"How Can I Keep From Singing?"
If you've read my previous SubStack posts or know me, you know that music is almost always around and about me, when I am high tiding. This is more metaphorical
”No storm can shake my inmost calm
while to that Rock I’m clinging.
Since love is Lord of heaven and earth,
how can I keep from singing?”
You may wonder, or maybe you don’t, why I post so many music videos within these daily Substack posts. It’s mostly because it’s how I think. A feeling, a thought, a disposition comes, and music is just there. It is often obvious why that song occurred to me in the context of that part of a day, but sometimes it is a more subtle connection.
But I promised that this would be a more metaphorical approach.
My former mentor, the Reverend Cedric Cobb, used to say this when he was especially happy (which happened a lot, so it was one of his most common expressions):
“My heart sings!”
You could see it in his face, his eyes, even the restless little movements of his body, like he wanted to lift off the ground and fly.
Partly I feel this way because it was a glorious weekend. The Forest Church workshop Saturday morning, a long hike with gorgeous views in the afternoon with a friend, relaxed time with my husband, and three lovely services and two choir practices at church, including a big confirmation service in the afternoon yesterday. It was lovely to see all the confirmands of many different ages and ethnicities along with their families, friends, and rectors, so excited about this next step in their journey of faith.
But it’s not just having had a delightful weekend. This has been a really wonderful year of renewal in my life. It began with me incorporating some needed changes in how I run my Kumon Math and Reading centre, and as a consequence, after nearly 30 years as a franchisee (my anniversary of opening my first Kumon centre in Outremont, Quebec is coming up in just over 3 months), I am enjoying what I do even more than I did in the early busy years of growing a centre to nearly 300 students before selling that business and relocating in 2010 to Hamilton, Ontario to marry my now husband.
Then, after a glorious Mozart Requiem performance I attended at Central Presbyterian Church on Good Friday, and savouring a light-filled Great Vigil service at Christ’s Church Cathedral Hamilton the next day, I became a part of the Cathedral choir and community. I’m sure you can see just by looking at the 12 thumbnails on the Cathedral’s home page of events happening this week just from Monday to Friday that this place is bursting with life and vitality 7 days a week, and those events are only the tip of the iceberg in terms of everything happening in the community.
I had really, really missed being part of a spiritual community, and it has been wonderful over these past six months to be in such a friendly and talented choir, and part of a church that has been deeply welcoming in ways I could never have imagined from previous church experiences of the gifts and talents that are most important to who I am as a person: contemplation, singing, and supporting others in community.
Finding new friends, one very special new one in particular, deepening friendships that I have had for years but hadn’t had the opportunity to really explore before, leading Taize again (if you’re local, hope you can join us November 2 at 4 pm!), co-leading Being With, and discovering a new path forward in the Commissioned Lay Missioner program offered through the Diocese with the other people in my cohort…
“How can I keep from singing?”
Hallelujah!