Showcasing My Writing and Me
Thanks to Lynda Lambert for giving me this opportunity to promote myself. Check this out.
Saturday is for Sharing: Abbie Johnson Taylor
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Abbie Johnson Taylor
We Shall Overcome
How to Build a Better Mousetrap: Recollections and Reflections of a Family Caregiver
That’s Life: New and Selected Poems
My Ideal Partner: How I Met, Married, and Cared for the Man I Loved Despite Debilitating Odds
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Tomorrow, my late husband Bill and I would have been married eleven years. In 2005 after Bill proposed to me, while we were still living miles apart, he sent me a Valentine care package which included, among other things, a cassette tape of love songs he’d downloaded from the Internet. The song below was on that tape. Even now, it captivates me, and I’m amazed that a man wanted to spend his lifetime loving me. I still want to spend the rest of my life loving him.
How to Build a Better Mousetrap: Recollections and Reflections of a Family Caregiver
That’s Life: New and Selected Poems
My Ideal Partner: How I Met, Married, and Cared for the Man I Loved Despite Debilitating Odds
Click to hear an audio trailer.
Thanks to My English Cup of Tea for inspiring this. Before I started writing full time, I was a registered music therapist, working for fifteen years in nursing homes and other facilities that served senior citizens.
I understood and still appreciate the power of music to heal. Even today, music relaxes me when I need to unwind and motivates me when I need to get up and do something.
When I ran across Kathrins’ musical tag, I decided to give it a try. Here are my answers to the questions provided on the site.
I enjoy classical, jazz, and some standards from the 60’s, 70’s, and 80’s. I also like a little contemporary music once in a while.
I play piano and guitar. Although I no longer work as a music therapist, I still visit nursing homes and other facilities from time to time and play my guitar and sing for the residents. I like the guitar’s portability, but I can do more with the piano.
I’m not sure where this came from, but I remember it being the theme of a concert I attended years ago featuring a college choir along with a children’s group sponsored by the YMCA. “Music is the doctor.”
My favorite singer is Linda Ronstadt. I read her autobiography a couple of years ago. She had an interesting life. “Heart Is Like a Wheel” is still one of my favorites. I don’t think it was as popular as her other work, but it echoes my sentiment after my husband passed.
I don’t have any favorites here. From Beethoven to Joni Mitchell, I don’t think any one is better than another.
I don’t have any, and that’s the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God.
I would choose songs representing different turning points in my life. Simon and Garfunkel’s “El Condor Pasa” was on one of my first eight-tracks when I was a kid. It was the first song I sang for a talent show, accompanying myself on the piano.
Barbara Streisand’s “Songbird” was one I listened to frequently during my music therapy internship in Fargo, North Dakota. At the time, my supervisor didn’t think I would be successful as a music therapist. The song echoed my sentiment.
“I Want to Spend My Lifetime Loving You” from The Mask of Zorro was a song my late husband and I enjoyed listening to together while snuggling. Even today, I’m amazed that a man wanted to spend his lifetime loving me. You can read more about this in My Ideal Partner.
I hate heavy metal. It grates on my nerves. I also don’t like modern atonal classical music. It sounds more like noise, but then again, one person’s noise is another’s music.
Now it’s your turn. If you have a blog, you can answer the above questions there and link to your post here. Otherwise, you can share your answers in the comments field. Either way, I look forward to hearing from you and wish you many more happy hours of music listening.
How to Build a Better Mousetrap: Recollections and Reflections of a Family Caregiver
That’s Life: New and Selected Poems
My Ideal Partner: How I Met, Married, and Cared for the Man I Loved Despite Debilitating Odds
On this Valentine’s Day, here’s a poem about love that endures through difficult times. I posted this last year, but it’s worth a second look.
The following poem was inspired by a song from a movie that was released in the late 1990’s. I never heard of the song or the movie until 2005 after my late husband Bill proposed to me. He was living in Fowler, Colorado, at the time, and I was here in Sheridan, Wyoming. We met through a magazine, and after a long-distance friendship during which we communicated regularly by e-mail and phone and met face to face twice, he sent me a letter, out of the blue, asking me to marry him. This was in January.
A month later, he sent me a Valentine care package that included, among other things, a cassette tape of love songs he downloaded from the Internet. One of these was “I Want to Spend My Lifetime Loving You” from The Mask of Zorro. It became one of our songs. Even now, after caring for him at home for six years when two strokes partially paralyzed him, and after I lost him three years ago, I still marvel that a man wanted to spend his lifetime loving me. To hear this song, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yo4AWDELNiY . To hear me read the poem, visit https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/15213189/rise%20fal%20of%20zorro.mp3 . Happy Valentine’s Day, honey, wherever you are.
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THE RISE AND FALL OF MY ZORRO
With cape, hat, mask, rapier,
he rode out of the darkness.
“Take my hand. Dance with me,” he said,
“I want to spend my lifetime loving you,”
but happily-ever-after was not to be.
My hero fell and rose many times.
I felt the glory
until he fell for the last time.
Where there’s love, life begins again.
When life dies, love goes on.
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How to Build a Better Mousetrap: Recollections and Reflections of a Family Caregiver
