Travelling the Blogosphere and Rediscovering "Simple Gifts"

'Tis the gift to be simple,
'tis the gift to be free.
'Tis the gift to come down
where we ought to be.
And when we find ourselves
in the place just right,
'Twill be in the valley
of love and delight.~ from "Simple Gifts"

One reason I enjoy aimlessly fumbling through other folks' blogs is coming across interesting buttons, flags, and formats that can be adapted for use on my own blog. There is the potential for a very nice shared community vibe with this whole internet thang...

While more often than not, I do not even use what unique things I find, I am always impressed that someone else did. One such "add-on" that I discovered, and borrowed,(see the bottom of the right column, below) is the LyricsBox available from Lyricsdownload.com. The implied intent of the LyricBox would seem to be to allow people to personalize their sites with lyrics of personal significance from which visitors might benefit.

I previously employed a Lyricsbox on the Myspace page I set up (and have since cancelled) many moons ago, to post (for my student's edification) some contemporary song lyrics from the Beastie Boys single, "Bodhisatva Vow". Since this most recent rediscovery, I have opted to instead reference post the lyrics to the Shaker classic Simple Gifts... Often describes as "the perfect marraige of lyric and tune," Simple Gifts is a song composed in 1848 by Shaker Elder Joseph Brackett as an easy-to-learn tune for Shaker worship--promoting the virtues of a simple life--that has since gone on to become one of America's most popular all-purpose melodies.

I guess many people are curoius about the Shakers or Amish or other groups who aspire to communal living arrangement. Like many, I, too, am fascinated with the idea of being part of a community joined by a singular common relgious or philosphical belief system, the very type of group think which might have sparked the writing of this song. Regardless of one's creed, the message is universal, which adds to the timeliness, and timelessness, of the lyric.

Breathe in, breathe out... YOU AND I ARE ALIVE!