Week 5 – January 31 2014 – No Big Deal

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQtwmuMxc6I

Today was a real surprise to me.  I’m starting to see the beauty of this project – regardless of how many people listen to the songs or share them around.  I had a song recorded and ready to post, when I was pulled up short by a beautiful piece of music of the radio whilst loading the dishwasher.  I had a little cry in my onesie, in my kitchen, in incredibly fleeting grief and then sat down to have a think about what had happened.  90 minutes later I’m posting this song on Youtube and to 52 Fridays.

I love the phrase “No Big Deal”.  It means a lot to me.  Apparently it was something of a catchphrase of the wonderful Buddhist teacher and all round eccentric wonder, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, as reported by the equally wonderful Pema Chodron.  He was Pema’s teacher and also taught my equally equally wonderful teacher, Lama Shenpen Hookham.  My understanding of it is not that nothing is important or that nothing matters, but whatever we feel or experience is OK.  That is the point.  That is what we were meant to feel.  We shouldn’t search for extremes of anything, just fully allow them to be.  That’s incredibly simplistic of me to put it like that but it’s been a big journey of understanding for me.  I hate you to think I was saying that love, joy and grief aren’t important.  They are, but they are not the destination.

The second verse is about my late husband and my new son, to save you wondering.

This song has been a nice visitor for me.  I’d better finish the washing up.

A new camera angle, because I’ve got a new tripod.  You can see my lovely fireplace.  I love that fireplace.  But it’s no big deal, obviously.  I’m sorry if these performances are boring, they are just the record of a song to me.  I hope you can see beyond the visual.

Written and performed by Christopher Green.  Published by MCPS.

Lyrics: No Big Deal

If you cry in the morning for no reason
Maybe it’s for no reason, except
It’s all of life you’re feeling
And that’s no big deal

If you run down the street for no reason
Maybe it’s for no reason, except
It’s the joy of life you’re feeling
And that’s no big deal

So you sit and you feel it
The profound nothing of each minute
And you start to understand there’s no need for a plan
Except to sit and to feel it
The infinite nothing of each minute
And it’s no big deal, No big deal, No big deal

We quake in the face of unknowable loss
He was here and now he’s not
He wasn’t here and now I’m lost in love
He is pure possibility
He is right now infinity
And though he’s everything
My love is no big deal

Chorus

I’m running through woods, running up hill
Longer than I thought steeper, harder, until the top, til I stop
And my lungs snap, and I feel trapped, it’s a tiny death
And it’s no big deal

Chorus


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