MOG

DAY #29 of singer-songwriter Kristin Hoffman's "Countdown To 30" with two days left.   A little back story from an earlier post is that Kristin has her 30th birthday coming up on October 10th.  She always like to do things to inspire herself on and around her birthday.  She has decided to do something special for this birthday milestone and decided to enter into the next decade with a fun and creative musical challenge.  For thirty days, Kristin will write, record and produce a new song every day - finishing on her birhday!

Kristin is excited about this and for those of you who sign up, she will be sending a daily MP3 straight to your email box, along with lyrics and an explanation about the song and how it came about.  Pretty cool huh?  You can sign up for 30 songs for $30 and the money that she raises from this project will hopefully be enough to finish and package her next album on CD, "The Waking", which Kristin has been working on for a year now with friend and composer Michael Whalen.

http://www.kristinhoffmann.com

October 9th will be her official COUNTDOWN TO 3Oth BIRTHDAY CONCERT at CAFFE VIVALDI @ 32 Jones Street in New York City from 9PM to Midnight.

We've been playing Kristin on the radio for a few years now and are excited to play a new song every day on the Hawaiian airwaves.  We'll also be sharing some of the songs on our radio website and here on MOG. 

Song number twenty-eight is titled "May We All Find Our Place" with lyrics and personal commentary from Kristin below:

May We All Find Our Place

May we all find a warm place to call our home
May we all find our smile and our inner glow
That will carry us through nights out in the cold
May we all find our place in this world

May we all find our dream and learn to fly
May we all feel life glimmer in our eyes
Even when only we know our gift inside
May we all find our place in this world

May we all find our way through this labyrinth
May we all find our strength in the aftermath
When all that is left is the truth of us
May we all find our place in this world
May we all find our place in this world
May we all find our place in this world



This song was inspired by two different stories of life paths that were shared with me in the past week.  Today, they somehow both weaved their way into one song. 

A while back, a family came, with my friend Kari, to one of my shows with their child who had been adopted from an orphanage in Siberia; his name was Nikolai.  They also adopted his younger brother Sergie. Life at the orphanage, where these boys spent their first years of life, was extremely challenging.  Probably most of us have never even touched on this kind of "challenging," and hopefully will never.  One experience, which completely shocked me, was hearing of how the children were woken up early in the morning every day and brought out barefoot, wearing only their underwear, into the snow, to run and do exercises.  I can't even imagine…  Coming to America was also challenging.  Imagine not speaking a language and suddenly being in a new family and having to go to school every day, when you have never had any prior education.  Also, learning to open your heart to emotions, like love, when you have not experienced it in your life before.  All of the things that we take for granted were completely new and unknown.  These boys were truly on a journey to "find their place in this world." 

Last week, my friend, Colin, told me of a family member, named Rich Pease, who was facing the end of his life.  He shared with me many things about Rich, how he loved nature and animals, especially eagles, and how he loved sitting, listening to music; classics like Amazing Grace.  Rich had apparently been a pretty tough guy for most of his life, but as he began facing the other side, he started opening up to the much gentler and emotional sides of himself.  The simple beauties of life began to bring tears to his eyes.  I love the image of this man truly "finding his place in the world" at such an unexpected time.  I received a message the other day saying that Rich had passed on. 

So, this song is dedicated to Nikolai and Sergie as well as to the children at the orphanage in Siberia, who are still searching for "their place."  It is also dedicated to the life of Richard Pease and all those who loved him.  May he now be the eagle soaring to find his new place in the Afterlife…guided by this melody.  And to every other soul who is searching…"May You Find Your Place In This World."

All my love,
Kristin