And in that moment I'm sitting there thinking about how, nine days ago, I was staring down the barrel of a gun, and do I really need this right now?
Can't my boss cut me some slack? Can't they give me a break?
Then those thoughts stepped on a tripwire in the back of my brain and I got mad. At myself.
Let's step back for a moment. I've written before about the sour taste that develops in my mouth when I start defining myself based on what I do. That is not the point. The point is to be. Wherever, whenever: just be.
Yet there I was, defining myself not by what I do but by something that happened to me. To my wife. To our family.
I was letting it take over. The fear, the hypersensitivity, the exhaustion, the overwhelming disarray that has become our lives as we scramble to find housing. We are in as good a home situation as we can be right now, and we are extremely thankful for and humbled by it, but it's just not home.
All those things were colluding in that moment to become the definition of me.
And I had to stop it.
I had to take a stand and remind myself of who I am and what defines me. i had to make a choice not to let the difficulties take over.
So that's what I've been deciding ever since then. I haven't always made the best choices, but I've slowly been shifting my mind over to think on good things, right things. To remember what God says about me. Occasionally I get it right.
All this was on my mind when I listened to Gillian Welch's sublime new album The Harrow & the Harvest yesterday. She and her cohort David Rawlings are modern-day troubadours of Americana with voices that blend as smoothly as oatmeal and maple syrup (which I regard as a good thing).
The entire record is brilliant, but one song stood out in stark relief. Called "Hard Times," it starts as the story of a man plowing a field, encouraging his mule just to make it "to the end of the row." It ends as a reminder that my choices are my own, and regardless of what happens to those who encourage or influence me, I am still solely responsible for the way I decide to view myself and the world.
I listened, and I learned, and I worked in a new direction that my boss is much more pleased with. And as the lyrics, music, and vocal delivery combined to create a thrill in my heart and a mist in my eyes, I remembered Whose I am.
Hard Times
(words and music [I'm assuming] by Gillian Welch and David Rawlings)
There was a camp-town man, used to plow and sing
He loved that mule and the mule loved him
When the day got long, as it does about now,
I'd hear him singing to his muley-cow:
"Come on, my sweet old girl
I'd bet the whole damn world
We're gonna make it yet to the end of the row."
Singing, "Hard times ain't gonna rule my mind
Hard times ain't gonna rule my mind, Bessie
Hard times ain't gonna rule my mind no more."
He said it's a mean old world, heavy in need
And that big machine is just picking up speed
We're supping on tears; we're supping on wine
We all get to heaven in our own sweet time
So come on, you Asheville boys
And turn up your old-time noise
Kick 'til the dust comes up from the cracks in the floor
Singing, "Hard times ain't gonna rule my mind, brother
Hard times ain't gonna rule my mind
Hard times ain't gonna rule my mind no more."
But the camp-town man, he doesn't plow no more
I've seen him walking down to the cigarette store
Guess he lost that knack and he forgot that song
Woke up one morning and the mule was gone
So come on, you ragtime kings
And come on, you dogs, and sing
Pick up your dusty old horn and give it a blow
Playing, "Hard times ain't gonna rule my mind, honey
Hard times ain't gonna rule my mind, sugar
Hard times ain't gonna rule my mind no more."
[NOTE: If we use music for Poetry Friday, we try to embed the song in the post so you can listen along as you read. I scoured the internet and couldn't find an embed-able version of "Hard Times," but you can listen to it in its entirety over at some site called Chunky Glasses. Alternately, you can buy the song or the album at iTunes.]
