Please don’t take my sunshine away.
I am fairly crap at dates – birthdays, anniversaries, whatever the occasion, it’s most often Kevin that keeps track of these things.
Now, of course, I have an extra bit of help. Facebook enables me to look like a birthday-remembering star.
But for many years, after Kevin and I became a couple, I had to really work at remembering his birthday. It was embarrassing, but there was really only one birthdate I knew for sure and that was my best friend Kathleen’s. I barely knew my Mom or Dad’s dates but Kathleen’s was burned on my brain.
Hers landed on July 16th and Kevin’s on July 21st. I always used the excuse that I’d learned hers first. But sometimes, it really was kind of ridiculous.
Even now, I have to concentrate to separate them.
The other day someone asked me when my father died and I suggested it might have been May. I’m not really sure. For some reason, I do remember Mom’s. She died on the third of January.
But for all the other people in my life, I rely on Kevin for birth and death dates.
Today was an anniversary of a different sort. Today was my last voice lesson. When I signed up for the package of five one-hour sessions, I knew that I wanted to encourage my voice, and I thought it might help my writing to get more in touch with my actual voice. I knew too, that someday I might revisit the idea of more lessons.
But today I knew that I was finished for now.
Besides, I have some writing and art projects that I want to get into…and so…
And so.
I went into the session in a happy state of mind. We did some fun exercises. Viviane is a wonderful teacher and these sessions don’t feel like lessons but more akin to an organic unfolding of discoveries.
A few weeks back, we had explored my very low range. Being able to hit those low notes wasn’t that big of a surprise to me. Back in the day of landline telephones, I was often mistaken for Kevin when I answered the phone. But today I was surprised to find out that I can also hit some fairly high notes.
I told Viviane my singing goal…that in three years, for my sixtieth birthday, I would like to be able to sing a song and accompany myself either on the ukulele or the piano. What I really meant to say, was that I’d like to sing a song without making everyone wish they could be magically transported to another place to avoid that song.
“What,” she asked, “do you think you’d like to sing?” I had no idea.
“That’s fine,” she said, “how about we think of a simple song right now, and you can try it?”
You are My Sunshine was the first thing that popped into my head. I think I’d recently heard it on CBC and found it quite poignant. Later, I’ll remember that it is a song that reminds me of Kathleen. But I wasn’t thinking that then.
And so, I sang as Vivianne played the notes on the keyboard.
We started with the chorus. But when I had to sing, please don’t take my sunshine away, I was suddenly crying too hard to go on. This was not the crying of discreet tears slipping quietly down my cheeks. This was the killer kind, the face-twisting weepings of pure pain.
What the hell?
She stopped playing and let me cry and then asked if there was something this song connected for me?
I told her that over the last few days I’d been thinking so much about Kathleen.
Kathleen, I explained, was my oldest friend and she died and it was hard and in the last few days it’s hit me more and more. I told her how I found myself wanting to call her up and talk. How I wanted to snort and laugh about nothing. I wanted her to hug me in that big bear hug way she had. I just wanted to be able to sit and hang out with her.
“Is this an anniversary?” Viviane asked.
“I don’t know,” I said, “I think she died in April or May, so yes, maybe that’s it.”
“Alright,” she said, “I want you to try singing this again, and, if you can, just keep singing through the crying, just keep going.”
I tried my best, but the sadness was the kind of emotion that hits like a storm, sweeping up everything in its path. I was knocked sideways by the force. This was the kind of crying that used to wipe me out when she was dying.
But let me be clear, other than my recent yearnings to talk to her, there’d been no clue that I had been feeling this so strongly, and please, what I really want to know is this; where the hell does something this big reside when it’s not being expressed?
I came home and told Kevin what happened. Then, I asked him, my husband, my keeper of our history, did Kathleen die around this time?
Kevin is the executor of Kathleen’s will. He wanted to be completely sure before he answered. He looked on his phone for the copy of the death certificate, and there it was: April 4th, 2015. Two years ago. Today.
Earlier, I’d ‘liked’ the picture Kathleen’s daughter Hanna had posted on Facebook. It was a wonderful photo of Hanna as a little girl being held and kissed by Kathleen, but even so, I had not consciously made the link to this anniversary.
I have no idea how all this works.
How does my body remember what my mind does not?
Or does the unconscious simply decide how much to let me know?
I don’t have a clue. I’m stunned by it all.
But I do know this, I miss my friend so much.
Please don’t take my sunshine away.
Hey Colleen,
You handing me your card yesterday afternoon in your new art space slowly taking form, turned out to be the canvas for my morning today.
I was curious about you and here I am, two hours later, having read, having marvelled at the beauty of your artwork, the deep feeling of your process, having cried, related, wondered and ultimately feeling a bit raw but all the better for being curious about you!
Thanks, Carol
Wow Carol. Thank you so much for spending the time with my writing and art. I really appreciate your lovely comments.
PS Maybe we can play in that new studio together sometime…
It really is a crazy life, as you stated in your last comment, and we need to be crazy enough to enjoy it. You are a deep feeler and thinker, Colleen, which means life will never be easy but always rewarding. No-one can take your sunshine away.
Blessings Carol.
I think that’s true…I really do feel very strongly. As a result, life can, in turns, be dark, deep & rich (I think maybe, just maybe, we might be related in this. Do ya think?!?).
I love your last sentence. It feels like a benediction. Thank you.
I heard an unforgettable rendition of that song over fifty years ago that left an indelible mark on my subconscious.
My sister and I were heading home in the back of a large truck with a dozen or more raspberry pickers (sitting on benches – no seat belts). It was at the end of a rainy day, we were wet, dirty and so tired. I didn’t know most of the others with the exception of Janice, who was in my grade at Abby High. She was a “town” girl, so I didn’t know her well.
Janice started singing “You are my Sunshine, my only Sunshine,” then at the top of her lungs, belted out using every bit of her powerful voice muscle,
“YOU MAKE ME HAPPY WHEN SKIES ARE GREY …”
We all joined in and I remember singing it over and over again — energized and overwhelmed with joy.
I’ve been singing that song in my head all day. In June this year, I’ll be attending our 50th Abby High grad union. I’m going to look for Janice to let her know the inspirational effect that her enthusiasm had on me … unforgettable!
Oh Martha, you painted such a vivid picture. I can see you in that truck and hear Janice belting out that tune.
Your high school reunion sounds like such a wonderful opportunity to tell Janice that her song has traveled all this distance through time and memory. That will be such a gift to her and would complete a lovely circle. Music and memory are so powerful.
Firstly I would like to say how privileged you have been to have a friendship so strong with Kathleen. You obviously loved her very much. The 4th April 2015 was such an awful day for you and all her friends that it marked your subconscious – even if you don’t remember dates.
The 4th of April was not a date but a very sad event for you.
Catherine, you’re so right. I feel very blessed by the friendship I shared with Kathleen. And though I always knew I loved her, the depth of it only became clearest when I was losing her. It is truly an awful loss and it definitely marked my subconscious. Thank you for your acknowledgement of all of it. I always appreciate your thoughts. Take good care.
Such a deeply touching and vulnerable share about your experience.
Tears flowed with complete understanding and awe of the power of love remembered.
And the depth to which our bodies carry all we’ve lived.
❤️❤️????
“The depth to which our bodies carry all we’ve lived.” That is it. All of it. Right there. Thank you for that sentence Colleen.
It’s such an incredible and humbling experience to find out all that you don’t know or at least haven’t brought to conscious awareness. With these kind of experiences, I always wonder…what else am I not knowing? We are universes unto ourselves. Thanks for sharing.
Oh wow, Colleen. The body is quite miraculous, is it not? And well, the mind is, too. It’s just so much trickier, isn’t it?
As I started to read this, I was nodding along with the “fairly crappy at dates.”Ha! It’s the best thing about Facebook, I say. Has probably saved me a friendship or two. Although I feel a little cheater-ish when I post on almost-nearly-not-friends’ profiles with a big Happy Birthday, when in “real life,” I never knew when their birthday was anyway, so WTH?
Anyway, then I kept reading and the moment I read the song you wanted to sing, tears sprung to my eyes. It’s definitely a song that resonates with my childhood and my sisters and a lot much “stuff.” Yea, the body is a crazy thing.
Sending you a big fat virtual hug, my friend. Love you. Keep on singin’!
I’m with you on the strangeness of FB-knowing (and sending best wishes) on birthdays that you would never ever otherwise know. On the upside, it’s fun that we all get some ‘bonus’ birthday wishes. I think it’s nice to be thought about, no matter how it comes about 🙂
My voice teacher wrote me an email after she read the post. In part, she wrote this, “My teacher’s teacher used to say “the voice is the muscle of the soul. So when we start using that muscle, the voice muscle, things can come up, can be revealed, can be remembered.
I’m a believer in that muscular soul. I’ll keep on singing and I think everyone should, even if it’s just in the car.
I’m feeling your big fat virtual hug and sending it right back to you. Clearly, with all our collective experiences in this crazy bodily-awareness type of thing, a virtual hug is completely in the realm of the possible. Love and Peace and All Things Good.
I love you dear friend.
Bless you AnneLise. I love you too and I love that we shared such a wonderful friendship with Kathleen. It’s a crazy life.