Jeff @ MindSay 
summer
Dear MindSay,
I know it's been a long time. I don't know how to break the ice with my own blog, so I'll post a short video of my son, Jeff, and his new wife, Denise, at the wedding.
Denise's mother played the violin solo for the ceremony. I performed the ceremony, and you will see two little girls, my youngest granddaughters, as the flower girls. Then there is an older girl, 14 now, Coralynn, in the yellow dress and blonde hair sitting at the guest book table. My oldest son, Michael, is in the wedding party, and you'll notice him steal something out of his brother's pocket. My brother, Peter the RN, affectionately known as madforpho is in the wedding party: he's the handsome bald one with the beard! My daughter, Julia, is the beautiful lady with long dark hair, taking a picture of someone else. Her husband, my son-in-law, Jason, is the tall handsome guy who walks to the end of the front row just as the ceremony begins. Hunter, my step-son, is the one standing next to me under the awning just prior to the ceremony, and of course the lovely bride and groom walked themselves down the aisle at the end. I didn't realize, for all the tears in my eyes, that Jocelynn and Denise were holding hands just at the beginning of the ceremony. I can tell you that one look at my husband's misty eyes and quivering chin, and I choked up right away. Jeff, fortunately, blocked my Captain from my sight so I could continue, though we three - Jeff, Denise and I, had a time keeping from busting out in tears anyway. It was an awesome and lovely event, and I am so happy to have my new daughter, Denise.
Rev. Cathian
I went out to dinner with my parents, and it was lovely. When I got home, there were 2 messages on the machine. I assumed they were for mom, so I didn't play them. She finally hit play, and the first one was from Jeff, my boss. He asked me to call back, so I did. I had no idea what about; if anything, I was imagining being asked if I wanted to help with the CITs this week or something. I don't know. In my mind, it was some kind of good news. Maybe he was asking if my mom had the pictures she took, and meant to say 'Ellen' instead of 'I'm calling for Emily'. Actually, I'm pretty sure that's what I thought he was calling about, because why would he announce he was calling for me, when he's my boss?
I digress.
Anyway, I call back, and he asks if I know anything/have heard anything/the news. I figured LeighAnn hurt her knee again somehow, another step towards me and the CITs.
To be honest, I wish the news was, "I know there's only one week left of work, but you're fired". I would have LOVED that phone call.
Instead what I got was, "Gaelan's brother died this weekend. He was swimming in Montana, and he drowned". And he went on to tell me about how Gaelan and her parents flew out there, and how Redyn and Sara weren't coming in to work tomorrow (their last day) to deal with stuff.
But it's not just Gaelan's brother. IT'S SAM. Sam, my co-counselor 2 summers ago. Sam with the beautiful blue eyes, who did the the amazing dives off the board, and was so good with Russell and Aaron when even I couldn't deal with them. Sam. The really sweet and cool kid who would help me get the work done, and make me feel like I wasn't bothering him when it was just the 2 of us and our kids when he was really closer friends with people otherwise on staff. Did Jeff forget that I knew Sam? Did he know it might prevent the tears for a few minutes if I had to think of the association between 'Gaelan's brother' and who that was? Did he know I was talking to Jeanette about Sam on Friday?
I'm actually devastated right now. It can't be right. I mean...not Sam.
I have about 4 million Kenny Chesney songs floating through my head right now. Be okay, Sam. Jeff's been wrong about stuff before, this has to be one of them. It just has to be. There isn't a second option.
Gaelan needs to be okay, too. I wish I knew her as long as I knew Sam so I'd feel more comfortable trying to look her up and offer her ANY kind of comfort, even though she has a million other people who DO know the family better and can provide a lot more. I feel like I need to do SOMETHING.
Something other than cry.
I've jumped forward a few videos, because they are out of context in a way. The first one being a Christmas song. I don't think there will be too many people celebrating Christmas at the time of this post. The second was was a thank you video, to all the people that left comments for me.
So moving straight on to the 51st video I uploaded to Youtube. I first heard George Michael singing this song. A while later I found out that Bonnie Raitt was the first to have a hit with it. I purchased both versions in time. Bonnie Raitt's version was quite low for a female voice, whilst George Michael sung it high for a male voice. It got me thinking a bit. I pondered over what it would turn out like if the male vocal was low. Perhaps it would sound closer.
Check out the results:
Here is the latest on my Youtube progress.
My Subscribers have increased by 4 to 456.
10,774 Channel Viewings. That's a very small increase. I'm happy with any increase at all :)
The total video views has increased again, but not by as much as has been normal lately. They are 130,781. Still impressive though.
Coming up next. It's probably one of David Gray's most well known songs.
Another tune off my list of requests. It's Eternity by Robbie Williams.
I said before about how my list of requests was growing too fast. So I stopped taking requests. This hasn't stopped them coming in though. I'm still getting over 5 requests for every video I put up. I have conceded that I will never reach the end of it. A friend of mine once said to me that more demand than you can cope with is a bit of a problem, but it's a good problem to have. So I'm happy with that :)
This video has been viewed nearly two and a half thousand times, up until this post.
Anyway, here's my rendition of Eternity.
I'm still catching up to my most recent videos, and I'm getting ever closer. It looks like I will probably achieve that within a month :)
The Youtube stats are still going strong. Here they are.
Subscribers = 448
10,752 Channel viewings
Video Views = 128,599
It wasn't long ago when I started putting this information in my posts, so in time, it's going to be quite interesting to look back over the posts and see the changing statistics. I'll find it interesting anyway :)
Next up it's a bit of Coldplay and a guitar :)
A number of months back, one of my friends asked me to do "America" by "Neil Diamond". I finally got around to doing it :)
It didn't matter to him that it took so long. He was overjoyed.
No beating about the bush.
Here is my rendition:
Not so long ago, I made instrumental versions of my own songs available online. For those that were interested in covering me, or using my music in their videos. I've already had 4 takers, and many more promises. A couple did an acoustic version of one of my songs, and someone else used my instrumental compositions in three of their videos. I'm pretty pleased with that :)
Here's the regular stats information.
I lost one subscriber, but then I gained another. So the total still stands at 438.
The channel views are up to 10,702.
The video views are now at 125,856.
A slight ponder over my next video.
Ah yes. A bit of Robbie Williams :)
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