Everyday Graces

I have lost track of Blip recently. I’m posting this on Tuesday, and it has been a week since I posted that shot of Art and Shasta. But it’s all good. Spending time with Sue is my favorite part. Also good: preparations for Bella’s return from Arizona and for holiday celebrations. Reading. Studying other people’s photographs. Time off the computer and time to exercise more, use the body more. Time on Facebook with both my daughters and with former students and friends far away. And time to attend an Aurora Chorus concert, which is the occasion for this blip. It’s not a good-enough photograph, but I’m posting this because I want to say something about TerriG, whose voice, words, and talents move me. That’s Terri, seated just right of the director, slightly right of center, on the front row.

At this concert, one of Terri’s original songs was featured, sung by her, accompanied on the guitar by her, and backed up by the full chorus and a viola duo. Terri’s song was my favorite part of the concert, in which every piece was wonderful. It’s not because Terri and her partner Laurie are my friends that I say this.

Terri has been a singer-songwriter all her life, and back in the 80s and 90s she was making a big name for herself when, heading into this century, cancer struck. She made her way through that successfully, but serious side-effects of cancer treatment cause her unremitting pain and limited mobility. Despite that, she recently completed a two-year intensive course that qualifies her to be a voice instructor. It included serious work on her own voice, and she developed her range and her repertoire to include Schubert songs and grand opera. After overcoming cancer, Terri has gone on creating new directions in her life, all of which would not be possible without Laurie, who still works full-time and supports Terri in countless ways. And so when I heard the lyrics to Terri’s song, I wept. I heard in her song her own struggle, Laurie’s struggle, and the struggles of many: our triumphs and losses, the beauty of everyday graces that sustain us. The lyrics are only a quarter of the joy of this song, and I’m sorry I can’t link to the sound. Link below! Hooray! Imagine a slight melancholy somewhere between klezmer and the blues, a bouncing rhythm like a three-year-old in a state of abandon, and an aching tenderness--for all the people in our lives who move on.


And the path to perfection is rutted and rocky
And the detours will throw us off course
We can go our own way and find new direction
Although we may not win the race

And they tell us that beauty is in the reflection
Of something we cannot retain
But the everyday graces in lines of old faces
Is beauty that won't fade away

When we search for the treasure we look in dark places
For traces of something long buried and gone
But we find it in pleasures of everyday graces
In faces that smile and move on.

--Terri Grayum.

Update: Hooray! Terri sent me a link to the song! It's not the full choral/viola version, but it's gorgeous, and you can just imagine it with 100 voices and two violas added. Here it is!