Susan’s Thursday Morning Note
October 1, 2026

Song of Years by Bess Streeter Aldrich.
Strength. Hope. Faith. Desire. Love.

Good morning. Autumn dawn sunlight wanting to break through after the rains. Complete stillness. Little bird friends must be sleeping in. As I struggle to put thoughts into words I replay in my mind thoughts written 800 years ago by Persian poet Rumi, “The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. Do not go back to sleep.” Through the window I see the outline of my angel. My angel of dawn. Encouraging me to drink strong coffee and begin clicking keys. The only sounds now the clicking of the keys. Maybe I will be the one to wake the birds this time. Are they looking over the sides of their nests into my window, finding me to be their angel of dawn? Do my little migrating butterflies ever sleep in the nests of the birds under their wings? Encouraging them as they see me type to enter this fall day? To push their straw, sticks, cotton, feathers, and other treasures they are sleeping under aside and enter this beautiful gift of today?

The early darkness with fall entering gives more hours in my day for reading. When too tired to read anything new I go pull out a friend from my shelf, this week inviting into my home one of my best friends who I have never gotten to meet in person or talk to, but who has influenced my life. Bess Streeter Aldrich. This week she handed me her words within her book Song of Years, written in 1938. This book is on the life of a family with nine children, seven being girls with the setting in Iowa in the 1850’s as the land was just being settled. There are times when I have named this book as my very favorite. I have many very favorites now, for the categorizing of books into “favorite” must be as a mother categorizes her children all as favorites. I have a shelf now that all hold the same position. Treasures. Words within that changed who I am.

Towards the end of the book there is a chapter where the paragraphs end with the following lines depending on which character she was referring to in her thought. The song of years was a song of strength. (Referring to Wayne, the main young character going to war). The song of years was a song of faith. (Jeremiah, father seeing his nation and sons go to war.) The song of years was a song of desire. (Emily dreaming when feeling trapped by duty as a young woman not able to leave home because of the war.) The song of years was a song of hope. (Phoebe Lou, young widow left home with children whose husband died in the war.) The song of years was a song of love. (Suzanne, main character keeping her dreams regardless of war.) These lines stayed with me, originally marked when I read these words over a decade ago. Below are quotes on each song of year. Each word describing parts of our lives. Strength. Faith. Desire. Hope. Love.

The song of years was a song of faith

Sorrow looks back, Worry looks around, Faith looks up. Ralph Waldo Emerson

Pactum serva – Keep the faith. Horace

Great is Thy faithfulness,
O God my Father, there is no shadow of turning with Thee.
Thou changest not, thy compassions they fail not,
as Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.

Great is Thy faithfulness, Great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
As I have needed Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.
Thomas Chisolm, 1925. Lamentations 3:22.

Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God. Corrie ten Boom (concentration camp survivor)

The song of years was a song of desire.

But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:

To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at noon hour and meditate love’s ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise on your lips. Kahlil Gibran

For what it’s worth; it’s never too late to be whoever you want to be. I hope you live a life you’re proud of, and if you find you’re not, I hope you have the strength to start over again. F. Scott Fitzgerald.

The song of years was a song of hope.

Song of Hope by Mary Artemisia Lathbury 1896

Children of yesterday, heirs of tomorrow,
What are you weaving? Labor and sorrow?
Look to your loom again, faster and faster.
Fly the great shuttles prepared by the Master.
There’s life in the loom! Room for it, room!
There’s life in the loom! Room for it, room!

Children of yesterday, heirs of tomorrow,
Lighten the labor and sweeten the sorrow;
Now while the shuttles fly faster and faster,
Up and be doing the work with the Master.
He stands at the loom! Room for Him, room!
He stands at the loom! Room for Him, room!

Children of yesterday, heirs of tomorrow,
Look at your fabric of labor and sorrow;
Seamy and dark with despair and disaster,
Turn it and lo, the design of the Master.
The Lord’s at the loom! Room for Him, room!
The Lord’s at the loom! Room for Him, room!

The song of years was a song of love.

Even after all this time the Sun never says to the Earth, “You owe me. Look what happens with a love like that. It lights up the whole sky.” Hafiz (Persian Poet 1326)