Simple Gifts

This is from about a year ago, around Thanksgiving:

I wonder how many people know this song?  I would think most do.  Now, how many people have actually thought about this song?  I have.

"'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free."  Simple and free, both, together; it's human nature.

"'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be."  One of my favorite words, ought, you know what you should be doing, come on down with the rest of us and do it.

This is, of course a Shaker song, a religious lot those Shakers, and yet the "place just right" in this song is "in the valley of love and delight."  Not some lofty heaven, not a threatened hell, no, right here, a place you know, a place familiar.

"When true simplicity is gained, to bow and to bend we shant be ashamed."  It took N to help me remember what this was about:  humility.  He likes to make little choreographed moves to the songs we sing and he did a simple bend at the waist and shook he head at "ashamed."  No, we should not be ashamed to bow to our loved ones and bend to our God, and yet we sometimes are.

The last line always gets me.  Remember the "merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily" in Row Your Boat from the 'Inexplicable Instruction and Flow Charts' post I did in late November.  This goes those four merrilies two less, and is better.  Think about it, "To turn, turn will be our delight, 'til by turning, turning we come 'round right."  Notice how the two "turns" are repeated in the "turning" part of the stanza.  Just turn a couple times, be delighted and come 'round right

"Come 'round right" is exactly what I ought to strive for everyday, especially with these boys.

The whole video kind of falls apart there in the end but, that's just the way we roll around here.

From Marci's '...things you don't expect to hear from the back seat...'

"You don't know everything.  Only God knows everything.  He has a VERY BIG brain."

Theology school, here we come...