A lot has happened this week where I’ve had to process many happenings and memories.

This week really tested me. This week was a week to test your strength in brokenness: Loss of grandmother, intense paperwork, challenging work week, the birthday of a dear pup I lost a few years ago, insensitive people and poor behavior from others in all aspects of life.

However, the week also brought new light and reawakened love that had been dormant for a while. I am grateful I’ve been able to reconnect and reunite with two good friends who I hadn’t seen in a while. These two friends have played integral parts in aspects of my life over the past years and I am grateful we had the opportunity to reconnect and pour our hearts into each other over several glasses of whiskey, wine and coffee.

And this week, I also reawakened a love for music that had laid dormant in me for such a long time. And I have my singing instructor to thank for that.

Oceans (Where feet may fail) is a song that I’ve really been leaning into lately. It’s a song that I am working on with my vocal coach and it’s also a song that I had to REALLY lean into when I got word of my grandmother passing. It’s a mantra that I’ve had to follow to get through some less than ideal days.

I’ve been staring at the music and the lyrics for a while. When I practice singing, I practice with my instructor in front of the Piano yet I never touch it. I remember the burn of my first awful piano recital. I felt forever scarred by that moment that I’ve always been intimidated by the piano and always hesitated returning to it.

But last night, after a late evening out with friends and family, I retreated to the bedroom and started to play the song in my head to quiet my thoughts. Out of the blue, I had an odd inclination to pull out the sheet music and see if I could sync the notes with my fingers.  At 2am, I opened up the keyboard on the Garage Band app, opened up my sheet music and sat in bed toying with the keys.

Now granted, fumbling around on a virtual keyboard on a dinky iPhone is no true way to play a song. However, my fingers somehow found a way to nimbly tap and bounce from key to key to release a jarred combination of sound.

There was undoubtedly a flub in notes here and there. I also inevitably forgot a F sharp every other line. But after about a half an hour, my fingers were able to unleash an audible melody.

While the world was asleep at 230 am, I started to awaken a side of my brain and the music in my heart that I had left dormant and abandoned for so long.

I realize that the middle of the night is an odd time to reawaken old skills and an iPhone keyboard is not really instrument in purest form. Regardless, I am still excited and energized by the idea the thought that the song is not lost.

If it wasn’t for this fear busting project of conquering the fear of Karaoke, I wouldn’t have signed up for singing lessons.

If it wasn’t for singing lessons, I wouldn’t see a sheet of music again.

If it wasn’t for my instructor, I wouldn’t have been pushed to learn notes again.

If it wasn’t for courage and faith, the music may have died inside of me.

But it hasn’t.

And now that it has been reawakened, I’m going to do my best to feed the fire.

I’m NOT going to let the music die inside of me.

One day, I WILL sing.