Journal Entry

Prose by Nichole Hastings

Days like this remind me
Not to live in the past
But once a year
I’m reminded
Of past
I want to forget

I don’t want to live like this
But here we are again on this calendar day
And amidst all the lovely joyous celebration
I curse this day
And you
For it reminding me of you

Should I be okay with it all?
And all that’s been done?
Put it behind me and move on?
I want to
But sometimes the rage still seethes in me
Bursting and unable to be contained

Today my gentle loving self
My logical empathetic compassion
My understanding and appreciation of others
And the gift of their existence in this world
Is as dead as you are
And I’m okay with that

@nicholehastings

I Ain’t Your Momma

Let me give a you little advice “my son”
There’s a reason you’re a party of one
Think about the way you’re living
Before the living is done

So you don’t die alone

First of all there is your health
Don’t care for you
Can’t for anyone else
Don’t love you
Can’t love anyone else

We all live and die alone

Second babe there’s what you do
Your talk ain’t nothing
If you don’t follow through
Your dreams ain’t nothing
If you ain’t in hot pursuit

Gotta live your life for you alone

Thirdly there’s the company you keep
How you treat them
And new people you meet
Are you a fairweather friend
Or true consistently?

So you don’t live alone

What kind of energy you want to be?
Me, I’m all about positivity
But you gotta do it for you
Don’t do it for me

So you don’t live alone
Hey
So you don’t die alone

So here we are full circle “my son”
Has the full force of self-realization finally won?
Have you parted the clouds to let in the sun?
I ain’t your momma so better learn these three ones

Before I leave you alone

Before the setting of the sun
Before this dance we’re dancing is done
Before all you have has left you and gone

Before I leave you alone
Yea
Before you’re all alone
Get it?
So you don’t die alone

@nicholehastings

Nichole Hastings in Coolidge Salon Series Opening for Jim Rooney

Not quite sure how this happened but I’ll be reciting poems from my recently published book titled A Remedy For Love and book signing alongside Americana folksinger and producer Jim Rooney this Friday!

Jim Rooney is a Grammy award winning producer and lifelong folk and country genre musician. He lives in Sharon, Vermont and Nashville Tennessee. As cited in his memoir “In It For The Long Run: A Musical Odyssey,” Rooney relates a kaleidoscopic first-hand account of more than five decades of success as a performer, concert promoter, songwriter, music publisher, engineer, and record producer.

Joining Rooney on the night will be Nashville Songwriter’s Hall of Fame member, Pat Alger, who penned many hit songs recorded by Nancy Griffith (“Once In A Very Blue Moon”), Kathy Mattea (“Goin’ Gone”) and Garth Brooks (“Unanswered Prayers”). Well-known Vermont instrumentalist Colin McCaffrey will also be joining Jim and Pat for what promises to be a very special occasion.

Doors open at 5:00pm and the music begins at 6:00 pm. The Coolidge Salon is with open seating in front of the fireplace which provides a very intimate setting. The program will last for approximately 50 minutes and will be followed by a question and answer session with the audience. Complimentary munchies will be coupled with a cash wine/beer bar.

When: This First Friday May 2nd in WRJ
Where: At the Hotel Coolidge
Starts: 5:00pm
Tickets: $10
Call the Hotel Coolidge at (802) 295-3118

—
A Remedy For Love
by Nichole Hastings

Description
This collection of poems and photography explores love, life, relationships and truth found in nature. The composer and photographer Nichole Hastings takes you on her journey as she relates her experiences and explorations with love. Written in free verse and rhyme, Nichole’s words share her tragedy, triumphs, challenges, fears, longings, bliss and realizations about love. Nichole and the other contributing photographers reveal more details about her and her life in each photograph. Her poems speak to a juxtaposition all adopted Asians face, who have no connections to their birth country or biological parents and growing up in white America, in the search for self and identity.

Biography
Nichole was born in South Korea and adopted at the age of two by a caucasian couple stationed in Seoul, the city of her birth in the late 1970s. She grew up hiking, camping and fishing in a small rural farming community in New Hampshire; the only girl among her three cousins and a younger brother.

*You may purchase A Remedy For Love at www.stylemylife.us/shop, at the Norwich Bookstore and in the Apple iBookstore!

Be Ordinary by Nichole Hastings

Second Vermont Republic

I was recently able to speak with Bernie Sanders in a small venue and to hear my fellow community members voice their comments and concerns. I asked Bernie the question : “How can we support change and address the challenges we are facing as a nation?”. I appreciated his response, “Be extraordinary.”, but that is a rather meaningless response and an inaccessible concept to the majority of people in this country who are working minimum wage with kids, a spouse, and living paycheck-to-paycheck trying to meet their basic needs. I have friends who fall into this socio-economic sphere and they would understandably be angry and uncomprehending and feel as though I was being condescending if I were to tell them that solution to our problems is for them to “Be extraordinary.”

One of my fellow community members brought up education as a solution. This is an admirable and key solution…

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