150 percent less depressing story than the song, "Christmas Shoes" .. guaranteed!
Well, I made this one back early in December as I had the photo stored on my hard drive from a year or two back, and hadn't really come up with anything. Originally, I had a vague "Blue Christmas" from Elvis feel to the picture, but it had stumped me .. until I forced myself to at least put it in a caption setting. At the very least, I would put it out there as a DIY Challenge, and if inspired, I could whip something up as filler.
Yeah, then I started writing .. and it seemed to get more inspired. I wanted to create a "Christmas Shoes - Haven edition" but without sounding trite and cloying.
The first verse hits home for me, because I know a person (you might too) who has those thoughts, and its a shitty time of year for her .. thrown out of the house and homeless when she was 19 for the crime of wanting to be female. She lives a fairly normal life now but the scars run deep .. she 'lives' as a female, but still has certain parts she wishes would never have to see again .. and is at that age now where seeing children makes her smile but also makes her sad because she would love to be a mother. Its even worse when she hears about children being abused, and how its not fair that they have the ability to produce offspring and neglect their kids when she would have so much love but cannot.
The second paragraph deals with the Christmas Angels program that helps kids get toys for Christmas, toys that they actually WANT. We've done it every year since my daughter was born through age 13, and since then have alternated between children and senior citizens living in nursing homes. As adults, we can go without, but children should NEVER be denied at least some sort of fun distraction, and the Christmas Angels program has been very successful.
So I had something REAL that I could work with, and something that needed to be said. In my mind, I just HAD to create a happy ending in this caption, even if I couldn't solve my friends issue's nor the plight of the unfortunate children that live in poverty. I hope this caption isn't too hokey, as my intentions were to make something meaningful and inspiring, hopeful and spirited.
And to my dear friend, I do wish you'd have your own child some day. You'd be an awesome mother and I'd love to be the Godparent!
I think everyone knows how much I love the Monkees and I'm sure I posted this last year as well. It was done live in ONE take, a Capella, and is truly beautiful Spanish Villancico. Even they seem to recognize how special the performance is WHILE they are doing it (notice the smiles on Peter and Davy's face as they acknowledge Mickey's vocals.) Never given as much credit as they should as musicians, its another in a long line of reasons I think they should be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The song is about the nativity scene, and if you want, you can find the translation on Wikipedia.