Music

Sometime during the week the most random song played on one of the computers at work and out of nowhere one of the girls in the office started singing along. I couldn’t believe it. How could she know this song that I’ve never heard?

It is then that I suddenly remembered that as a little girl I use to think that it is possible to know every single song in the world. This off course is well before I understood that there is music in every language. As I got older the realisation hit and I was rather disappointed that I would never know every song there is to know.

Even as a teen I closed all the windows and doors and put the volume at its maximum and just listened to my latest tape or cd. (At that stage it was all Celine Dion and I’m confident to say that I knew all her songs – even the French ones). I would listen to a song over and over again. I would enjoy every sound and tried to separate every instrument. I loved my music.

Varsity life came along and I sometimes still had my alone moments with music – most of them in the conservatory absorbing the sounds of soon to be professionals. I loved the piano concerts, the organist and his musical feet, the choir concerts and best of all the symphonies. For days to come I would live the dream of a musician.

And then adult life happened and music disappeared almost all together from my life. Yes, the radio is still doing its thing in my car and on my laptop, but I hardly register anymore. Every once in a while a song would get stuck, but will soon lose its meaning again. More often than not, I find that I prefer silence. That silence that penetrates heart, soul and mind. It is this silence that rejuvenates me, where I find myself wondering and thinking again. It’s a Godly silence I can only find when I’m in the middle of nowhere among endless sand dunes or bushes filled with forest wonders. This is now my music.

And yet, as I drove to work this morning I could not help but put the volume at its maximum and sing like a mad woman along with Nianell’s “What’s the matter?” http://nianell.co.za/site/ And suddenly I felt human again.