The Untitled Hymn and The Weepin' Mama

I told you that Nathan sang The Untitled Hymn (by Chris Rice) at my Dad's funeral two weeks ago and how special that was to me.

Here's a story from the archives about the first time I ever heard him sing that song. It helps explain why the song means so much and it also helps to explain why my oldest child is so stinkin' special to me. I just love that fella!


SUMMER 2007

I remember about three years when Sarah was in the middle of an especially challenging chapter of cancer treatment and I heard The Untitled Hymn on the radio. The song talks about all the different chapters in a person’s life and then comes to a poignant, powerful section about the end of a person’s life ending with the words, “Fly to Jesus, fly to Jesus, fly to Jesus and live.”

Well, when I first heard that song, I almost had to pull the car over because of the tide of tears that swept over me as I thought about our precious little daughter battling for her life.

I hadn’t heard the song in a long time and then just last week, Nathan told me he had been practicing it because he wanted to sing it in church. Yesterday after lunch, he asked me to come to his room to listen to him practice and suggest any changes.

As I settled myself contentedly in his recliner, he planted his lanky, gangly self in front of me and started to sing. He has such a sweet baritone voice and the words to that song are so incredibly beautiful. In wasn't long before the memories of the first time I'd heard that song, and the thoughts of what was happening with Sarah at that time, came sweeping back over me.

I listened to his tender voice and I thought about loss and grief and comfort and death and hope and the journey of life. I thought about him flying off to Ecuador soon and flying off to college soon after that I thought about the possibility that Sarah might fly off to heaven sooner than we all hope.

By the time he finally got to those words, "Fly to Jesus," I was an absolutely, completely, totally teary mess. Nathan looked just a tad alarmed to see that his singing had made me cry but after casting a sympathetic look in my direction, he sang on to the end.

As I listened to his warm, resonant voice filling the sun-splashed room, I felt such peace. For a few moments, it seemed like the roles had been reversed and my child had become the lullaby singer, the comfort giver, the voice of healing to my soul.

On a quiet Sunday afternoon, in a bedroom filled with all the precious pieces of his life, I listened to my son sing his heart and I heard the peace of heaven in his voice.

The Untitled Hymn

It was requested that I post the lyrics to the song Nathan sang at my Dad's funeral. (Video of his singing can be found below.) This is one of those songs I wish I had written; it is absolutely gorgeous. Chris Rice is one of our family's favorite writers and singers.


The Untitled Hymn
(Lyrics/Music by Chris Rice)

Weak and wounded sinner
Lost and left to die
O, raise your head, for love is passing by
Come to Jesus, Come to Jesus, Come to Jesus and live!

Now your burden's lifted
And carried far away
And precious blood has washed away the stain, so
Sing to Jesus, Sing to Jesus, Sing to Jesus and live!

And like a newborn baby
Don't be afraid to crawl
And remember when you walk
Sometimes we fall...so
Fall on Jesus, Fall on Jesus, Fall on Jesus and live!

Sometimes the way is lonely
And steep and filled with pain
So if your sky is dark and pours the rain, then
Cry to Jesus, Cry to Jesus, Cry to Jesus and live!

O, and when the love spills over
And music fills the night
And when you can't contain your joy inside, then
Dance for Jesus, Dance for Jesus, Dance for Jesus and live!

And with your final heartbeat
Kiss the world goodbye
Then go in peace, and laugh on Glory's side, and
Fly to Jesus, Fly to Jesus, Fly to Jesus and live!

Never Been A Newbie

I am forty-seven years old.

During these forty-seven years of life, I have never been the "newbie" in a band or musical ensemble. Never.

And just to prove that point, I am hereby going to take you on a pictorial musical journey so that you can experience along with me my long-running foray into non-newbieness.


The first step on the journey is when I was in my early teens and my friend, Lorrie, and I wrote, played guitar, and performed together. (By the way, you MUST promise not to laugh at my hair in these pictures!)





In my later teens, my two younger sisters and I performed together for several years.



When Steve and I got married (I was nineteen, he was twenty-three) he and I, along with my younger sisters traveled and sang together. (The four of us lived FULL TIME in a 31 foot RV. Since Steve had been raised in a family of all boys, he definitely deserves a medal of some sort.)



After taking a two year break from the road, we started up again with Steve and me, my sister, Debbie, and her husband Randy.







Then it was just Steve and me as a full time duo.






I was four months pregnant with Sarah in this photo.




Steve hamming it up for a Garth Brooks style song we wrote.



In the studio recording, "Like A Blanket." The majority of the guys in this picture (all professional studio musicians) either donated their time or gave us a discount on the session since we recorded that CD to give away to cancer families.



The final product of that recording session. (Ordering info is on the sidebar.)



And to go back even further in our musical history journey, I just couldn't resist posting this picture of Steve in one of his early (pre-Becky) bands. Isn't he just the grooviest dude ever? The plaid pants are especially wonderful.




After spending fifteen years spent traveling around in various musical permutations, we left the road and spent 4 1/2 years at First Assembly in Smithfield, where Steve pastored and we headed up their worship band. I happily and encouragingly welcomed various newbies to the band, all the while so thankful that it wasn't me who was new because being new is so scary!

This is actually a band rehearsal, which is why I have my shoes off and Steve is sitting down.

To sum up that whole musical journey, I just have to say that there's something very comforting about being the old-timer in a musical group. It was a role that I liked because it didn't make me feel intimidated or scared or mushy in my spirit. ("Mushy in my spirit" is a theological term.)

But then it all changed. My "never been a newbie" status was obliterated forever when I was asked to fill in on the keyboard at our home church. Now let me just say that I have been listening to this particular worship band for eight months now and I have been so impressed with how good they are. And then they ask ME to fill in on keyboard?

Miss Never Been a Newbie?

Miss Insecure Piano Woman?

ME?

I was a bit nervous (understatement) while driving to the rehearsal Wednesday night. Happily though, the first person I spoke to was the lead guitar player who remembered Steve's and my group from the early eighties. As it turns out, he and his band had played a mini-concert at a particular church as sort of an "opener" before Steve and I and our group sang. How old did THAT make me feel to be discussing music from the early eighties? Yikes.

At any rate, the rehearsal went fine and everyone there was very friendly to ye olde newbie. To be honest, I had actually been losing sleep over the whole deal because I just wasn't sure I was up to the musical level of this band, and I could just picture myself crashing and burning in fine newbie style!

But lo and behold, I survived.

I arrived at the church yesterday at 8 am for another rehearsal. Then at 9 am, the first of two services started. You can see from this picture that I was really rippin' it up on the ol' keyboard.

Look at me go!



And look me again! Am I fabulous keyboardist, or what?

Oh wait. You mean I was actually supposed to be playing?

Oh right. That.




Although the morning turned out to be very enjoyable, I must say that I was very relieved when we finally left the church after the second service. It's just really a lot of pressure being a newbie after forty-seven years of non-newbiness!

But I did it! Hooray!

And of course, I had a brownie to celebrate. One cannot successfully become a newbie without a brownie (topped with ice cream) to mark the occasion.

And you can quote me on that.

Shower Curtains and Miracles

So here's the deal.

I took my camera along on Steve's and my weekend trip to South Carolina, thinking that since this was one of our few opportunities to go out and do something interesting, I could snap a few fabulous, scintillating pictures along the way and create a lively and lovely photo journal for you all to enjoy.

Because I'm nice like that.

Well, I DID take some pictures. In fact, I took more than one picture. I took several pictures. I snapped away with feverish alacrity and fervent enthusiasm.

The pictures I took will reveal the scope and breadth and depth of our journey. They will uncover the nuances and subtleties of our excursion to our southern sister state. They will make you laugh. They will make you cry. They will move you.


Are you ready?

Now wasn't that worth getting up for this morning? Two versions of the same shower curtain in the same bathroom of the same hotel in the same town of the same state!


I understand that you may now be staring at your computer screen in some consternation and puzzlement. You may be asking, "WHY did Becky feel compelled to take (and post) these pictures? Did her 47-year old brain suddenly take a vacation and leave her without wisdom or common sense? Did she actually think that we, her readers, would find these showers curtains interesting? WHAT is going on here?

Well, here's the scoop. We were in a small southern town staying at a hotel that was clean and comfortable but not real fancy. And because it wasn't an extra fancy place, I was especially impressed when I walked into the bathroom and saw the way they "displayed" their shower curtain; I just couldn't resist taking a picture. And then I just sort of FORGOT about taking more pictures of the weekend, since I was sort of stressed out over the concert, and everything.

So although I DID fall down on my job as Official Smith Photographer and Documenter Extraordinaire of the Official Smith Family Sojourn, you are hereby getting the privilege of viewing a creatively arranged shower curtain. Therefore, I don't want to hear any complaining! Or you will go to your room! Do you understand me, young lady? (Oh sorry. I accidentally put on my "mommy hat" there for a minute.)

Okay, enough about shower curtains. Now we move on to miracles!

(Nothing like a smooth segue.)

As you probably remember, I was quite nervous about doing this concert in SC for two reasons. First, Steve and I have not done a full concert together in seven years and secondly, I haven't been able to sing through even one song recently, let alone seven!

It didn't help matters any that I slept poorly on Saturday night (probably because of anxiety) and woke up Sunday morning with a sore throat. (On top of all the already existing vocal cord issues.) As a result, I was not feeling overly perky or positive when we walked into the church to prepare for the service. The way I was feeling, I figured I'd last maybe a song or two and then we would move on to Plan B.

Oh wait.

We didn't HAVE a Plan B. We only had a Plan A. And Plan A was for a certain Becky Smith to sing the whole concert.

And do you know what? I DID sing the whole concert! I sang Every. Single. Song. (Well, except for Steve's solo.)

Now every note I sang wasn't perfect, and I had to grab a few breaths in places that I didn't used to have to breathe, but all in all, my voice stayed amazingly clear and strong all the way through to the end.

Just so you know how incredible that was, earlier last week I was practicing some of the songs and after singing through just two songs, my throat was on fire and my voice was husky and weak. All I could think was, "I am SUCH a goner."

But on Sunday morning, when people were praying for me and I when I was actually up there singing, my voice held out. And it continued to hold out on the 4-hour trip home so that Steve and I could enjoy lots of laughs and conversation on our journey.

So if you were praying for me yesterday--thank you! It was a great morning in many ways and especially wonderful that Steve and I got to do once more what we're gifted to do.

When we got home last night, we enjoyed a quick meal with the kids. And since Sarah hadn't been feeling well, I was especially glad to get home and do my mommy stuff.

I asked her if she and Nathan had gone to church and she said they hadn't. Our church is about 45 minutes away (round trip) and Nathan wasn't thrilled about using his precious supply of gas to make the journey. (Of course, when Steve and I are home, everyone rides with us and uses OUR gas.)

However, Sarah went on to add that Nathan had prepared a Sunday teaching for her using some of his pictures from Israel displaying where David and Goliath had fought. Nathan had a "sermon" all ready, complete with three points about the life of David. Steve and I agreed that we would have loved to have been a little fly on the wall listening to THAT Sunday morning service. And I'm sure it was a Sunday morning service that Sarah will NEVER forget!

So as I close today, let me reiterate my list of thanks: attractively displayed shower curtains, miraculous vocal strength, and sermon-giving nineteen year olds.

A good weekend, indeed.

Winging It!

First of all, a couple guest book things.

Kim W. asked if I had perfect pitch. The answer to that question is, "I wish!"

And also a word to Sue G., Pam D., and Mary H: You ladies are having a little bit too much fun in the guestbook so I'm going to have to ask you keep it down a little. Fun is NOT permitted around here! :-)

Okay, on to other Smithellaneous business:

I do want to mention that in the next couple of days, you'll be seeing some small changes here on Smithellaneous. There will be new pictures posted of the family, a few changes made to the color scheme and some minor adjustments done to the layout.

I thought I would warn you ahead of time so that you when you log on and see different colors, you won't worry that your computer screen is playing tricks on you.

In other news, Steve is on his way home from Charlotte and should be here in an hour or so. Then we'll have one day to get our act together before taking off for South Carolina Saturday morning for a Sunday morning preaching/singing service there. The thought of doing a whole concert after all these years is just slightly daunting on many levels but I guess the skills we learned being "road warriors" for fifteen years should get us through it.

Even though I've written most of the songs we'll be singing, I still worry about remembering the lyrics. I recall that more than once when we were on the road, I would forget the original words to a song and would just "filled in the blanks" as I went along. The audience usually didn't know the difference but Steve's face was always a picture. That's why I always tried not to look at him while I was "winging it."

(I was going to finish that line with " . . . while I wanged it" but I knew that was wrong. But it is still a very fun word to say! Trying saying it. Wanged, wanged, wanged. There. Now wasn't that fun?)

At any rate, it should be an interesting weekend! Although we'll do our very best to be prepared there still may be a lot of winging (and wanging) involved, especially if my voice conks out after the first (or second) song.

Hmmmm. I think I'm starting to feel a wee bit nervous just thinking about it. If you have any extra prayers to send our way Sunday morning, we would be most appreciative.

Now I'm off to study lyrics so that I can keep the wingin' to a minimum.

I Write The Songs

Hi. I'm Becky.

And I am a songwriter.

I wrote my first song when I was six years old and got really serious about it when I was about twelve. That was when I joined up with my dear friend, Lorrie, and we formed a group called The Sonrise Singers.

We spent many hours a week, after school and on Saturdays, playing our guitars, singing and writing songs. A couple times a month, we got asked to go somewhere and perform and that was majorly, mega exciting especially since we got to wear one of our two sets of matching maxi dresses. (That's what long dresses were called in those golden olden days of yore. ) Lorrie, being an accomplished seamstress even at fourteen, made all of our dresses. We were quite sure that whenever we put them on, we were "stylin.'"

I think we ended up writing 20-30 songs together, songs that were actually pretty good considering we didn't know the first thing about writing. We both just had a love for words and an ear for melody and that's about all we needed to "write the songs!"

After our family moved from Wisconsin to North Carolina in 1977, my two younger sisters and I started playing and singing together. (Ruth on bass/keyboard, Debbie on drums, and me on guitar/keyboard.) And it seemed like a pretty natural thing for me to just go on writing, even without my Wisconsin friend and cohort.

And so I did. I continued to write the songs and while they didn't make the whole world sing (like Barry Manilow's songs did) they at least gave my sisters and me something to sing in our Campbell Sisters concerts.

And then when I was nineteen, I married the daddy of Princess Groovy Chick and The College Dude, although at that time, of course, we had yet to meet the aforementioned wonderful children. :-)

The fine fella I married was a singer. A bass player. A guitar player. And (drum roll, please) a songwriter! It wasn't long before the two of us were tossing melodies and words around the room, arguing over lyrics, and pounding out chords on the piano. And I kept on writing the songs!

We entered a period of life where, over the course of fifteen years or so, we traveled with both of my sisters and then later on, with my sister Debbie and her husband, Randy.

As it turned out, Randy was also a songwriter! (Deb, I always knew you would marry well.) And so Steve, Randy and I (with Debbie--who is quite the wordsmith--throwing in helpful advice) wrote enough songs for about a dozen recording projects.

The recordings were mostly CD's, but we have actually been at this music thing long enough to have recorded one LP. Can you believe we're that old? (Don't answer that.)

For fifteen years I wrote songs like a maniac, just about every day working on some part of some song. I specifically remember a time when Nathan was six, Sarah was a newborn and Steve and I (we were a duo then) were headed into the studio to record. Only problem was, having a baby a couple months earlier had been just slightly distracting and I had gotten behind on writing the songs for the project. And since I was the primary songwriter, I was feeling just a wee bit stressed.

I distinctly remember that I actually felt relieved when Sarah would wake me up at 2 am because I would settle down to feed her and then, in the middle of the night silence, start working on lyrics in my head. Getting up with her gave me a chance to concentrate with no interruptions and it really worked out pretty well--the CD got written and recorded. But just barely. (Thanks, Sarah, for your help!)

So life went on--traveling, raising kids, home schooling, writing, recording, performing, setting up and tearing down equipment. And then came May of 2002 when my nocturnal infant songwriting partner was diagnosed with Stage IV cancer.

In one blink of an eye, the traveling stopped. The singing stopped. The writing stopped. The music stopped.

Full stop.

I whipped off my full time musician hat and stuck on my full time cancer mom hat faster than you can imagine. I left the road and the music behind with very few glances back over my shoulder. Life catapulted us into a new chapter which we hadn't asked for and hadn't, in our wildest nightmares, anticipated.

That was seven years ago and I haven't written a song since. It's not Sarah's fault, it's not cancer's fault, it not leaving the road's fault. It's no one's fault. It just is.

I've still stayed in touch with songwriters, gone to some songwriting conferences and joined a songwriting discussion group whose members have been a huge blessing to me over the years.

About three years ago, I received an invitation to a small writer's weekend which would be attended by only a couple dozen people, several of which are responsible for writing the songs you hear on Christian radio every day. It was a chance to spend a weekend co-writing with established writers and up and coming writers; to receive an invitation to something like that was certainly an honor.

But the smushed down songwriter in me regretfully declined. The following year, the invitation came again and again I declined saying, "I'm just not writing anymore."

This year, that songwriter's weekend once more took place and once more, I wasn't there. And I saw some of the pictures from the weekend and they made me sad because I saw all those people doing and being what I used to do and be. They were in a lovely location, separated from all distractions, and they were enjoying chasing ideas, and melodies and word and thoughts. They were hammering out ideas and arguing over melody lines. In other words, they were speaking my native language. A language I no longer speak. At least not out loud.

But the truth of the matter is this: Once a songwriter. Always a songwriter. (As Sue G so nicely reminded me in the guest book.) In fact, I am SUCH a songwriter at heart that I can't even listen to music and clean out my closet at the same time because my brain is so focused on the song and what's happening in the lyric.

When I'm out shopping, I can be going through racks of clothes and not even SEE them because there's a song playing over the store's PA system that every brainwave in my entire head is tuned into. I'm analyzing it, and listening to where the bridge is going to go, and wondering where the writer is going to take the second verse, and trying to guess why they chose to do this with the melody instead of that. Before I know it, I've looked through three racks of clothes and haven't seen anything.

Does that sound like a songwriter to you?

Yeah, I thought so. Me, too.

So all I can say at this point is even though I called myself a "former songwriter" the other day, the truth of the matter is that I am still a songwriter. Can't get away from it and really don't want to.

As far as knowing when that gift will show itself again, I don't know. But it's still in there, still waiting in the corners of my heart, readying itself for the time when this blog writer starts writing songs again.

I'm looking forward to that day.

I'm looking forward to being able to say once again, "I write the songs. . . "