I know very little about ‘Mole Rogers’ but hope that her day of celebration goes well. Declan lives in a part of Ireland that remains very special to me as it is where my mother was born. Sheila’s niece, Sarah Daramy-Williams is an accomplished violinist who I am sure will one day be famous in the classical music arena. Sarah comes from a highly musical family and has one sister who is an opera singer, another younger sister who is also a very accomplished classical violinist, and a mother who is a concert pianist. Her other two brothers and sister also play instruments and sing. I never realised when I was marrying Sheila that I was also marrying into a modern-day version of the Von Trap Family.
I hope that all three birthday celebrants have a good day and leave lots of room for cake and suitable refreshments. Love and peace Bill xxx
While we celebrate the day that three people were born into this life on April 5th, I also ask that you celebrate the life of the father of Philip Ellis who sadly died from COVID-19 within the past twenty-four hours. Philip’s father had dementia prior to his death. Our thoughts and prayers are with Philip and his family. There is a ribbon across the heavenly sky today, Philip, which has written on it, “LOVE YOU, DAD, AND WILL MISS YOU GREATLY. YOUR LOVING SON, PHILIP XXX”
My song today is a gentle ballad that was made popular by Stevie Wonder, ‘Ribbon in The Sky’. This song was first featured on the 1982 ‘Greatest Hits Album: Stevie Wonder’s Original Musiquarium 1’ , and charted at Number 54 in the ‘Pop Chart’ and Number 10 in the ‘R&B US Chart’ when it was released.
In February 1983, Stevie Wonder was nominated for a ‘Grammy Award for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance’ at the 25th Grammy Awards. In 2009, ‘Essence Magazine’ included the song in their list of the ‘25 Best Slow Jams of All Time’. Stevie Wonder also performed a version of the song at Whitney Houston’s funeral on February 18, 2012.
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There is very little that I can say about this love song apart from marvelling at its simplistic beauty of composition and sentiment. Although I was aged 40 years when this song was released, I never recall hearing it until I came across it about one year ago in 2019 (40 years later).
Being an author and a lover of all romantic images, I have always wondered what a woman thinks when her man sends her a message up in the sky, either proposing marriage to her from the smoke of an airplane forming a message of love in its wake as it flies over the loving couple, or expressing his undying love for her, emblazoned across the skies. Imagine having one’s sweetheart see a similar message in the sky that is written large across a lengthy ribbon saying, ‘Sheila, Bill loves you’.
When I was in my teens and would date a young woman who I’d taken dancing or to the pictures, the end of the evening would always witness me escorting the young woman back home. It mattered not what hour it was or how far one had to walk if we’d missed the last bus; the only thing that mattered was that one’s date was returned to her parental home and was delivered back into the protection of her parents’ arms (to all intent and purpose) as intact and as unsullied as she’d left the house when she went out earlier to meet up with you.
I’m not saying that girls in the 1950s and 1960s were primmer and more proper than they are today; just that they were more creative and adaptable to the occasion to make themselves as presentable as possible when meeting their date. I have dated many a young woman who would leave home to go dancing wearing a different dress, skirt or blouse and shoes when she left the house, to what she’d slip into and wear when she was out of sight of the parental abode, ready to arrive at her destination for the night.
That is where the fashion for large women’s handbags originated if you ever wondered. Their bags were large enough to carry purses and every other female necessity imaginable, but they were also large enough to store a tight-fitting slit skirt or a figure-hugging sweater that accentuated the young woman’s breast assets; along with a pair of high heels, a spare pair of nylons in the event of getting one’s good pair laddered, and the reddest lipstick that was obtainable from Boots’ ‘daring woman’ selection of cosmetic products. In fact, had they also wanted to incorporate a chamber pot into their bag, I’m sure there would have been enough room!
All young men who fancied their chances with their date would have a number of rehearsed lines that might ‘accidentally’ just happen to be trotted out at the appropriate moment, along with a few romantic tricks up their sleeves. I remember that the skies were different sixty years ago to what they are today. For one thing, it wasn’t clouded with the atmospheric pollution we have today, and the skies and all its stars were clearer and shone far brighter than they do today.
Now, whereas many a young woman had been shown the ‘Plough’ by their young man who was out to impress them with his astrological knowledge, there the astrological knowledge of her suitor would most likely stop. But not me, Buster! I would gen up deliberately beforehand and casually speak about the most famous constellations that are most visible to the naked eye in the Northern Hemisphere as I showed my date the romantic heavens. The mere mention of Aquarius, Aquila, Aries, Canis Major, Cassiopea, Cygnus, Gemini, and Leo would usually be enough in itself to impress the young woman at your side and convince her that she wasn’t being walked back home by some Heckmondwike ignoramus who was never destined to go far in life. If I saw that she was impressed with what she heard, I would also throw in a bit more brain-power for good measure by casually mentioning ‘The Little Dipper’, ‘The Little Bear’, ‘Orion the Hunter’, Taurus the Bull’ and ‘Gemini the Twins’.
Here’s a tip for all you young men on the pull. Some women are turned on by good looks, some like to walk on the wild side of life with a bad boy on their arm, some women like sweet talk, some are attracted by power, status and wealth, some are happy to take a turn with the best dancer on the floor, some are in it for the sex and some just like to jump in the puddles of life for nothing more than the sheer hell of it and to make a splash. Different women invariably want different things, but ALL women love a man with intellect!
All of the astrological detail I had at my fingertips would merely act as a precursor to telling the young woman some convoluted Irish story that would make her consider me even more romantic than I imagined myself to be.
On any occasion, I wanted to put my arms around my date and cuddle up close enough for a possible kiss, I might point to the heavens and spin her some story that would momentarily distract her. For instance, I might fabricate the name of a constellation of stars called ‘Debby’s Way’. The young woman I was dating at the time was naturally called Deborah and my astrological lesson would be sufficient to impress her enough to reward me with the kiss I sought.
Now, come on, be truthful! Which woman among you could fail to be romantically impressed by having their own constellation of stars to keep as a namesake at the end of a romantic night out? Every woman would love an astrological ribbon in the sky. Every time they looked up at that constellation of stars in the future, one could be reasonably assured they’d be thinking of the man who gave them heaven and earth in one night’s unforgettable experience.
It is akin to getting inside a woman’s head as a teenager, and remaining there for evermore; even twenty years down the line when she’s in another man’s bed, married to him and the mother of his three children! I imagine there must be many a woman out there who I once dated, and who frequently wonders ‘what might have been?’ had I been 'the marrying kind' in my late teens. Who’s to say with certainty when a woman closes her eyes to kiss you, that it’s you she’s thinking about when she does it? No man possesses the power to fathom the intricate workings of the female mind, but some know more than others!
I don’t know what any of my teenage dates would think of me today if they are still alive and kicking, but I’ll willingly bet £1000 that none would ever allow the passage of time (even 60 years) to lead them to forget my name, or the star I introduced them to which bore theirs!
And just in case you are wondering how one young man could continue to make different heavenly constellations work for him with so many young women, whatever their Christian name happened to be, the answer ‘was in the stars’. I’d simply select any group of stars and Christened them anew to fit the occasion and whatever the young woman’s name who I was dating at the time happened to be.
Women, beware! Never trust in any man who does not believe everyone’s destiny is to be found ‘in the stars’.
Love and peace Bill xxx