A Moving Tribute

Absolutely beautiful! An extremely moving tribute to those that suffered loss during the recent tornadoes in Oklahoma - knowing the background of this song, seeing the expressions on the faces of Blake and Miranda, understanding loss ourselves, we know this runs deep. For all their craziness, I think these two have beautiful hearts.

God bless them!  God Bless the people of Oklahoma in their resilience, optimism, and determination; and God bless America!



From Taste of Country:

"Blake Shelton and Miranda Lambert brought their much-decorated ballad ‘Over You,’ which they penned together about the death of Shelton’s brother, to ‘The Voice‘ on Tuesday, performing the intimate and deeply personal song with a different purpose.

Sitting next to one another on a stage illuminated by foot lights, Shelton strummed his acoustic guitar, looking at his wife with pain all over his face while she belted out the lyrics. You could see the mix of emotion and admiration in his eyes as she delivered the words. Both looked to be welling up with tears, in light of the tragedy of their home state of Oklahoma, where a devastating tornado ripped through the region earlier this week.

The couple called attention to the situation in their state, as a text box was featured on the screen, calling for donations to aid the Red Cross in relief efforts for the victims.

“I think ‘Over You’ was the perfect song for this situation,” Shelton said after the show. 'The moment was right. I wish things could have been different. I wouldn’t have thought about performing a song like that, but it seemed like the right thing to do.'"

Country At It's Finest

“So one more question before I let you go…” the morning television host queried. “Your hat – just what does it mean to you?  I mean you always wear it, right?”

“Well I don’t always wear it,” he responded. “I wear it when I’m working.”

I smiled. He was wearing his trademark black straw hat, for this interview. I hadn’t thought about that before, but to a country singing superstar, yeah, I guess a television interview would be considered work - just part of the job.

“What does it mean to you,” she had asked him. I thought it a bit of a lame question when I first heard it. But his answer wiped my negative thought away.

Super Man's Cape

“I don’t know…It’s kinda like Superman’s cape,” he smiled with a sincerity that was revealed in his eyes.

That made me smile, too. I got it and it made me proud of him. He was just an ordinary guy, until it was time to perform. I wasn’t seeing any arrogance.  I wasn’t seeing any puffed-up pride. As he answered the questions posed to him, I was simply seeing a kind, thoughtful man; proud of his wife and kids, and protective of both. I was seeing a man, who because of his talent, has a name that just happens to be a household word whether “said” household likes country music or not.  I mean, everyone has heard of Tim McGraw, right?

I can’t help it – I just like “country”. I like the down-to-earth, laid back style. I like the love of God and country that always seems to be a priority with most country music artists. Usually in these country songs, there is poetry in the lyrics; which if one isn’t a fan of country, one wouldn’t really realize or understand.  It’s not just about drinking and divorce and cheatin’ that its longtime reputation says it is.  Yeah, yeah, I know; that reputation is somewhat deserved.  But when one really listens, more often than not, one will find beautiful, heartfelt poetry that is often about real life - songs filled with love of family, nation and God. And I happen to believe we find those topics in country music more often than any other music genre. Besides the fact that I was raised on country music, "real life" lyrics is what the appeal is for me more than anything else, I think. I love the mandolins and steel guitars. I love the country twang. No doubt, I love the cowboy hats and boots, but what I love the most is songs delivered from the heart.

“What’s your favorite ‘Tim McGraw’ song?” the host asked him towards the end of the interview.

“Live Like You Were Dying,” he answered without as much as a pause to think about it. “It was as they say, ‘like God had walked through the room’, when we first heard that song.”


Clark Kent - An Ordinary Guy

“Mine too!” the host excitedly proclaimed. “That’s the one I was going to say, too!”

No doubt, Live Like You Were Dying is probably Tim’s trademark song. And it does have awesome words. But so do a lot of his songs. He often sings about family and Jesus and war heroes. In each of the songs that he sings, I think we see a bit of the man.

The television host later stated her favorite line from their mutual favorite song is:  

 

“And I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter,

And I gave forgiveness I'd been denying."

Now, those are words to live by; that’s for sure!  We should all aspire to be more like that in our lives. And behind the black hat – Superman’s cape – I believe we see a man, that probably actually lives out those words.

Oh, but my favorite line from that song? 

“I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu.”  

Now, that’s country at its finest!  

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Live Like You Were Dying

James Timothy Nichols and Craig Michael Wiseman

 

He said
"I was in my early forties
With a lot of life before me
And a moment came that stopped me on a dime
I spent most of the next days
Looking at the x-rays
Talkin' 'bout the options
And talkin' 'bout sweet time"
I asked him
"When it sank in
That this might really be the real end
How's it hit you
When you get that kind of news?
Man, what'd you do?"

He said
"I went skydiving
I went Rocky Mountain climbing
I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu
And I loved deeper
And I spoke sweeter
And I gave forgiveness I'd been denying"
And he said
"Someday I hope you get the chance
To live like you were dying"

He said
"I was finally the husband
That most of the time I wasn't
And I became a friend a friend would like to have
And all of a sudden going fishin'
Wasn't such an imposition
And I went three times that year I lost my dad
I finally read the Good Book, and I
Took a good, long, hard look
At what I'd do if I could do it all again
And then

I went skydiving
I went Rocky Mountain climbing
I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named fu man chu
And I loved deeper
And I spoke sweeter
And I gave forgiveness I'd been denying"
And he said
"Someday I hope you get the chance
To live like you were dying
Like tomorrow was a gift
And you've got eternity
To think about
What you'd do with it
What could you do with it
What did I do with it?
What would I do with it?

Skydiving
I went Rocky mountain climbing
I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu
And I loved deeper
And I spoke sweeter
And I watched an eagle as it was flying"
And he said
"Someday I hope you get the chance
To live like you were dying
To live like you were dying
To live like you were dying"

3 C's: Coffee, Charmin and Chickadee's

Oh man! Who could that be? I asked myself shaking myself from sleep. The phone was playing one of my favorite tunes, but it wasn’t very enjoyable right now. I looked at the screen to see who was calling.  Oh wow! Friends we hadn’t heard from in a while.

It was early; but it wasn’t that early. Normally, we would be awake and breakfast over by this time. But it had been a rough few weeks and I was beat. I had already been up once to get some things done, but I decided it was just too early, so I went back to bed for just a bit longer.  When the phone rang I had slept longer than I intended. It was now 8:45 AM and I was going to be caught unprepared despite being happy to see the two morning visitors.

 

“Just let me jump in the shower,” I told them.  “Give me about half an hour”? 

 

“OK” they obliged me. “We will take a drive down to the lake.”

“Company’s coming.” I told my husband who had also decided to take the opportunity to catch up on some much needed z’s.  “Will you go up to the little store to get coffee? We are completely out. I forgot to pick some up when I was in town.”

I jumped in the shower; then got busy at picking up the house - to the extent that I could get done in 30 minutes, anyway. It had been an intense couple of months and things were slowly falling apart around here…no groceries; the house a disaster; the yard almost as bad; and of course that’s when company comes!!

But forget coffee??  Not sure how that ever could have happened.  Now there are two things that I don’t scrimp on when buying groceries: That would be Charmin and Coffee.  Yes, coffee deserves a capital “C”!  Well almost... ;-)

 

I knew the little store wouldn’t have the kind of coffee I normally buy, so I told my husband to look for that “local brand of roasted beans” that I had seen in the store.  We hadn’t really liked it before, but someone told me the other day it was pretty good, so I thought maybe it would be worth another try; maybe they had improved.

 

“Alright” he answered agreeably. He preferred the freshness of a locally roasted bean as well.

 

But when he returned home he had Folgers! Yikes!  Is this what we have come to???

 

God help us!  And Lord, PLEASE! No matter how busy I get; don’t ever let me forget the Charmin!

HOWEVER...Look at the surprise I found on my camera after shooting the Folger's pic. Matt had taken it one morning when I was out mowing the lawn and then left it on the camera for me to find later. Look closely...It's a Chickadee taking a bath in my Cowboy fountain! 

 

 So, so sweet. It brought such a smile. A fount of refreshing...to go another mile.  ;-)

How to Sing With a Broken Heart

"Brother George taught us how to sing with a broken heart," Vince Gill told those in attendance. Not to belabor my last post about George Jones, but this video was simply too beautiful not to share.


                                 Regrouping in the Licks




                                     Amazing Grace