Tuesday, May 2, 2023

Gloomy Skies: Goodbye to Gordon Lightfoot

 I am listening to "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald," which I only usually do "when the skies of November turn gloomy" (to borrow a phrase from the song).  But Gordon Lightfoot has died, and it's a gloomy May day, so the song fits my mood.

Of course, Lightfoot was 84 years old, and from what I can tell from the various news stories, he seemed to have lived a good life.  He wrote amazing songs and had a good run as a performer.  Lots of people will be reflecting on his life and appreciating him today, and plenty of us have been doing this for over 50 years.

His music is the background of my childhood, along with Neil Diamond, Simon and Garfunkle, and John Denver.  Yesterday on my drive back to my seminary apartment, I heard John Denver's live version of "Thank God I'm a Country Boy"--what a great song.

He also wrote songs that other people made more famous, like "Early Morning Rain."  I've been listening to some of those songs this morning.  At some point, when I don't have seminary papers to finish, I might do more reflecting on how this folk music formed my perception of what it would be like to be an adult--not because I listened to it as a child, but because I continued to listen to it in adolescence.

Well, we do have an early morning rain, but today is not a travel day for me.  I need to do my last revisions on my Queer Theology paper which is due at 5 p.m.; when I went to bed last night, I thought it was mostly finished.

And then it's on to my paper for my class on the Gospel of Luke:  looking at the Annunciation as a kind of call story, thinking about different kinds of call stories.  If you're like me, you think that a call means that you're leaving your home, going out with very little, and converting the ones you find along the way.  But what if Jesus has a different call?  One that has to do with hospitality?  


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