The sky may be starless
The night may be moonless,
But deep in my heart there’s a glow
For deep in my heart, I know that you love me;
You love me because you told me soLove letters straight from your heart
Keep us so near while apart
I’m not alone in the night
When I can have all the love you writeI’ve memorized every line
I kiss the name that you sign
and darling, then I read again right from the start
Love letters, straight from your heartThere are so many versions of this sing. I’ve posted the original but I first learned about this song when my husband got me the Diana Krall live from Paris DVD when we were still dating. Her love letters has a lot more instrumental stuff in it and it’s amazing. Also amazing is the version of this song that I heard for the very first time tonight as I was looking for this song on you tube. Ketty Lester’s version adds a bluesy feel to it, even though she gets rid of the entire opening lyric.
Anyway, this relates to parenting because this is in the rotation of 4 or 5 songs that I sing to Indy while I’m putting him down for the night. Tonight, he requested this song specifically. “Sing the song about I love you.” And when I sang the part that goes “You love me, because you told me so….” Indy always tells me he loves me and then promptly falls asleep. If he’s still awake by the time I sing “I kiss the name that you sign” He gives me a little kiss on the lips. It’s soooo sweet!
I think I originally sang this to him because I wanted to sing a song about me and Keith. And when he asks me what this song is about, I tell him it’s about me and his father and how we used to live far apart and how Keith used to write me letters all the time. He seems satisfied with that answer.
Sub-Saharan African Economic Growth Projections Are Bullish →
Sub-Saharan Africa, with numbers from powerhouse South Africa excluded, can expect economic growth of 6.6 percent on average this year, says African Development Bank President Donald Kaberuka.
“The dynamic is good, there are risks in the global environment, but providing there is no worsening in the current situation we remain completely optimistic about the future,” he said in an interview with “Business Day” in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, over the weekend.
“Now, if you include South Africa, because of its weight — that is, 30 percent of sub-Saharan Africa’s economy — the number goes down to 5.4 percent. But the predictions are still quite good.”
Kaberuka, a Rwandan economist, was in Addis Ababa for a meeting with his counterparts at the African Union Commission and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa.
Laying It All Out
23 / 365 • Morning Light
There are days when I over analyse everything, it’s a flaw of mine that I have never quite been able to nip in the bud. As I was becoming a mother I felt the pressure to change who I was, and I did, but doing so had me lost and questioning my identity. It was almost like I left a big piece of myself sitting on that hospital shelf above my bed in May 2008, as I was anxiously awaiting the new life I created, I was slowly losing myself while trying to wipe clean the girl I felt needed to change. I fought with myself for so long and found it hard to establish a motherlike identity as I was conflicted between the girl I use to be and who I thought I had to be. I remember tearing myself to shreds emotionally trying to deal with some of the biggest life changes I faced in 2008, becoming a young mother while I was losing my own mother wasn’t the easiest of things. I felt torn and angry, I was angry at my mother for leaving me at such a vulnerable stage of my life, a stage when I needed her the most, that anger would quickly turn into a tear puddle of guilt as I know she wanted to be here for me just as much as I needed her to be. I continued on a emotional battle for months, it was nothing short of a roller coaster ride with a new confronting emotion around every windy bend and what seemed like a different struggle at the bottom of each and every hill.
This morning similar flood of emotions had rushed back as I heard you calling for me from my bedroom. As I raced in thinking something had happened I see you standing against the window looking so pure and perfect and Bodie sitting at the other reading a loud and I thought to myself ‘how on earth did I get this lucky’. For so long I had put myself through hell and back trying to figure out who I thought I was meant to be, who I wanted to be, if what I am was enough and if my mother was proud. Just being greeted by you both in what seemed like a perfect moment had me breaking down inside and not necessarily in a negative sense.
Thankfully so much sense was made in early 2010 and I knew that being mum was who I was meant to be, who I wanted to be and that it was more than enough. I still have dreams and I still have ambitions, I still grieve for my mother and I still wish she could see the beauty she left behind in you two. But most importantly, I now know who I am not and where I need to be.
