Last month, I attended my 40th high school reunion. It was one of those rare occasions where I had my hair and makeup done.
I am so blessed to be a free-lance artist. After many months without any kind of artwork, I had two large projects come in on the same day. Even though my workload was a bit intense, I finished both my jobs a few days ago and I am definitely celebrating. I leave on a trip to Alaska next week with my three adult children and wanted to finish them before then.
Despite having 11 illustrations to paint in 3 weeks, I continued creating music that I love with my new arranger. Everything we worked on just got better and better. The new arrangements were magnificent – they were beautiful symphonies I enjoyed listening to while working on my paintings.
I recently finished arrangements for “Every Season” and “Alabaster Seashell.” I am going to share them, as well as the guitar tracks that will be the basis for a new arrangement of my song “Set You Free.” When my vocals are done, I’ll post them with stories about those songs.
SET YOU FREE – Two guitars – Copyright 2017 by Judy Unger
ALABASTER SEASHELL ARRANGEMENT – Copyright 2017 by J Unger
EVERY SEASON ARRANGEMENT – Copyright 2017 by J Unger
I named my post “My Fairytale Life” because it feels that way lately. On several occasions, I’ve had strangers come over to me and tell me I am shining and radiant with my big smile. Well – I love hearing that and have every reason to smile!
I share a link to a post I wrote four years ago where I also mention “my fairytale life.” It could be considered Part 1 of this story: MY DREAM HAS ME BLESSED.
My fairytale is all about how rediscovering music in 2010 changed my life.
Memories of trauma seldom erupt from me anymore. I embrace my past because it has led me to where I am today. All of my heartbreak has eased because of music, which envelopes my heart with joy.
Now I am going to share some recent pictures!
I am posing with Delia at the Macy’s make-up counter. She was lovely and did a great job making me up!
After my makeup session, I put on my dress in the Macy’s restroom.
I could write an entire post about my 40th high school reunion, but will sum it up.
Even though I didn’t clearly remember many of the high school attendees at the reunion, it didn’t matter. We were all connected by our memories and life experiences since then. I suddenly found I had new friends and looked forward to future lunch dates filled with reminiscing and reconnecting.
Pretty funny how everyone would bend over to check out each other’s name tags!
I like my color picture better! Who is that girl?
I was very touched when a woman told me she enjoyed reading my blog. I almost felt naked because my blog is such an honest expression of my heart and soul.
I also caught up with a few good friends I never lost touch with. We spoke about very deep subjects and the time at flew by. Soon it was time for this Cinderella to get home and focus on finishing her many paintings!
On my last post, I wrote about the wonderful App named Insight Timer where I have a large audience for my instrumental music. Every day I receive messages from people all over the world telling me how comforting my music is for them. I even had a lovely Skype conversation with a new friend in Greece whom I met through Insight Timer.
https://www.insighttimer.com/judyunger
I was very excited about meeting the CEO, Christopher Plowman and his assistant, Maddy Gerard a few weeks ago. We met for tea at a restaurant in Santa Monica named Shutters by the Beach.
Christopher and Maddy were very warm and I brought some of my artwork to share with them. I told them my story, and Christopher shared how he bought Insight Timer two years ago and the progress he had made with it since then. Now Insight Timer is the most popular free meditation site available and has close to two million meditators.
I think these pictures once again show my big smile and joy.
I especially loved when Christopher shared the Insight Timer philosophy. He said, “We do not actively promote our site. Our belief is that by putting something special out there and being open to the universe, we are hopeful people will come to us.”
Well his motto is exactly what has happened for me.
I dislike promoting my music for money. I prefer to put all of my energy into creating music that moves me; music that I love. And with my willingness to freely share my music on Insight Timer, I have found a loving audience and made wonderful new friendships.
I also find it an amazing coincidence that my blog name carries the word insight!
A few weeks after our meeting, I received a message from Maddy. She asked me if I would like to be the host for a week of meditations related to grief and healing. I would choose 6 other meditations in addition to my own for every day of the week. And the best part was that I would also have an opportunity to share a brief recording about myself.
How beautiful that I have found an ideal platform to speak about how music healed me from my grief.
These are two of my recent illustrations which will be used on yogurt labels.
Below is my correspondence with a woman I went to high school with 40 years ago. She did not attend the reunion, but sent me a message after seeing the pictures I posted on our reunion’s Facebook page. I’m excited about my new friend! (Clicking on the image makes it larger).
