Dan

Psychologists insist that anger is a legitimate stage of grieving, and so I admit. I feel like cussing. I am angry. I've been thinking all day about how much I want to sit shiva for Dan, my friend who died on Tuesday. I want to spend seven days sitting around with friends, laughing about the good times, eating, crying and remembering. I suppose this is what I feel like cussing about. Dan was not Jewish, and I guess I'm not either. But that particular discipline is a really important one. Grieving is something I feel like I know too much about. And what I've learned is that not allowing it to take it's course; not meeting, talking, crying and eating, is the worst thing you can do.

I am also angry that this is the second person I've loved that I've eulogized in as many weeks. As horrible and shocking as it was to lose Barbara one could not deny that she lived an incredible, full life. Six children, many grandchildren, friends, family. And Barbara's beloved had left this earth four years ago- she must have longed to be with him again. She told me often that she was pissed at him for leaving her so early.

But Dan. Dan, Dan, Dan. He had half the years Barbie did, but he squeezed every last drop of life out of the time he had. He travelled the world with amazing musicians, including Regina Spektor, played SNL (!), Ellen DeGeneres, played for Coldplay. Pretty much the 'bucket list' for any musician. He had a beautiful wife, a gifted artist in her own right, and a gorgeous baby girl. His family was just beginning. He should have had 20, 30, 40, 50 more years with them.

So I met Dan at the Manhattan Vineyard Church. I was not yet a Christian, I was investigating. I'd gone once with Matt, but he was on tour and so I went alone. I cried during the worship time. The music pierced me. It was so powerful, moving and minor. Not what I expected. I don't remember the line up, except for Dan. He was the cellist. I approached him with some bizarro boldness I didn't have and simply asked "I'm a singer songwriter. Would you play with me?" He said "Ok." And kinda smiled and shook his head.

Dan was a Christian. He answered alot of questions for me, but he never evangelized. He'd smile and kinda shake his head when I'd say or do something that indicated I was 'getting' it. He was proud of me. He was sort of, protective. When I said or did something that indicated that I wasn't 'getting' it, he shook his head again, but this time differently. I cared tremendously what he thought of my life, and my choices. When I was baptized in the middle of a lighting storm on the beach at Coney Island, he and Julia were there. With a camera. Because of them I have a record of this major milestone in my life. Julia made a collage for me with pictures from the baptism and scriptures and framed it, presenting it to me as a gift a few weeks later. I was blown away. I knew I had become a part of a real family. And they were a part of it.

Dan was a man of few words. But the ones he did speak, meant the world. He was so mellow about everything, I sometimes wondered if he liked playing with me. He seemed content, and interested, but I am a chick who needs a lot of reassurance. When I would ask him what he thought of a new song, or a new arrangement- he was honest, and encouraging. Musically, he provided a depth and resonance that those early songs probably didn't deserve. I remember recording his part of "Gulf of Mexico"- on "Mary's Daughter" the song I wrote about Jeff Buckley's drowning. I see the irony in this only now. He played a cello part that made the song. It was far more emotional, and powerful than any guitar solo could've been. And since there were no guitars on my record, by choice, Dan was it. He was my lead player. He colored everything he played with honey, resin, and love. I don't know how else to say it.

When I saw him in Houston, he was on tour with Regina Spektor. I was proud that Dan had graduated to such heights. He was protective of her too. Apologizing in advance for her if she didn't say hi to us, explaining her voice is strained, she's been sick. He loved playing with her, and she obviously loved playing with him. Her songs deserved him. It was a perfect fit. He was luminous at that show; the honey tone warming and washing Regina's songs. He got us the most rock star seats in the whole place, and I kept shouting "Dan!" when ever I thought it wouldn't embaress him too much. We drank green tea, we swapped baby pictures. Being away from Julia and Audrey was really wearing on him, Matt and I could both see that. I had the sense that he planned to get off the road in the somewhat near future, but he didn't say anything specific.

Dan was loyal. I kept expecting him to flake out on my in those early days and he never did. I wouldn't have blamed him. He certainly wasn't playing with me for the money. But he would always be there. I remember our first rehearsal, at a divey rehearsal room off of Times Square- just him and I. He was excited and prepared. I couldn't have hoped for more. This is not all I will say about Dan, but this is all for now. I hope this paints a bit of a picture of the person who he was, at least to me.
Posted by Cameron Dezen Hammon a

pain.is.everywhere.

I'm sitting in the coffeeshop where last week I met a woman, who is now a friend. She told me the story of having, and losing her first child, a son. He was born with a fatal heart condition, and lived only 56 hours. I need to write this, I'm not sure why, to do what I do- to mark these events as having happened. I have no conclusions, except that pain is everywhere. Its sitting next to you in the coffeeshop sipping a cup of french press, looking at a map. It's behind the wheel in the car on your tail. It's there,radiating like a muscle spasm.

What are we going to do? All I can think of is to talk to eachother, to ask eachother about pain- how is it going? how are you feeling? what are you remembering of your beloved mother, husband, friend today?

Death is foreign. It's not supposed to be this way. It's shocking because it's not a part of the original plan. We wait anxiously for the day when all is shalom, when all is restored. And we are playing music, cracking jokes, and cuddling with our loved ones again.

Rest in Christ; Daniel, Barbara, Dan, and Mike.

Barbara

You have a special place in your heart for the people who love your children. Aunt Barbie loved our children, Grace Presbyterian Church. She gave them candy when we weren't looking (or when we were) she kept their pictures at her desk, and always wanted the most recent one. She hugged them, held them and let them push the button on that Christmas reindeer as many times as they wanted to, making it sing an ear splittting chipmunks version of some carol. She loved it. She loved our kids and they loved her. Barbara Marsden Cattanach you are loved and missed and will always be Aunt Barbie to me and Sydney. Enjoy Jesus. Tell him we said hi.

short leash

I will admit this: I'm on a short leash. And honestly, I'm grateful. I remember tearing out of bed one morning, choking down coffee and throwing on jeans and a tee-shirt (while Matt did the same) to make it to the Houston Vineyard on time for worship. Not just to participate in worship, but to lead worship as a part of the band. We lived three blocks away and slept until about 15 minutes before soundcheck. Now, this is the Vineyard. Jeans and tee-shirt- just fine. Bedhead-- no problem. It isn't a Vineyard church if at least one Pastor isn't wearing flip flops.

So, tearing out of bed to get to soundcheck on time I realized something. We probably would have slept through both services if we weren't playing on the worship team. This is awful, right? Only making it to church on time if I'm singing, or serving, or needed in some way? Shouldn't church leaders be the ones who are there every time they open the doors, early and eager?

Maybe yes maybe no. At the time, our marriage had just suffered a pretty significant blow. We'd been married two years and the issues that had been there before we got married- well, they'd just gotten worse. Heated to boiling. Someway, somehow- just on the other side of this crisis point, our friend Shae Cottar asked us to join the worship team at the Houston Vineyard. Matt had been making his living, though with considerable difficulty, as a touring drummer. He was, and is, and incredible musician. The offer came with a promise of hot coffee and community but no paycheck. Though I was not a professional musician at the time, and had no problem volunteering, I knew it would be hard for Matt. A caveat- he'd learned to play drums as a teenager in this very same church. Then left Houston, and the church (well, all church) for about 10 years.
I'd been going to the Houston Vineyard on and off by myself for most of the first two years of our marriage. People would often ask me if I was single. It was painful.
I'm not even really sure how Shae knew we were even Christians. But he invited us in, and so really, he invited us into what would become the call on our lives. To lead worship, to play music together. TOGETHER. That's what God had for us. And it took a volunteer opportunity in our local church, (a church we were rarely on time for, but who loved us just the same) to show us that. Seven years later Matt and I are worship pastors and songwriter's. He is an accomplished record producer. He uses his gifts to help artists and musicians shape their songs and lives.

If God hadn't opened up that opportunity to serve--we would likely have not even gone to church, let alone shaped our lives around serving the church. It all just sparkles with God-personality. Humor. Patience.

I give you all this back story to say simply, that I've been tugging at the leash for the last three weeks. Having left my job at Grace, I've had some 'time off'. For the first time in 5 years I haven't spent all day every day at a church. I've spent a week with intellectuals, writer's!, at a workshop at U of H. Dipping a toe or two in the fountain of academia, flirting with graduate school; a interesting idea I am still flirting with. But suddenly, I was a fish out of water, and I allowed myself to doubt, for the first time in a very long time. Spending time with poets made me realize that I had been on auto-pilot as a Christian. Quipping slogans and trying to believe them. Could I go back?

Full of humor and patience, God sent me there. To the writer's workshop. A chance encounter, led to a narrowly missed discovery matched with impeccable timing and there I was. Only God could organize something so flawless and unlikely. He knew what I needed, and how I would best receive it- he released me to wander (though only a few miles east)- and process. Jesus stuff was everywhere. At the workshop I mean. And not in a religious manifestation - like seeing the Virgin Mary in a water stain on the ceiling- but in everyone's work. Tortured, wrestling, hurting, searching, grappling, hiding- all of it - with "Jesus stuff." I felt like the most well adjusted person there. I felt so grateful that I knew what I knew. And I believed. I needed to wander to be reminded. I smiled to myself all week about that.

It's like this- I will let my daughter grow up and be her own person, make her own choices. I will do this, though every fiber in my being wants to protect her, keep her safe, limit her choices and therefore limit the potential for pain. But I know, because I love her, she will have to figure it out for herself. And if I let her wander just a few more steps, she'll come running back to me by her own choice. Eager to show me what she'd seen and learned.

So at the end of this week, I will return to work for the church. It's a different church, it's ecclesia. It's the place I've gone to worship on Sunday evening, often by myself, for the better part of eight years when I wasn't serving somewhere else. It's a place I'd gladly volunteer. It's a place I'd take out the trash if it was full. It's a place that makes getting out of bed at 6:15 on Sunday morning sound like a great idea.

Moving Day

I am feeling, in no small way, like a bride packing up her childhood bedroom. Wondering what stays, what goes and what goes to good will. If I slide into unbridleld sentimentality, forgive me, but bear with me.

Grace Presbyterian Church has been the childhood home of my ministry. Of our ministry. It's the place I wrote all my songs, save one. It's the place I led worship in front of hundreds of people, none of whom knew me from Adam when we arrived in the summer of 2005. I remember being awed by the sanctuary. Walking in and being overwhelmed by the stained glass, the royal red carpet, the beautiful chancel, the communion table- whose message implored "Do this in rememberence of me."

I learned alot here. Like what "Call to Worship," and "Words of institution" means. How to plan a worship service. How to be a part of a team. How to be a mother. How to drive fearlessly on I10.

I learned to love the history and the liturgy of Grace. I remember thinking, "these people must be really holy" as I stood in the shadow of the giant cross, suspended as if in mid air above the platform. What I learned, and this is no small thing, is that all people- regardless of denomination, liturgy or history- are working out their salvation with fear and trembling. Liturgy does not holy make. But I dare to say, Love does. And they've got it in spades.

As I sit here surrounded by moving boxes, stacks of books, layers of effort, hope and intention, I am reaching for the meaning of it all. And what I'm finding is simply the last page of the first chapter. One I hope to revisit with fondness. But one that's finished none the less.

Thank you Grace. For trusting, loving and letting me go. You will be missed.

You cannot love both me and Ezra Pound

I knew it would never work. Deep down, I knew. Because of Pound. I made it my business to know who all the Anti-Semites were in art, music, literature and the like. I was like a one woman Red Scare, except I was hunting people who don't like Jews, not Communists. As a child I wanted to be Ann Frank. Or rather, I wanted to play Ann Frank, in an original production, written by me of course, that would include "Somewhere" from West Side Story. Yes, Ann Frank the musical. My fourth grade English teacher politely advised against it.

Walt Disney
Ezra Pound
Charles Lindbergh
Martin Luther
Henry Ford

The list goes on, at least according to google. But back then, there was no google, and this information was hard to come by. It was passed with the salt and gefilte fish. Dropped like alka seltzer into conversations of adults that I eavesdropped on. Pop, pop. Fizz, fizz.

So when a man I liked in college, (I was in college, he was in Baltimore) who was courting me through letters and poems, declared his love for Ezra Pound, I should have run in the other direction. He loved ampersands (and apparently still does),played in a well known rock band and was considerably older than me.

He was very concerned that he couldn't take me to his neighborhood bar. And being a "writer" who loved "Pound" his neighborhood bar was critical to the formation and maintenence of his delicate psyche. I was 20. "I have an id", I whispered over the phone as snow piled up outside my window. "Oh, God" he said dramatically,"a fake id?"

I went to Baltimore nonetheless. Against my better judgement (where was my mother?) I got on an Amtrak train over Christmas break, from New York City to D.C., to spend a few days with ampersand guy.

When we got to his house and I dropped my stuff on the futon in the loft outside his bedroom he raised an eyebrow. Then I raised an eyebrow. I expected him to offer to sleep on the futon. He was expecting some other arrangement.

What ensued was a quasi-comedic unraveling of this poetry based relationship, starting with Ethiopian food, ending with me hiding out at a girlfriends parents' house in suburban Maryland.

What could be less poetic than eating Ethiopian food on a first date. When you're 20. At thirty five I will happily eat Ethiopian food in front of anyone. I am married to a beautiful man whom I love and I am comfortable in my skin. Back then I wanted all boys to think I wore no makeup ("oh that? My lips are naturally berry-crush"), looked perfect first thing in the morning, and never went to the bathroom.


In this day and age you cannot escape anyone. If you have the slightest curiosity about a person who was a part of your life in some capacity you can find them on the internet. And their spouses. And children. Whether it's ampersand guy or your high school English teacher.

I feel as though this is both good and bad. Good in a way, for compulsive memoirists like myself. But also bad for us. There is less liberty we can take with these stories. Though I can't imagine the ampersand guy would particularly care if I re-wrote a few details of our short, strange story.

I was a bit of a groupie I will admit. I loved that he was in a band. And even though this visit was going badly, not just awkwardly but badly, I stayed long enough to accompany him to a show at a DC club. We walked the ten or so blocks from the train in silence. When we got our names checked off the guest list he went straight for the 21 and over VIP section and began drinking scotch. I drank diet coke with a girlfriend and shot irritated glances at him as often as I could make eye contact.

By the time the show was over he was hammered. My girlfriend drove us back to his house in her VW Rabbit, and he spent the entire ride hitting on her. When we pulled up to his place, he climbed into the front seat and kissed her cheek, half falling onto the icy sidewalk.

I went home with my friend that night, wondering what could have gone so wrong. I was usually a pretty good judge of character. "Serves me right," I thought. "Pound." There are signs, there is writing on the wall.

Weeks later I called him, snowed in and bored. "What happened?" I asked, thinking of all the lyrical poems, letters and ampersands. "Truth be told, Cameron," he said, "I really don't give a damn." Maybe it was less Rhett Butler. I can't remember now. But what I do remember was the "truth be told." It was so colloquial. So average. So unlike the dramatic vocabulary of his written self. But really, what did I know? I was only 20 after all.

Jamaican Gold

When I was a little girl, I was obsessed with gold cross necklaces. I was about 8, and Jewish, so naturally this caused a bit of a stir in our house. We had a nanny who lived with us back then, she was from Jamaica and wore a light blue nurse's uniform. Her skin smelled like gardenias and cocoa butter and she did bible studies in her room at night, when I was supposed to be in bed. Sneaking glimpses of her bible and notebooks, I zeroed in on the crosses emblazoned on them. Bingo, I thought. This is my chance.

While Soul Train played on her small TV with the sound turned down, Mary would read bible stories to me, eventually giving me colorful, illustrated versions from her churches Sunday school archives.

If I'm honest, I will admit that my motivation for participating in these secretive studies was the glittery cross that teased me from the throat of my classmate, Allison Scully. Allison was also allowed to wear ripped jeans, had blonde hair and a tan-all-year-round complexion. She was not Jewish. And I wanted to be like her.

Our studies were secretive because Mary knew, much better than I did, that my Jewish father would likely object to his only daughter being evangelized under his roof. In retrospect, he might not have cared much. It was my lapsed Catholic mother that eventually put the kabosh on the late night Soul Train sessions.

Mary told me that she would get me a gold cross necklace if I finished all my lessons with her. She told me that the gold that came from her country is more beautiful than from anywhere else. She proudly showed me her own cross, tucked discreetly behind her powder blue collar. Good for her. She knew that visions of jewelry danced in my head and wanted to be sure I knew the meaning of that pendant I so desperately wanted.

When the day came that I'd correctly filled in all the blank, underlined spaces in my notebooks (and believe me, I labored over them) I casually approached my mother in the kitchen after she'd gotten home from work.

Poor Mom. Working her tail off. Sitting in traffic on the George Washington bridge. Likely worrying about my nutjob younger brother and how he was compulsively punching his Kindergarden classmates. The last thing she was expecting was a religious grenade, lobbed from her daughter's 4th grade hand.

Ironically, this is still how I approach my mother, 20, er, ahem, plus years later, with my biggest news. "Want something from Starbucks? By the way, I'm getting married and moving to Texas." That sort of thing.

Before the words had even fully left my mouth, she was hushing me and pulling me to the dark of the front stairwell. "Whatever you do," she said, "don't tell your father." That was it. End of story. The saga of the gold cross necklace had come to an end, at least temporarily.

Looking back, I am profoundly moved by this act of love from my mother toward my father. Maybe there was some genuine fear there, but my mother is not one to scare easily. Though my father has always, and still does at 82, cut an intimidating figure. Their marriage was a shell, propped up on holidays (Jewish ones) for us kids, and their friends. There was literally no love between them, though I didn't really know that yet. Though her own needs, and even dignity were often disregarded by my father, my mother took great care in protecting his Jewish-ness. Something that he himself cared little about.

Recently on the telephone he told me, "You know, when you were a kid, you begged me to send you to Hebrew school." I waited breathless for some additional revelation of my childhood self. "Why didn't you?" I asked. "I don't know" he said. Silence.

"Well," I retorted, tongue planted firmly in cheek, "blame yourself I'm not a Jew."

I kept prodding. "Well, your mother was not interested and..." "Dad," I said, "she was more interested in Judaism than you ever were."

A note of tenderness entered his gravelly voice, "I never knew that", he said " I never knew that."