas celebrations.

So there is one event in particular that had me soaring in this sweetness, Chris got invited with his board at West Mini to the MoTab (Mormon Tabernacle Choir) Christmas concert with VIP treatment! I have never been to one of these concerts before and I was REALLY excited. My relationship with the MoTab has grown over the years and that relationship relates directly to my mother. She was always a big fan and revered them, I might add. Me, not so much. But, in more recent years, I've started to have an appreciation for them as part of my heritage and a treasure. I started recording their program on TV, "Music and the Spoken Word," a few years ago when Harrison was a baby. We sometimes listen to it on Sundays when getting ready for church.

I will always be grateful for one Sunday program in particular. It was October 2008, I had it on in the background while getting ready and I was drawn in by a song. I sat down on the couch, listened closer and started to cry. These were the words of the song:

HOMEWARD BOUND
Words and Music by Marta Keen

LOVE IS SPOKEN HERE album - The Mormon Tabernacle Choir

In the quiet misty morning, when the moon has gone to bed,
When the sparrows stop their singing and the sky is clear and red,
When the summer's ceased its gleaming, when the corn is past its prime,
When adventure's lost its meaning, I'll be homeward bound in time.

Bind me not to the pasture. Chain me not to the plow.
Set me free to find my calling and I'll return to you somehow.

If you find it's me you're missing, if you're hoping I'll return,
To your thought I'll soon be list'ning; in the road I'll stop and turn.
Then the wind will set me racing as my journey nears its end,
And the path I'll be retracing when I'm homeward bound again.

Bind me not to the pasture. Chain me not to the plow.
Set me free to find my calling and I'll return to you somehow.

In the quiet misty morning when the moon has gone to bed,
When the sparrows stop their singing, I'll be homeward bound again.

I felt so strongly that this song was talking about my mother. I cried and cried that morning and looked up the words to the song later and cried again. She passed away a month later. I often listen to this song and it gives me great comfort that she had been ready to go. Sometimes you just know things are there for you, this was one of those times for me.

So, as I sat in this year's Christmas Concert with the MoTab I once again was wrapped up in the gentle spirit of this choir and the sweet spirit of the season. My mother would have loved to have been there with me and I somehow felt that she was....