Molly Piper

I’ve mentioned before that music was unspeakably healing to me in the first months and years of grief after the death of our daughter.

For some reason, Christmas compels me to share a couple. Maybe it’s because there’s so much frickin’ happiness at Christmas, and I remember feeling so desperately unhappy those first couple Christmases. I remember getting the album Snow Angels at Christmas time in 2007, our first one without Felicity.

I have particular memories of playing–no, blasting–this one over and over with tears streaming down my face anytime I was in the car alone.

I don’t want to explicate why it was so comforting to me. That’s not how music works. If it grabs you, it grabs you. If it doesn’t, then no amount of my explaining it will help you feel what I feel when I hear it. It punches me in the gut still today, in the best kind of gut-punching way.

Don’t forget to pray this week for people shedding more tears this Christmas than sharing smiles. Remember them. Listen to a song for them. Light a candle for them. If they can’t ask for the white horse for Christmas for themselves, hold out hope for them and ask for it for them.

White Horse
(Words and Music: Detweiler)

Bring me a white horse for Christmas
We’ll ride him through the town
Out into the snowy woods
Where we will both lie down

Underneath white birches
Our faces toward the sky
We will make snow angels
With our white horse standing by

Hush now baby
One day we’re gonna ride
Hush now baby
Our white horse through the sky

Bring me a white horse for Christmas
We’ll ride him through the snow
All the way to Bethlehem
2000 years ago

I wanna speak with the angel
Who said do not be afraid
I wanna kneel where the oxen knelt
Where the little child was laid

Hush now baby
One day you’re gonna ride
Hush now baby
Your white horse through the sky

No bridle will he be wearing
His unshod hoofs they will fly
Keep a watch out this Christmas
For that white horse in the sky

Hush now baby
One day we’re gonna ride
Hush now baby
Our white horse through the sky

Hush now baby
Let every angel sing
Hush now baby
One day we’ll ride again

I heard this song the other night for the first time. There were more than a few tears.

I recommend it if:

• it feels like the holidays suck
• you’re battling for joy at Christmas
• you’re in the throes of a grief journey
• you know someone on a grief journey

Maybe you fit into all those categories.

So if you want a good cry at Christmas (I personally love crying) go ahead and hit play. If you want to wait til you can have that good, cleansing cry, wait til later, light a candle or ten, and then hit play.

I love the sentiment of the song–we’re gonna grieve. We’re gonna grieve hard at times. And then there’s still going to be joy for some things, too.

That’s the epitome of the holidays if you’re in the early days or months of a grief journey. There are times when it’s just hard. Christmas? That time of family togetherness? What if you’re family isn’t together and never will be this side of heaven? And what of the warm, fuzzy feelings? What if there are none of those? What if they’re further off and farther between than they’ve ever been?

I know some of you who are experiencing your first Christmas without your son or daughter. They should be there. They should be gathered up in your number, bundled into coats and carted off to Christmas Eve service. They should be whisked off to Grandma & Grandpa’s house and endlessly adored by all privileged enough to know them. That’s why it hurts, right? They should be there.

We’ve had four Christmases now, and I still cry. And somehow there’s still joy at Christmas.

There’s Still My Joy (by Indigo Girls)

I thought I’d post the lyrics here too so you can read along:

I took my tree down to the shore
The garland, and the silver star
To find my peace, and grieve no more
To heal this place inside my heart

On every branch I laid some bread
And hungry birds filled up the sky
They rang like bells around my head
They sang my spirit back to life

One tiny child can change the world
One shining light can show the way
Through all my tears, for what I’ve lost
There’s still my joy
There’s still my joy
For Christmas day

The snow comes down on empty sand
There’s tinsel moonlight on the waves
My soul was lost, but here I am
So this must be amazing grace

One tiny child can change the world
One shining light can show the way
Beyond these tears for what I’ve lost
There’s still my joy
There’s still my joy
For Christmas day
There’s still my joy for Christmas day

This video is of our church worship team this past weekend covering an awesome Tom Waits song called Come On Up to the House. It was so stinkin’ good, I just had to post it.

It was amazingly timely, too, because last week, a family in our church suffered a 35-week-gestation stillbirth. And for a relatively young church who hasn’t experienced much death or grief, people came around them so well.

I was particularly struck by the line:

Does life seem nasty, brutish and short?
Come on up to the house.
The seas are stormy
And you can’t find no port.
Come on up to the house.

What I took from it was a simple confirmation to just come to Jesus. I feel like I can hear it in ways I wouldn’t have been able to when we were so freshly living our tragedy. I also felt like I was able to call to mind times that I was able to “come on up to the house” in the last three years that changed me in such deep, irrevocable ways.

And I’ve experienced his welcome every time I’ve come on up.

Somehow I ended up watching a video on Facebook last night. I don’t usually click on videos these days, because I don’t have time. But this 12 minutes was so worth it. Worth every second. And maybe it’s because I just read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (by the way, it’s really good), but I don’t think that’s it.

This is a video of Alice Sommer, the oldest Holocaust survivor alive. She’ll turn 107 next month.

I was moved and heart-broken by so many things she said. I don’t think everything she said is spot-on (the whole “music is God” thing), but I want to run it through the sieve of Truth and hold onto the lessons that are worth learning, namely, that I have a choice to love. I have a choice to be joyful in difficult circumstances. I want to take what’s true and beautiful here and let the Holy Spirit point me to Jesus.

And while I’m not comparing her Nazi prison camp experience to my experience of losing a child, I still see lessons and similarities. There’s no use in comparing what she went through and what I’ve gone through. They’re different. But there is pain. Pain is universal, no?

There’s potential for all kinds of hatred and anger in both of our situations (and probably in yours). But can I forgive? Can I move toward healing? Yes. Oh my, yes. I’ve experienced measures of healing I didn’t think possible. And you can hear it in her laugh. Healing exists.

The other thing that I can totally relate to is the power of music. I grew up in a very musical family, and music was a part of my life for as long as I can remember. I love to listen to music, I love to play or sing music, I love to enjoy music.

When Felicity died, when I was going through some of my darkest days, I developed a soundtrack. A song would hit me as I drove down the road, or sat on my bed, and it would inspire my shriveling faith, or encourage me toward (what I felt was non-existent) hope, or meet me right in the midst of my anger and challenge me toward love. I have a playlist now. It’s the “Grief Mix.” I still love that mix. I remember pulling up to the graveside on one occasion, blasting Sandra McCracken’s “Guardian” over and over on repeat and just sobbing until I had nothing left. There was promise there for my soul.

When you go out, when you come home;
like a hedge, like a shield, I’ll be your guardian…

It was as though God used the music to break through the hardest parts of me, and dig into the deepest depths. And it’s funny, because it was like those songs were for me only. It’s like my own little secret language with the Lord. Because no one will hear those songs and know exactly how it makes me feel, or know exactly what I was experiencing the first time I heard it, or know why it has a place on the “Grief Mix.” It’s just mine. I own it for my soul. And that’s kinda like Alice. She owned those Chopin etudes in the camp and they transformed her.

I don’t think music is God. But I do think that there was so much power in it for my healing. God used music to change me.

So I hope you feel inspired by Alice today. And, more importantly, I hope you want to heal.

So I had a few new visitors to the old bloggy-blog yesterday. Welcome. Thanks for visiting.

Not every post is about the loss of our daughter. I do a little of everything, and I sometimes share things from day-to-day life.

And today is one of those days, because I had one of the best nights of my life last night, and I just have to share.

Abraham and I were offered 2 tickets to see one of our favorite musicians in concert last night. None other than the amazing Lyle Lovett!!!

Most of you probably know him as the funny-looking guy who used to be married to Julia Roberts. If that’s true, I feel sorry for you and I want that to change. :-)

One of the things I love about Lyle (I like to refer to him on a first-name basis, just to pretend that he and I are friends) is that his style is so diverse—gospel, country, folk, blues. So if you like any of those genres of music, chances are you’ll like something of his.

He often tours with his “Large Band,” meaning that there was anywhere from 4 to 13 people on the stage last night during any given song. It was pure musical excellence.

I have to admit that I’m primarily a sucker for his croony, buttery ballads. And I love story songs, so I’m usually drawn into his music for that reason as well.

Last night, my favorite song they played was called “I Will Rise Up/Ain’t No More Cane,” which is a medley of Lyle’s original lyrics and melody and a South Texas folk song from the early 1900s, “Ain’t No More Cane on the Brazos,” a chain-gang song.

I found this video of Lyle and his Large Band performing it on Leno, so here it is. Enjoy!

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