I GAVE MY SON A SONG FOR CHRISTMAS 2011 ~ UNTIL FOREVER ENDS

Christmas Eve
December 24, Saturday, 2011
Photo credit: Sandra Hammel

Christmas Eve
December 24, Saturday, 2011
Photo credit: Sandra Hammel

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This is a public video, however the purpose of this song is for my son, which is a personal matter. He is 24 years old. Some bonds are deep, some never take at all. The bond that I feel with my son is the deep kind, that of hearts, spirits - between two souls. And he came into my life when he was 8 years old.

I am grateful for this special experience, this special bond.

One day, I hope to do this song with better voice. In the meantime, I upload what I did yesterday and include the live version that I sang for my son as one of his Christmas presents on Christmas Eve 2011, which was shot with the cheapest camera sold. I dream of having a decent camera one day. I just can't afford one.

This song was written December 14, 2011 for my son.

Until Forever Ends

Written by Sandra Hammel

Though we are two hearts, many years apart,

Our bond runs deep, deeper than the blue sea,

Now, you, you sail on,

I stand here and watch you take flight……

Every day, keep your passions alive, breathe free,

I will love you always,

Until forever ends,

I will love you until forever ends.

Key: F Major

6/8 feel

Raw title: Until Forever Ends Live.mov

MIGHT BE UNBELIEVABLE IF IT WASN'T HAPPENING

Do you have one person in your life that the bond would be unbelievable, if it wasn't actually happening to you? I do. I didn't look for this bond where I found it. I always wanted this bond to happen with one other person and expected or hoped it would happen in an intimate relationship. But that is not where it showed up.

The bond is organic, in that it is natural and just is. That doesn't mean that it has only been warm feelings, peaceful and always smooth. None of those things are true. Trying to understand his emotional pain, heartfelt best intentions to always be what I needed to be for this person, times of being on the receiving end of hurtful words are true. Importantly, the hurtful words are not definitive of who he is. He owns his mistakes. And this is a new experience for me. I feel heard when expressing my feelings. I have not witnessed this truthful and complete endeavor in others to be the best that they are in all parts of their life. More specifically, the introspection that he uses to be his best self, I have not seen before. Especially in the men I have known.

The connection is one that is deep in my soul. I believe it is reciprocal. It is a rich and complex relationship between two deeply-feeling and deeply-experiencing beings. I am so grateful to have this bond and to know the connection in the way that I do as a gift from this other spirit walking the earth at the same time that I am.

It is without pretense. There is genuine communication not only in a mortal way, but in a spiritual way. The sincerity he has is so healing for me to see in another human being.

Truthfulness is a hallmark of how we allow each other to be. It is stunning and beautiful and I am grateful.

Recently, each time I have brought a difficult conversation to him, he has shown himself to not only meet me fairly and with complete integrity, he has exceeded how I might have imagined him to show up and allow himself to be and allow me to see. The openness has been refreshing. As he has entered his young adult life and I have entered the autumn into winter season of my life, he has shown glimpses of the most beautiful human being I have ever known. We are now working through things with our roles changing and I now can ask for things not possible when my role was the grown-up and he the, child.

We are approximately 40 years different in age.

He is my son. I didn't give him birth. But, if I had, we couldn't have been more connected with more of a bond.

December 28, 1997

Since my movie camera stopped working the day that he moved in, we went out and rented a movie camera to capture memories of the first Christmas together.

More of the same day

LIFE IS PERSONAL

November 27, 2010, Saturday

Today, was my day with my son. Although thanksgiving day was Thursday and this is Saturday, I have never insisted on him spending it with me and not be able to go to his dad's extended family's thanksgiving day gathering. There he receives the importance of a large family coming together that is inviting and welcoming. He needs that.

Often I want to share what I write in my journal, but then I don't because it may be too personal. Recently, I started another journal and will share some writings from it.

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Journal #22, pages s15 - 17

(My son's name)

The miracle in my life.

❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧

Resilience, tenderness, courage, strength in spirit ~

the best in our humanness.

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Kindness

Giving or receiving kindness lifts your spirit, lifts the universe.

No translation needed.

❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧❧

Imagine your life with no one in it who treats you with kindness. You never experience a person who helps you when you are down. The only way you have connection with another human being who is an adult is by abuse, and worse, neglect.

If you are not even important enough to have even negative attention, how can you feel worthy to be alive? Many children live this life. November 11, 2010

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Pages 18 - 19

This I Know

So much of my experience has been either transient, let me down, betrayed me or simply been too little to fill me up and certainly never taken me to 'overflowing'.

But music has been there always for the taking and giving.

It has been a constant in my life. It has saved me from despair. It comforts me, lifts me up, inspires and been the vessel for my inspiration.

It is the vessel for my tears, my delight, my exuberance, my spirit.

For me music is a refuge in a world that isolates and tries to exile you from your own soul, at times. Music is a refuge in an often cold world.

Music is a gift that is for the soul and is born in the soul of Life.

November 14, 2010

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I was in the kitchen doing something I rarely do. Cook. My son was coming and this is what I do for him. It is a meal he loves. Thankfully, because it is the only thing I have kept in the cooking repertoire.

A Hole That Weighs Heavy

Sandra Hammel

It happened again today.

Like an anchor residing in my chest.

Burning hard and intense.

It has come and come again

and it doesn't lessen.

It's always the same. Deep and wide pain.

A hole that weighs heavy.

The skin around my eyes sting, my chest wells up and releases hot tear drops that I feel in the corners of my eyes. My cheeks flush with blood.

You have said the words. But I haven't felt it.

When these times come, I know.

When I stood by the apples on the counter with a paring knife in my hand, I froze and made the tears stop. I forced my face muscles to harden. Immediately, I took inventory of why I needed to be strong. Why it had to be okay that I'm not loved. But it sure feels like being loved would have healed the hole I carry around.

The hole you left me to heal.

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Uploaded by Thespadecaller

There is a website - www.gratefulness.org - that as a part of it, you can light a candle for anyone, any group or sometimes I light a candle for myself. I just did that again and called the page Soul
Sometimes I name it Spirit instead.

Also, a long time ago, I started a page for Darfuris. When a page is opened but the candles all burn out (in 48 hours) and not one candle burns, that page ceases to exist, until someone starts the page anew. But the page I opened for Darfur - Darfr - never goes away, not even when no candle is burning anymore. What that means, I do not know, but I think it is wonderful that it never ceases to be, no matter what.

Where I sometimes light a candle also for

Jon - my son

Dad

ami (friend)

Heath Ledger

FAILING A CHILD BECOMES A LEGACY

Last night I read a report about a boy of 7 years old that made me cry. The heaviness is so powerful that it takes over. The unprotected boy lived a life of hell. He has grown since and is living as one who lived a childhood of hell. He didn't escape the eternal and internal prison that could be expected of one who was immersed in a life of neglect, abuse and rejection. Children lost become all of our legacy.

This child was failed by his mother, his father, his extended family, his community and in the end by one state's foster system that made the wrong decision to place him back with his mother when it was the one place he should never return.

One state's jurisdiction had to be handed over to the adjacent state when the boy's mother moved over the state line at a critical time in his life. The boy's report's recommendation - after a long residence stay in a caring facility for the boy, that he not be returned to the mother - was overturned by the new state. It could not have been clearer in the report that this would be disastrous for the 7 year old.

We - as the larger community - fail our children when we don't search out the truth of these children's private lives and act accordingly. The thing about this boy is that enough of his truth was known and still he was not placed in a safe home. This boy's story will never be told. The honoring of confidentiality will protect those who made the wrong decisions. Light needs to be shed on the horrendous truth of the quiet lives of desperation that children live right here in the United States of America.

Hell is For Children
Lyrics

They cry in the dark, so you can't see their tears
They hide in the light, so you can't see their fears
Forgive and forget, all the while
Love and pain become one and the same
In the eyes of a wounded child

It's all so confusing, this brutal abusing
They blacken your eyes, and then apologize
You're daddy's good girl, and don't tell mommy a thing
Be a good little boy, and you'll get a new toy
Tell grandma you fell off the swing

Because hell
Hell is for children
And you know that their little lives can become such a mess
Hell
Hell is for children
And you shouldn't have to pay for your love with your bones and your flesh

No, hell is for children

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Love Rescue Me - U2
Written by Bono and Bob Dylan
Uploaded by Impulse032

You can adopt children who are waiting while in foster care: foster-adoption

www.fosterparenting.com

rhode-island.adoption.com

Who May Adopt In Rhode Island

In Rhode Island you may adopt a child if you are over 21 years of age. There is no upper age limit, and adoptive parents in their 40s and 50s are quite common. You do not need to own your own home and either single or married parents may adopt. Your sexual orientation doesn't matter in Rhode Island for adoption.

At 4:36 of the Youtube below, Odetta speaks from the words of the quote I have included here:

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous? Actually, who are you, not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

Marianne Williamson
in Return to Love

We must answer the call when asked to step up and be a help to others. We must. Or we risk living at the mercy of those who grew up in childhood hell.

We each can do our part.

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Odetta
Uploaded by justjoshfunk1