Tuning Slide 5.17- Giving Thanks- A Story to Tell

Weekly Reflections on Life and Music

Music can heal the wounds which medicine cannot touch.
Debasish Mridha

The past two weeks have been difficult, which is why there wasn’t a Tuning Slide post last week. One of my older and deeper friends had a major health event two weeks ago tomorrow. We waited and prayed. A lot! My wife and I spent his last day at the hospital with his wife and daughter. We said goodbye about an hour after the life-support was disconnected. Five minutes after we walked out the door, he passed. Over these weeks, music was the grounding force of my life. This week, then, I have a couple of stories to tell. Since last week was Thanksgiving, the stories connect with the holiday and the gratitude I have felt in the midst of the difficulties.

The overall story goes back many years- thirty-five, to be exact. This friend was a highly talented musician. He was more than just excellent at guitar, banjo, and mandolin. He had played in many groups over the years. He was also our neighbor, he had children the same age group as our daughter, and was a member of our church. We did a lot together- if it wasn’t about church, faith, and family, it usually involved music. He was often encouraging me to work on my musical skills at the trumpet- and the guitar.

One day we were sitting having a conversation over lunch or some meal or other. We began talking about music in the church- and church musicians, many of whom were our friends in our church as well as in the larger community. We were commenting about something or other of those things that often bug pastors, even pastors like myself who were also musicians. For some now long-forgotten reason, I made some comment about myself not being one of those church musicians who would give pastors headaches. He got this “oh, really?” look on his face, paused and said:

“If you practiced more, you might.”

He looked satisfied with that- and dropped the subject.

I didn’t forget, however. I especially remembered it a number of times in the past 8-10 years when I did start practicing more- a lot more! I remembered it as my skills did improve. He was one of those smacks up the side of the head that made me wonder what it was I could really do with music if I put my mind to it.

As part of that ongoing subtle prodding, he suggested I go with him up north one year to a bluegrass jam camp he had discovered. While I have tried to learn to play guitar a number of times over the past 50+ years, I never progressed. I wanted to be as good at the guitar as I was at the trumpet, but without the years of practice. He told me there would be a number of others at the camp with the same skill level as I had- and that it would be fun. Since I have always enjoyed bluegrass music- the jazz of country music- I finally agreed. It was everything he said- and more. He and I then organized a couple bluegrass jam camps of our own at our church’s camp in Wisconsin and had the chance to meet, work with, and become friends with Monroe Crossing, one of Minnesota’s top bluegrass groups. I even went to several monthly jam sessions in the Twin Cities before moving.

After the move, my bluegrass chops began to fall away when my trumpet chops and engagement in a number of groups grew. I continued to love bluegrass and listened to it. I attempted to work on trumpet or brass quintet arrangements of some bluegrass classics. They haven’t fallen into place, but my friend did encourage me at it.

Back in September our community band was putting the music together for our fall concert. I was overjoyed to see an arrangement of a bluegrass classic, Arkansas Traveler, in the list. I took the first part with the short 16-bar solo in the middle of it. I knew it would be fun and would fit right in with all my many musical interests.That piece became the closing number of the concert.

The concert was last Saturday, only three hours after my friend died.

I had told his family about it and we were all humbled by the timing. Over the past couple of years I have lost most of my fear and anxiety of solos. As we came to my three measures of rest right before the solo, I said a brief “Thank you. This is for you, my friend” and just played.

But the story isn’t quite over. The next night my wife and I were at another concert in the Twin Cities with the incredible guitar duo of Rodrigo y Gabriela. They both talked during the concert about how powerful and important music is. It is, they both said, “a force for healing.” My friend knew that in his life. One of the groups that he played with for a number of years was a faith-based group. He often talked about how the music they played in concert or for church was more than performing. It was spirit. It was faith being lived and shared. He often talked about how when they sand and the audience or congregation sang with them, it was a “boomerang” effect. The music and faith, and healing, that they sent out was echoed back to them.

As I put all this together, and our big band played a gig this past Monday, I realized that is what has been happening in my life over these 55 years since I started playing the trumpet. It is what I discovered playing in many groups over the years. It is what I am continuing to discover, even when I sit and play long tones or woodshed a difficult part of a piece. It is what happens when our big band plays for a senior citizens group- and they smile, tap their feet, and even sometimes yell “wahoo!” when we’re done.

Music. What a joy, what a gift both to give and receive. I am thankful to overflowing with it. Never lose it. Keep playing, keep practicing, keep performing. You and the people around you will discover healing and hope.

My friend’s memorial will be next Saturday. It will be a celebration of his life- and it will be filled with music!

Buddy's War #38- Thanksgiving 1944 and Beyond

Diary Entries, Beula Keller Lehman

    •    November 21, 1944
Dora called and said she was coming up for Thanksgiving

    •    November 23, 1944- Thanksgiving Day
Dora came at 9.20. Had dinner. It was a lovely day

    •    November 26, 1944
Dora and I went to Bethlehem.

For Thanksgiving, Dora made her second trip to Pennsylvania since her new husband had deployed. Beula, as usual, shows no emotions in her diary about what is happening. Dora has become another person in her life who can help fill her loneliness. She and Dora go to the movies, visit Ruth in Bethlehem, sharing what must have been a very subdued Thanksgiving. Beula regularly comments that she receives letters from Buddy and that she writes back. There is never anything indicating she knows where he is or what is happening. Most likely, he downplayed the events knowing that in any case, the letters were censored.


In Europe, on November 21 Co. C was moved to support CC B. It was their first time on the “front line” and not with the reserve unit closer to Division headquarters. It would only last a week, but they were finally, truly, in the midst of combat casualties.

    ✓    21 November 1944
    ✓    Company C Morning Report
Departed Kaltweiler 1300 via motor convoy. Traveled 9.4 miles to Ritzing. Arrived 1600. Billeted troops and set up Clearing Station. (MR)

During this week that Buddy’s Company C was assigned to CC B:

    ⁃    21 Nov- the north column of CCB received a heavy counterattack just west of BUDINGEN but it was repulsed with heavy loss to the enemy.

    ⁃    22 and 23 Nov- CCB was patrolling to the front to determine exact location of enemy positions.

    ⁃    26 Nov- CCB cleared the woods east of WALDWISSE and then entered the town of BETHINGEN. Although the town was taken by surprise, heavy enemy artillery concentrations soon necessitated a withdrawal. General PIBURN now had three columns within four miles of his objective, the bridge of MERZIG. The head of the northern column was just east of BUDINGEN with a good road leading into the city of LERZIG.

    ⁃    27 – 28 Nov- The Germans had realized the importance of the city of MERZIG, the key to the SAAR Valley, and had taken extreme care to block all avenues of approach. The terrain along with the soft subsoil afforded the defender an excellent position. The roads, the only avenues of approach for armor, were covered with numerous roadblocks, which made going extremely slow.

    ✓    29 November 1944
    ✓    Company C Morning Report
Left Ritzing 1100. Traveled 5.2 miles via motor convoy to Sierck-les-Bains. Arrived 1200. Billeted troops and set up clearing station. (MR)

[Co C reassigned back to reserve combat command (CC R) and they moved back to the vicinity of Division HQ.]

    ⁃    29 Nov- Both the northern and the center columns of CCB pushed to the built-up area of HILBRINGEN, only one mile west of the bridge in the afternoon

    ⁃    30 Nov- As the elements of CCB were preparing to complete their mission of seizing the bridge intact over the SAAR River at MERZIG, a terrific explosion shook the area. The Germans had blown the bridge just as the engineers reached it.



All this action with CC B is taking place in an area smaller than the New York City borough of Brooklyn! It was 11 miles wide and 7 miles long.

It is interesting to note that there are no morning reports for Company C from 23 Nov - 29 Nov, the period they are assigned to CC B. While I have the end of the month After Action Report for the whole 80th Battalion which shows the activity at the clearing stations, it is not broken down by company. (I will post that at the beginning of December.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Following the 80th Armored Medical Battalion and10th Armored Division in World War II has given me a new perspective on the planning and execution of war. I have never been in the military; I have read many books (novels as well as non-fiction); I have watched many movies; I have never studied the tactics of warfare. It is intriguing and educational to look at war from a tactical perspective, even if it is with the “perfect” vision of seventy-five years.

The staggering number of troops involved is far more than my mind can handle. As I stare at the maps I realize that each map is but a small slice of a huge story, even within the area covered by the maps. I remember that the whole 10th Armored Division would have been between 10 and 15,000 troops.

An armored division’s organization included

    ▪    a Division Headquarters and Headquarters Company,
    ▪    two Combat Command Headquarters (CC A and CC B),
    ▪    a Reserve Combat Command Headquarters (CC R),
    ▪    three tank battalions (of three medium and one light tank companies),
    ▪    three armored infantry battalions,
    ▪    three eighteen-gun artillery battalions,
    ▪    a cavalry reconnaissance squadron (battalion),
    ▪    an armored medical battalion.
    ▪    an engineer battalion, and
    ▪    division services,

The division was commanded by a major general, the combat commands by a brigadier general (who was also assistant division commander) and two colonels. The division included

    ▪        77 light tanks,
    ▪        168 medium tanks,
    ▪        18 M4 105mm assault guns,
    ▪        54 M7 105mm SP artillery pieces,
    ▪        54 M8 armored cars,
    ▪        450 halftracks,
    ▪        1,031 motor vehicles, and
    ▪        8 light observation aircraft.

(Military History Online)

Eastern France was a city in the mud and rain that November seventy-five years ago. To organize, direct and carry out the maneuvers must have been incredibly complex and, of course, based on the fact that the German troops weren’t just going to fall over and quit.

So I look at the maps and read the descriptions and am finally, after seven years of this, beginning to figure it out.

    ▪    First there’s the work of Combat Command A or B (CC A, CC B). CC A went one way with one job, CC B went another.
    ▪    Then there are the different Task Forces sent out from the Combat Commands. One might come in from the rear and another from a flanking maneuver.
    ▪    On top of all that this had to be coordinated with other divisions, Combat Commands, Task Forces, air support, medical support.

The movies make it look like all the tanks did was just barrel on forward crushing everything in their path. That is obviously not what happened. There were the days or weeks when a particular group might be less involved than at other times. There were the times after a battle when they could (sort of) relax.

How much could the medics relax? What could the soldiers do in the “downtime?” It must have been nothing short of maddening on some level of awareness that they must have had to sublimate, push away, forget.

Thanksgiving Day 2019

It has been a difficult two weeks with friends and family concerns. Yet today IS Thanksgiving Day here in the United States. I am grateful for so many things today, I cannot even begin to list them. The poem below was posted on the On Being website several years ago. It is perfect.

I pray that everyone enjoys this day and can move through the downs of the past and look forward with grateful hope.

Three Gratitudes

Carrie Newcomer

Every night before I go to sleep
I say out loud
Three things that I’m grateful for,
All the significant, insignificant
Extraordinary, ordinary stuff of my life.
It’s a small practice and humble,
And yet, I find I sleep better
Holding what lightens and softens my life
Ever so briefly at the end of the day.
Sunlight, and blueberries,
Good dogs and wool socks,
A fine rain,
A good friend,
Fresh basil and wild phlox,
My father’s good health,
My daughter’s new job,
The song that always makes me cry,
Always at the same part,
No matter how many times I hear it.
Decent coffee at the airport,
And your quiet breathing,
The stories you told me,
The frost patterns on the windows,
English horns and banjos,
Wood Thrush and June bugs,
The smooth glassy calm of the morning pond,
An old coat,
A new poem,
My library card,
And that my car keeps running
Despite all the miles.
And after three things,
More often than not,
I get on a roll and I just keep on going,
I keep naming and listing,

Until I lie grinning,
Blankets pulled up to my chin,
Awash with wonder
At the sweetness of it all.

Buddy's War: #9- Thanksgiving 1943

This is part of a series that over two years will follow the story of my father in World War II 75 years ago. I did this five years ago in the series Following the 10th Armored, but I have been doing more research and expanding the ideas. The beginning posts will set the stage for the events of 1944 and 1945 when he was in Europe as part of the 10th Armored Division's 80th Armored Medical Battalion.

~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`~`

◆    November 25, 1943
Thanksgiving Day
75 Years Ago Today…

My dad had been home for around 10 days on furlough. It was time to head back to Georgia and Camp Gordon. Grandma’s diary simply records that she got up at 8:00 (early for her), got dinner, and then “took Buddy to the station at 2-.”

By 6:00 both Carl and Ruth were also gone.

Such was Thanksgiving 1943.

Meanwhile in Georgia:

The troops that were not on furlough over Thanksgiving had their own feasts. Since they had formed in 1942, the 10th Armored Division, the Tiger Division, had produced a newspaper:

From Vol II, No. 11 on Dad’s birthday, they had the following information about the upcoming Thanksgiving:

"Next Thursday is Thanksgiving, traditionally a holiday that ranks as a day for good eating, good fellowship and general celebration. The Tiger Division should have a typical Thanksgiving holiday. Turkey dinner in the mess halls. Two Tiger grid teams will clash on the post gridiron in what promises to be a fast-moving, hard-fought contest.
Sometime during the day every Tier might well stop for a few minutes to consider why he, personally, should feel thankful on Thanksgiving Day 1943. Here are a few reasons we can think of: We are part of the greatest Army in the world, preparing to fight for the greatest country in the world; our forces on the fighting fronts are everywhere surging ahead; on the home front, production is ever on the increase and there is no longer any doubt that we shall have the planes, ships, and tanks necessary to destroy the enemy;… there is plenty to be grateful about… So lets consider ourselves very lucky, and enjoy the day— and then, the next day, go on about the business of winning the war so we can return home and have our old-fashioned Thanksgivings."

4.19- Tuning Slide: Music and Thanksgiving

Weekly Reflections on Life and Music

Gratitude can transform common days into thanksgivings, turn routine jobs into joy, and change ordinary opportunities into blessings.
— William Arthur Ward

Without gratitude my life would be dull and pretty well beyond help. It is the foundation of whatever I have and whatever I have been blessed to share. A day without gratitude? I really don’t know any more. It would be a day lost.

Music, for me does the same thing as gratitude. I can’t live without either one.

Music, too, can transform common days into thanksgivings,
turn routine jobs into joy, and
change ordinary opportunities into blessings.

The music I am thankful for makes me move, makes me pay attention to life and hope, inspires me to be better than I am at what I do, and moves me to smile in the deepest part of my soul. It’s why I play music. Every day. It’s why I try to listen to music every day. I tried to figure out which ones are my favorites.

Yeah, right! How can I narrow it down to less than fifty or one hundred? But here are four that in a quick thought, make me smile and be part of this amazing gift of music. Have a Happy Thanksgiving this week.

Listen to music.
Play music.
Smile. A lot!

First, the energy that moves the world as best seen in Buddy Rich- Birdland

Then the sound that propels me to be better- even at my age. Listen to the complete range of sound that Doc Severinsen can make- A Song for You.

From an album of all new material, this version was recorded just up the road right here in Minnesota at The Current, part of Minnesota Public Radio. The Preservation Hall Jazz Band- That’s It!

Finally, Satchmo in a true song of Thanksgiving. Listen and give thanks with Louis Armstrong- What a Wonderful World

The Tuning Slide - With Gratitude

Weekly Reflections on Life and Music

Gratitude is the music of the heart.

-Unknown

It's Thanksgiving Week and it is hard to move past the week without talking about gratitude.

Will gratitude make you a better musician? Not as much as practice will, but it will do something just as important that will have an impact- it will increase your mindfulness, your awareness of yourself and the world around you. THAT will help your trumpet playing.

• It will give you insight into your own life and emotions- an important part of being an advancing musician. 
• It will keep you in touch with those around you that will make your life fuller and more enriching. 
• It will keep you humble- which is another way of saying you will continue to be teachable- willing and ready to learn.
• It will increase your happiness levels on a daily basis, say a number of research studies.
• It will increase your energy and motivation more often.
• Depression and stress will be more easily coped with on a daily basis.

As preachers have been saying for years on Thanksgiving, don't just save all your gratitude for this one day. It actually will make you a better person if you learn to practice it every day.

• Dr. Amit Sood of Mayo Clinic suggests that you not get out of bed in the morning any day without some awareness of reasons or people to be grateful for. 
• Keep a gratitude journal and review it on a daily basis. 
• Don't repeat yourself- find new reasons to be grateful each day.
• Silently wish each person you pass in a given period of time, grace and peace.
• Meister Eckhart was a man of wisdom:

If the only prayer you say in your life is ‘thank you,’

that would suffice.

– Meister Eckhart

One person who has helped me over the past couple years is Shane Burcaw. He is a young man with Spinal Muscular Atrophy and has been in a wheelchair his whole life. He also has a journalism degree, is the author of a wonderful book, Laughing at My Nightmare, is the founder of a foundation to assist others with Muscular Dystrophy and its variations, and has an incredible sense of humor. His attitude is nothing short of remarkable. No, he does not play trumpet (I don't think so, anyway!) but he is a person filled with energy- and gratitude.

Every week he posts a list called What Made Me Smile This Week. There are many things each week that bring a smile to Shane's face: meeting with college students at his Alma Mater (Moravian College!), eating turkey chili, giving a talk at an elementary school, writing, or just being able to stretch out after a long day.

Each week he makes me smile. He also reminds me of the wonders I miss around me when all I do is complain or find reasons to criticize. He challenges me, someone nearly three times his age, to see the world as fresh and refreshing each day. No matter what!

Maybe I should apply that to my trumpet playing and practice. How did my practicing today make me smile? What were the moments of gratitude and joy? Maybe I wasn't as focused as I needed to be, but what was neat about it? Maybe it was the particular exercise that is just fun to play. Maybe it was the ability to hit some difficult notes with a little more clarity. Maybe it was just the way I felt after making music.

What works for you? Where are you grateful today? Just enjoy it. No matter what!

Just Another Day....

 Yep, just one more of 365 in which to give thanks.

So, just do it, everyday.

Give thanks with a grateful heart.

No More and

No Less!

Happy Thanksgiving, 2014!

It's Tradition

Sit back. Have a hot cocoa by the fire and transport yourself back almost 50 years when getting busted for trash was a big deal.

A Thanksgiving tradition... Alice's Restaurant.

Happy Thanksgiving 2013

A reason for thanksgiving every day.

Is It Safe to Come Out?

Black Friday is just about over.

Phew.

I wasn't sure I would make it. Such incredible bargains to be had. All I had to do was head to the store and they would be laid out before me in an array of wonders that I couldn't resist if I went.

Well, I have to admit I DID go to one of my local big box retailers today. I needed a couple things for our Thanksgiving Family Gathering this afternoon. I did some food shopping; some odds and ends.But there it was. The Black Friday Banners.

Special!

Low Price!

Get it Now!

I couldn't resist. I had to buy something that wasn't on my shopping list for today.

The siren call of the bargains led me to one section where I just had to look to see if one of the gifts we were buying was on sale. I felt like I would be un-American, un-Patriotic, if I didn't at least look.

It was not on sale. It was regular price. The let-down was tremendous. How could I do my part in this big, yearly American ritual? How could I be helping the economy rebound from the great recession if the store wouldn't put what I wanted on sale.  All that other stuff I didn't need, or could never use, was on sale. Why not my wish?

Sadly, I turned to walk away. But not before getting the gift anyway. No one will call me un-American. I even sacrificed by paying full price.

Quotes for Thanksgiving Week (4)

Link

Thanksgiving, after all, is a word of action.

– W.J. Cameron

Let's Laugh

Ya sure, you betcha- laughter is great for Thanksgiving. Sometimes we get too serious too often. (Pity the poor weatherman who, in a bit of humor, referred to today as Turkey Day, then had to apologize the next day for not respecting the importance of Thanksgiving.)

So here are a few I found on the web.(Link)

• Dizzy Person + Turkey = "Wobble Wobble"
• UFO + Thanksgiving Fruit = Cranberry Saucer
• Thanksgiving Dinner + Office Message = Turkey with all the Faxings

Hippies put what on their mashed potatoes?
Groovy.


What sound does a turkey's phone make?
Wing-wing

What is big and green and goes "Gobble. Gobble."
Turkey-saurus Rex
 
What Thanksgiving food has grandchildren?
Gran-berry Sauce

What do you get when you cross a turkey with a banjo?
A turkey that plucks himself


(And one for the pre-adolescent boys among us, regardless of age...)

When a turkey picks his nose, what comes out?
A Gobble-goober.

(Sorry. My 10 year old self got loose!)

Graphics from Design Bolts Website

Quotes for Thanksgiving Week (3)

Gratitude makes sense of our past,

brings peace for today, and

creates a vision for tomorrow.

– Melody Beattie

Quotes for Thanksgiving Week (2)

Love wholeheartedly,
be surprised,
give thanks and praise…

then you will discover the fullness of your life.

– Brother David Steindl-Rast

Quotes for Thanksgiving Week (1)

"Gratitude is not a spiritual or moral dessert which we may take or push away according to the whims of the moment, and in either case without material consequences.

Gratitude is the very bread and meat of spiritual and moral health, individually and collectively.

What was the seed of disintegration that corrupted the heart of the ancient world beyond the point of divine remedy...? What was it but ingratitude?"
--Noel Smith

It's Still a Day for Giving Thanks

In our amazingly material culture there is more interest in today than in yesterday. Bl*ck Fr*d*y is the big news, not a simple day of thanks. (Got your attention?) I am not meaning to say that the whole idea of a shopping explosion day is obscene and needs to be edited- but I am implying it. We are out of hand. It's not the merchants- Big Box or local. It is us.

Me, too. I scanned and skimmed the ads for today looking for a deal that I might want. I toyed with a computer here or an e-reader there. yes, I already have a computer or two and we have his and hers e-readers already. But i was being lured by the possibilities. but i didn't want to get up that early today (or go to bed that late this morning.)

So I am not entirely this Scrooge who wants American stores to lose money. But somehow, somewhere in the great scheme of things this frenzy of shopping is not healthy. Not for any of us. It predicates a good healthy economy on out-of-control buying. Or perhaps buying controlled by the ones who are doing the selling. They are frantic for our business. They lure us, entice us, woo us, and seduce us.

In order to truly live in the kind of happiness I have come to discover over the past couple decades, I can't get so swept up in today's madness. I have to hold on to yesterday's serenity. No, not a wistful looking at a non-existent nostalgic past. I mean simply yesterday. November 24, 2011. A day we gave thanks.

I can't- I must not forget that today. I have no reason to add unwanted stuff to my already overcrowded life. I need to add more gratitude for what I already have- material and spiritual. I need to stop today and be grateful for each day. It is quite a life I have been able to enjoy in this past year. I have hopes for a lot more great things to be thankful for.

But right now, today, all I have is today. I'm glad I didn't get up and participate in the madness. I didn't need it. If you did, I am not one to judge. Simply take time tonight to give thanks that you were able to do so. Spend some time with all the ways that you can know a peace and serenity today. With or without the goodies on sale.

With a different thought, here is another possible use of all our money:
(HT to Boing Boing's Xeni Jardin)

by visually via

Okay- It's a Day Late

But not really.

It was November 25, 1965 that the Alice's restaurant Massacree happened. So, breaking a little with Thanksgiving tradition, I give you Arlo 46 years to the date later....





With a Hat Tip to The Washington Post Blog for the links.

For This Day- and Each Day

Gratitude and thanksgiving from Louie Schwartzberg on TED.




May this day be a day of deep and wonderful thanksgiving.

Getting Ready for Tomorrow

It's classic.....

Quiet Thanks

We didn't do Thanksgiving today. That will be on Saturday. But we had a good day, just the two of us. I made a simple rice and chicken dish for supper and we watched football.

What a wonderful Thanksgiving Day.

“Prayer after Eating” by Wendell Berry

I have taken in the light
that quickened eye and leaf.
May my brain be bright with praise
of what I eat, in the brief blaze
of motion and of thought.
May I be worthy of my meat.
HT to Kim on Connexions