Do You Know Where Your Song Is?

He started singing and I turned in surprise to see who was being so bold.

He grinned, partially toothless, and said, “Well?  Somebody has to sing!”

I couldn’t help but smile.  It made me so happy that if I’d known the tune I might have joined in.  He didn’t have star quality or a voice that stopped you in your tracks but he had something.  He didn’t have nice clothes or even clean clothes but he had a song and a smile.

As I left Safeway, he called out from the bench where he sat with his shopping bag, “Have a good night, Miss.”

“Thank you for singing.” I replied.

I drove out of the lot with a smile on my face and wondered who his family was, what his story was and why he still had a song.  I think each person has a song and it’s not necessarily a song they sing.  Your song is whatever gives you a passion for life.  It makes the blue sky bluer and the hard times easier.

Sitting in the comfort of my warm home, with family around and food in the cupboard, sometimes I struggle to keep my song alive.  Then  people like the singer at Safeway are placed in my path or I attend a Role Mothers event and meet people like Dawn, who helps run the Birthday Buddies program in Calgary and spends her free time delivering a normal birthday experience to kids staying with their moms at second stage housing for abused women.  These beautiful souls remind me that keeping the song alive is not only possible it is most likely vital.

So, here’s to all of us facing the long season of winter, here’s to those with situations that threaten to steal all positive energies, here’s to my friends in New York that have been without power for 12 days and counting, and here’s to the moms and dads whose lovable kids are getting on their last nerve –  may you hear the song today and may it remind you that it is good to be alive!

Sometimes I find it funny when Max loses his “song”.