Never Give Up
by rebecca ~ October 18th, 2005. Filed under: Ordinary Miracles.
Lately I have been listening to Ben Harper over and over again because it’s in our cd player in the car. I sing along with it during the recent long drives to and fro my son’s new school.
Ben Harper is a down-to-earth singer/songwriter–maybe like a young Bob Dylan–his voice is not perfect, but carries a truth to it, and he is also socially awake–in a way that not many well-known musicians are anymore–so many wrapped up Pepsi flags and MTV camouflage it seems.
My son especially enjoys “Gold to Me” and I like it, too, along with “Excuse Me, Mr.,” “By My Side” and “Give a Man a Home.”
Which brings my brain to a related topic (at least it’s related in my mind, although, as my husband often says to me, “Wait a minute. How did you jump from that train to this train?!”): I will post a pic of an abandoned house in the middle of the rice fields that I gaze at everyday with restoration fantasies.
Birds twitter and skitter to nests in its walls, bricks and plaster have slid into crumpled pyramids. If I had big money (oh, if!) I would give this house a devoted fix up. It would surely cost a lot as it looks so forlorn.
I already have an imagined action plan to plant a row of windbreaking trees around it, so the winter winds wouldn’t shiver its timbers and new recycled windows.
Yet, a couple of tipped over corn stalks and brown-eyed susans are springing up around it, so I know this home was once loved by someone. I hope this house’s spirit can remember that even when we feel abandoned and alone, someone somewhere still cares. As Elizabeth Bishop concludes in her poem, “Filling Station”:
Somebody loves us all.