For the last five years, that is to say, as far back as her memory ran, the poor child had shivered and trembled. She had always been exposed completely naked to the sharp wind of adversity; now it seemed to her she was clothed. Formerly her soul had seemed cold, now it was warm. Cosette was no longer afraid of the Thénardier. She was no longer alone; she had somebody to look to.
Victor Hugo (Les Miserables)
Want more? Click here and keep reading until you find “that star which was blazing at the bottom of her pocket.”
I know, I didn’t write today’s story. But this journal is about sharing as much as it is about writing. And I thought this was worth sharing.
Thank you for posting this, Lia –
Update: I have turned to the composition of music more than the writing of words, in these last few weeks. Music was my first language, really — and my father, before he passed away at age 97 (in Feb. 2018), told me before he died that as a child, I was “filled with music” – singing almost all day, creating little tunes, driving my parents crazy humming during mealtime, listening endlessly to their great collection of golden era Broadway musicals… that is, until I discovered the late-night classical music program on the little radio beside my bed – and I was smitten! 🙂
Recently, after much reading and watching of video demos, I downloaded the “StaffPad” app on my new iPad – and my iPencil is in the mail (StaffPad only can read handwriting from an actual iPencil, whose special programming opens up all the near-miraculous things that can be done creatively in the app, allowing the composer to handwrite the musical notation on the staff, along with numerous other creative and immensely time-saving features. If it does what it appears to, StaffPad will be, for me, like creating in a dream… I honestly have never seen any music composition software that comes near its capabilities (Note: I am OLD – “ever so much older than twenty, Peter” 🙂 — and was trained to compose on paper, with a pencil and eraser, at a physical piano — IMAGINE. It was very time consuming for me to compose in those days – and especially because I am not a skilled pianist. Then I married and we had four children to raise… but now because of this new technologay, I am on fire to write music again — and am right now listening to Vaughan-Williams’s ethereally beautiful “Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis” via YouTube, with the full score in front of me (on a headset, working from my home office). I have loved that piece dearly since I first heard it in my college days — and am in tears now, attempting to work for my technology company ‘day job’ , enraptured with this glorious music… [Secret Prayer: I still dream of being a fulltime artist — it was the idea that originally fired my heart when I was a young man, with no sense of myself or anyone else really — but that for our GOD and his all-expansive Grace, am I still able to dream of this – and to create works to His glory, not my own] — and oh, did I do a great deal to my own glory – sadly yes, for several decades. I always struggled with a deep internal need to gain others’ recognition, acceptance and admiration — a terrible problem to have, but God is slowly breaking me of it with His tender love — and is giving me HIS dreams, not just my own — I have Him to thank for that loving gift of Failure to Achieve Ones Own Glory…
I am filled with gratitude to Him for this, and am unable to put my feelings into words — and because of this, I will be seeking to create music that speaks that unutterable language that all true believers understand, when they hear it… not that I will not write — but I have to remember that writing words is my second language.
Thank you Lia, for posting this – and most of all, for your and Robert’s patient and loving friendship.
Much, much love,
Bill Brunson
Hahahaha! Just saw my “technologay” typo!!! Falling down laughing now…