Recently I had an epiphany and a song came to me. It went like: ‘I know what’s missin’ in our life.. and it’s music, music!’ It suddenly became very clear. The three of us need more music in our life in a big way. And we hadn’t been getting enough of it.

What did you want to be when you were growing up? I wanted to be a singer. It was my dream. I had a little tape recorder and I would go into my bedroom and record songs on it. I’d make up songs and pour my little heart into them. In elementary school, I auditioned for a children’s choir and I got in. I learned so much. (I’ve seemed to have forgotten much of it now, but I wonder if it would come back to me?) I remember going to music camp. Learning to read music. But mostly singing and singing and singing. I loved singing with groups of people. Harmonizing voices was the most incredible feeling I could ever imagine. It fed my soul in the deepest way. We sang so many songs and some in other languages. I loved them all. We had practices a lot and being in the choir was very time intensive, it was a big commitment. We all had tape recorders and recorded all of our practices. Then we’d take our recorders home and practice. I only knew one girl in the chorus and we carpooled together from a smaller town to the “bigger city.” Singing made me feel at home, but the group of children in general was not one I felt comfortable in. I didn’t really know anyone and felt out of place. Some girls who sat in the row behind me put gum in my hair one night during practice. I was hurt and felt pretty devastated. I didn’t know why they didn’t like me. Then the girl I was carpooling with quit the chorus. With that, and other things in my life that were challenging at the time, I didn’t feel I could do it anymore. So I quit too. I did join band at school and played the clarinet for a few years. I liked band most of the time. We moved and I started at a new school. In junior high I was in chorus and loved it again. I decided to try out for show choir (with a sore throat), but I didn’t make it. I asked the teacher if I could try out again. She had never been very fond of me and said no, but allowed some of my friends to try out again. I was crushed. And after chorus ended that year, so did all my musical activities. In high school, every time the choir would sing in school assemblies, I nearly cried because I missed it so much. Why didn’t I start again? Good question. I have no idea. I was going through so much during all those years and didn’t have the tools for caring for my spirit. I needed music in my life at that time more than ever. I still listened to the radio and sang along. Sometimes I sang in the shower. But it wasn’t the same. 

When I moved to Oregon and met Jeff, he played the guitar and sang all the time. He had a karaoke machine, which we had a lot of fun with. Jeff loved drumming with groups of people and I started drumming for the first time. Jeff bought me an inexpensive guitar for my birthday one year. I strummed on the guitar a bit, but didn’t have it click for me (yet.) Jeff taught me a few chords and we played a couple of songs together. I explored a local chorus, but it didn’t feel like a good fit for me. So I stuck to making music with Jeff and sometimes with neighbors.

When I was pregnant with Bracken, I had such a strong feeling that our baby was a musical soul. We all are, I feel, but I knew music was a big part of his path. And I felt he’d help reconnect me with music in my life. Jeff felt the same way. After Bracken was born, Jeff would make up songs just for him, play his guitar, and sing to him. Jeff had a twelve string guitar he loved. Then the neck got warped somehow and it didn’t really work anymore. We didn’t have the money to replace it and the music that had constantly filled our home, stopped. It didn’t feel like home without the sound of Jeff’s guitar. I tell people that my stress relief is knitting and that Jeff’s is playing the guitar. He missed it so much. Jeff and I talked about all the instruments we would love to try and instruments we’d like to buy, but it seemed like a distant dream.

And then I had that epiphany. The one I started this post talking about in the first place. It was pretty obvious that we were all missing music, so I don’t know why it was such an epiphany for me, but it was. A sudden ‘A-ha! That’s what we all need!‘ A reminder of something I had forgotten. So lately we’ve been listening to music all morning, while I make breakfast and we go about our busy morning work. I started finding myself singing throughout the day without realizing it, and then catching myself. At night, we’ve been making music together. Drumming together. Dancing together. Singing together. Jeff has been playing my guitar here and there. He thinks he might be able to fix his. We started remembering the songs he used to sing all the time, the words slowly coming back to us. The other night we were making music (I jokingly called us The Wilson Family Band) and then it was time for bed. Bracken started crying and didn’t want the music to stop, he loved it so much.

Music has a way to transport us. It has a way of filling us up. And lifting us up. It has a way of connecting us with pure bliss. Of opening our hearts and connecting us with the world and all of humanity, the earth and the web of life. A simple hum can resonate throughout our bodies like waves of healing. A simple song can make us feel we’ll just burst with joy.

I want to embrace music in my life. I want to embrace it showing up in new and surprising ways. I want to learn new instruments. And learn new songs. I want to sing with people. And make music with others. 

I want music to fill up my life. 

Let’s fill our homes with music. 

Let’s make music with others.

Let’s fill the world will music. 

And watch our lives and the world around us, transform. 

What do you say?