When I was in high school I attended a church camp each summer. It was in the woods of western Pennsylvania, and the hundred or so campers gathered together to worship, and dance, and eat. Sometimes my friends and I got a notion to amble through the campground before breakfast, as a substitute for the clanging wake up bell. I brought my guitar and we sang. People enjoyed hearing our voices wafting through the screens of their cabins. We called ourselves a heavenly choir.
One of the images I had of motherhood was that I would serenade my children to sleep. It would be a gentle conclusion to a love filled day, and their long lashed eyes would flutter closed as I gazed adoringly at them.
It didn't turn out that way. More often I was exhausted and shoved rather than tucked them into bed. But on occasion I did manage a simple tune.
"Mom, could you told us to sleep instead?" As in told us a story.
I got the message.
My father loved to sing, and was in a barbershop quartet with his buds. They were one act short of winning the prize on an amateur hour. My mother, on the other hand, was a wobbly alto. One day I tried to get them to record a song I had written with three parts, and helping her come in on time while still managing my own line was hit or miss. Mostly miss.
In the past week I have been sung awake. By that I mean there is music streaming through my head as I slide from dreamland to the remembrance that life s creaking under the weight of discord. Two days ago it was a song John wrote called Hear in Heaven Your Dwelling Place. I confess that he has composed so many I had to check our book to see if I had the words straight.
"Hear in heaven your dwelling place. Hear and forgive our sins.
Hear in heaven your dwelling place. Hear and forgive and do.
If there is a famine or war in the land,
Whatever plague or sickness there may be,
When we pray and we know the plague of our hearts,
and spread out our hands to Your house..."
Another morning it was Guide Me Oh Thou Great Jehovah, which is pretty popular.
"When I tread the verge of Jordan, bid my anxious fears subside.
Bear me through the selling current
Land me safe on Canaan's side.
Strong deliverer, strong deliverer, be thou still my strength and shield.
Strong deliverer, strong deliverer, be thou still my strength and shield."
I have no proof, of course, but I think it was my mother serenading me. She knows that I wrestle with emergencies. I take that back. I lay down and forfeit the match. But she wants me to know that she loves me. And that her ability to carry a melody has improved.
