THIS IS A LONG POST! YOU’VE BEEN WARNED! ;)! (…Birthday Self Indulgence!) For My 60th… I wrote a song for everyone. I’m calling it the Inside Out Song. From Inside me & Out to You! And here’s the thing This song isn’t about hitting the notes, or whether I am a good singer or not a good singer, or whether the song has any merit. It IS about LOVE. And how love is many things. Love can be an adventure. It can be succumbing to a little tickle that’s been teasing you for years! Squeak!! Letting go of Perfect. Starting. FINDING the path, by picking an entrance. Being the exception to your own rules. Rethinking the plan. Why not?! Love can be crushin’ on your Self. Saying Yes - to You. Yes…so…here is a little story…a bit of a background as to how this song came to be. ☺ I have always wanted to sing. Not as a career, but I always wanted to get good at it. I wanted to sing for people. I used to make everybody shut up, sit down and listen to me as I plaintively sang folk songs in a little coffee house in Port Moody. My 12 year old self commanding the room, weakly accompanied by my 12 string guitar. “So little snowbird take me with you when you goooooooooooooo!” (I only knew 4 songs, so they didn’t have to sit still for long!) ;) I used to write songs for hours in my room. Deep dark tumultuous songs tumbled from my tortured teenaged heart… My family endured and encouraged me. My guitar and my music and musings were my life- line. My “true” reality. I can remember a Camp Counsellor - I was maybe 10? (an elderly woman who taught piano and singing) telling me I had an angelic voice, and then asked me to sing a song for her again. I could never replicate the sound that I had just sung for her, and I know she was disappointed – as was I…but her words haunted me…and I always wondered if she had heard what I Felt? Could it be true?? Could I really sing? Was there something special in there? Because I LOVED to sing. It just felt so good. Life went on. There wasn’t much opportunity to sing unless I joined a choir. Port Moody sucked for the arts. There wasn’t much on offer…you were either in band & uncool, or out in the woods smoking or whatever & cool…I chose cool, even though I never really fit in. (I secretly wanted to do band!) Years and years later, I moved to Whistler. OmGAWD! Hours and HOURS singing…walking alone in the Dark along gravel roads in the wee hours of the morning…top of my LUNGS! Smokey Robinson, Joan Armatrading, ANITA BAKER!, Stevie Wonder…Oh the late 70’s and early 80’s…amazing melodies…mmmm mmmm MMMM! I NEVER had to worry about bears – they fo’ sho’ heard me comin’! I could feel my voice developing…it was strong and had range and it was so much Fun to play with the melodies in my head… I moved back to Vancouver, and more life has gone on. All I really ever sing now is Birthday songs! My social life changed drastically. As did my party habits. The things I did that helped me hang loose, weren’t really working for me anymore - and I didn’t really have anything that served the same purpose to fill that space. And I became tight, and out of practice, and more and more shy to sing. Flash forward to today. The past few years I have been thinking more and more about singing. In the last year, I have reconnected with many of my friends from the past on Facebook and I am reminded of that girl I used to be. And I see so many of my friends living their truth. Living lives that have grown from that seed of a gift given. Now THOSE are successful lives! And as I reflect on my Own life, I can see that I have Not given my gifts/desires/dreams a chance to bloom. So …that is what I am going to do…while I am still relatively healthy and have most of a working Brain! This song is the culmination of All that I have said here. I like singing, and I am going to do more of it. I am going to practice so that I get good. Can’t wait to start my lessons, that I signed up for 4 months ago! Wahoooo CJ!! On my very first walk on Salt Spring I broke out into song. Heartfelt and LOUD! It felt incredibly GOOD! So. I started looking for a song to sing for everyone for my Birthday. As a personal Dare! But nothing clicked. I decided to Write a song that voiced what was in my heart. I can’t read music, so it was just writing a phrase or two….singing it, recording it on my cell, playing with it…adding to it, changing it…until I thought I had something that felt comfortable. An unexpected casting maelstrom prevented me from giving it any serious practice time. Just a few runs before I went to bed, - but my singing really upset Frank!!! I have learned that I am a perfectionist. And it has hindered my ability to play. I’d be stressin’ that I wasn’t hitting the notes, that the light wasn’t quite right, that I wasn’t slim enough and my hair was stupid… because I couldn’t quite figure out how to make the song sound right, because I couldn’t find the right location to film it, because it wouldn’t sound right without music, because people might cringe, and even because people might say a nice thing and make me feel shy and uncomfortable, because I’d embarrass my friends and family… Not any more. ☺ Some of you may remember me asking you what I should do for my 60th…Camino Trail? Help Elephants…Volunteer Work…Yoga retreat…all sounded fabulous, but none were hitting the mark. And I realized why. The Celebration had to come from within. I didn’t need any more stimulation from the Outside,…I needed to acknowledge and set free - the Inside. The part that had been patiently sitting in the side wings waiting for Her Turn. And so, THAT is my 60th Birthday Gift to Me. I am going to utterly SPOIL myself this year. Give free rein to my inner dreams and desires. Take some Drastic measures. Freefall. Have a lot of Blind Trust. Go for Big Change. So…please excuse the notes that I don’t quite reach (I KNOW you were rootin’ for me!)…that is Not what THIS song is about. This song is about my wishes for Me and for YOU. This song is about Jumping and trusting that you will be ok…maybe even kinda exhilarated! This song is about being 60 and getting a whole new vision of what your life can Be! You are ALL a HUGE part of helping me to let go of my “stuff” and just get out there and Be…me. And I THANK YOU!!! Oh my GAWD, I have not been this excited for YEARS!! Please join me for my Year Long 60th Birthday Party of Gettin’ a Move on with those Dreams! Jumping up and down in a circle Hugs All Round! Thanks everyone for being here with me.
Posted on: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 08:12:48 +0000
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