Sunday afternoon I went to see Brent sing with The McGill Choral Society & Women Making Music.
I was fine for the first half (Bach) and all through intermission but as soon as the second half (Choir/Audience Sing-A-Long Christmas carols) started, with Silent Night, I started to cry.
I have had this issue for many years now but it seems to be getting worse.
At first, I only cried at my Children’s school concerts, which I even questioned at the time.
Surely a pile of toothless, fidgeting, nose-picking delinquents, shifting from foot to foot, singing off key, the same songs they’ve sung the last three years in a row and at home, ad nauseam, day in and day out, for the last two weeks, is not all that moving.
But it is.
Because those are your kids. And you borned them and grew them up and everything they do is a beautiful milestone in their lives.
And also, seeing them participate in group activities, exercising their independence, is so entirely validating.
Unless you’re me. In which case, I suspect, my tears were based on loss and a deep-seeded negative core belief that even my own little spawn would grow to abandon me one day…
*ahem*
But then I started crying at other people’s childrens’ concerts which, quite honestly, I couldn’t make much sense of at all.
There is just something about a room full of voices coming together. This mass of pure energy dancing in unison. It gives me goosebumps.
So there I was, this past Sunday, singing Les Anges Dans Nos Campagnes, with a few hundred other people, trying ever so discreetly to wipe the tears from my cheeks before my niece noticed I was crying. She’s a teenager you know and having your aunt sing along was embarrassing enough without the open weeping.
It was mid chorus, Glooooooooooooooooria… that, for the first time in weeks, I felt good. No anxiety, no pain, no discomfort. I felt completely at one and though that if I could sing like this everyday, I would never be stressed and my mystery autoimmune bullshit would certainly shrivel up and disappear. Because nothing bad could survive this kind of genuine, unbridled emotion. This kind of beautiful exchange with the whole giant universe. This kind of cathartic release of every feeling and experience and memory and every ounce of energy and sadness and joy and love all at the same time.
And it was at this moment that I realized 2 things.
- I am insane and shouldn’t be trusted at choir recitals, much less with other people’s children,
- I need to stay home and sing Christmas carols all day and all night. Preferably but not exclusively accompanied by a choir of about 300-400 people, in order to be healthy and whole.
And for these reasons, it is absolutely imperative that I find a lifelong financial sponsor so that I can finally quit my f^&*ing job.
*Note IF anybody else enjoys singing and crying at the same time, the Singalong Messiah is Saturday Dec.15 at Montréal’s Christ Church Cathedral (BYOK).