Sweet Omega

I twirl for peace

2010-11-18T11:24:00.000-08:00

My daughter was asked what she would do to have "five minutes peace." Her response: I twirl for peace. As you can see from the look on her face, she does indeed.

He's a poet, he's a picker... he's Kris Kristofferson

2010-11-09T18:34:00.000-08:00

I am not your typical celebrity hound. I practice law. I'm married. I've got daughter. I've got a life. But for reason's unknown to me, I strongly identify with the words of a modern day poet and social activist named Kris Kristofferson. So when I heard he was going to be in Nashville last weekend, I knew I had to be there.

On a Sunday morning, I made the four hour trek to Nashville.

Kristofferson was being honored at a public event, along with a few other folks. My Hubby and I walked in, found a seat under a fantastically blue sky and listened to a lone guitarist strumming instrumentals as we waited for the ceremony to begin.

And then there was Kristofferson.

These days I feel like the lone ranger. I live in the Bible belt with a governor-elect who condemns homosexuals, wants to enact Arizona-esque immigration "reform" and who has demanded that Barack Obama produce his birth certificate. It makes me angry and profoundly sad. I don't recognize this country anymore. The words "America...it was supposed to stand for something" reverberate in my head often. I listen to fellow Americans talk about "taking our country back" and I know in my heart that it is my beliefs they hold in such disdain; I am one of the ones from whom they wish to take their country back from. You know, one of those "liberal commies" who believes in justice for all, regardless of whether they live inside or outside of our borders.

As Kristofferson received his accolades that afternoon, there was a marked acceptance by the crowd of a man who has described himself as "left of liberal." Later than evening, at the Ryman, I listened to the crowd boo at the mention of President Obama. I was appalled, and wondered what Kristofferson would have said or done if he had been on the stage at that time. But, paradoxically, I later watched in awe and appreciation as that same crowd jumped to its feet to applaud and plead for "just one more" song from him as he finished his third and final song.

It was an honor to be in the presence of a gentle soul, who speaks powerful truths through his artistry, his activism and through his words. He inspires me to live authentically and to try and "perfect myself in my own peculiar way," as he so eloquently sings in Pilgrim's Progress.

Sometimes we all need a hero, someone to inspire us, someone to show us the way, so thank you, Kris Kristofferson, for being mine.

Some Me of Beauty

2009-10-24T03:49:00.001-07:00

Some Me of Beauty

Carolyn Rogers

I took a good long look at myself in a full length mirror

Sometimes it's good to look in a full length mirror

And what I saw was not some soul sister poetess of the moment

But I saw just a woman

Just a woman feeling

Just a woman human

And what I felt was

What I felt was a spiritual revelation

And what I felt was a root revival of some love coming on

Coming on strong

And I knew then looking in a full length mirror

That many things were over

And some me of beauty was about to begin

Mommy, did your friend die?

2009-05-06T04:04:00.000-07:00

The innocent question from a tiny, sweet voice, "Mommy, did your friend die? . . . but why?"

How to explain the unexplainable to a child.

"Well, honey, sometimes people die and . . ."

"Like our garden, mommy? It dies in the winter and comes back in the spring. Like your friend."

Having answered her own question, she turned and walked over to her strawberry patch. I watched as she picked a ripe red strawberry, still moist from the rain, and ate it while laughing.

For everything there is a season.

From my blog: www.sweetomega.blogspot.com

The Times They Are A Changin'

2008-11-04T07:40:00.001-08:00

A note to my daughter on Election Day, 2008

Dearest L,

Today your mom and dad witnessed the promise of America; the guarantee that dreams do come true and that possibilities can become realities. The America of Abraham Lincoln, John Kennedy and Martin Luther King is still alive. We witnessed it in Chicago's Grant Park on a Tuesday evening in November, 2008.

For the first time in a very long time, I am hopeful.

Mama

Birth of a Buckeye

2008-11-04T03:08:00.000-08:00

Smoky Mountain Morn

2008-11-02T19:03:00.000-08:00

Sweet Omega

2008-11-02T17:14:00.000-08:00

I wrote this piece in honor of my grandmother, a kind, sweet soul, long departed, but never forgotten. She lived and died in the mountains of North Carolina, as did her parents, her grandparents before her and their parents and grandparents and so on and so on. The land she lived on during her lifetime was acquired generations before her birth by her family from the State of North Carolina who had "acquired" it from the Cherokee Nation. Her son and grandsons live on that same land today. Her name was Omega, the last of five girls, and her simple, yet lovely, ways of living her life are as much a part of my fiber as the earth beneath my feet:

Sweet Omega, I carry your memory with me.

Milk jugs for blackberry picking; fabric scraps for quilting; front porch sitting; canning, cooking and old time religion.

Cathead biscuits; Cast Iron cornbread and buttermilk; the sweetness of sorghum syrup.

I carry you with me.

Mountain air; mountain laurel; and mountain people.

Leaves changing; fog lifting; sun shining.

I carry you with me.

Snow globes; Christmas carvings; cloves and oranges.

Faded photographs; flowers pressed in a family Bible; he loves me-he loves me not.

Softly and tenderly, I go, carrying memories of you with me.

October, 2008