The Lovers, The Dreamers, and Me

My children love for me to sing to them. My daughter, especially. She has even “named” the songs that I sing. Her favorite is “Leaving on a Jet Plane” which she has named the Taxi song.Most of the songs I sing to her are old seventies songs. (I know “big surprise”!) Basically, I sing her the songs that I used to sing when I was sitting in front of the speakers to my parent’s stereo (the one that included an 8-track). The songs that made Sunday afternoons special. The songs that fueled my dreams and allowed me to believe, as all children should, that I could do anything, be anything if I only worked hard enough. If I cared enough. If I I dreamed enough. So I love sharing these with my children.

Another of her other favorites is “The Rainbow Connection” — you know the song that Kermit sings at the beginning of “The Muppet Movie”. Now I should admit now that I love the Muppets. And that movie meant a lot to me growing up. The story of a rag-tag group trying desperately to get to Hollywood to fulfill their dreams didn’t just speak but sing to my heart. And I literally played the grooves off this song on the album, listening over and over. (Thank you Mom for not breaking the record over your knee!)

And like me with the well-worn LP, my daughter wants me to sing it again and again. And like the “Taxi” song, she knows the words. Sometimes, I stop singing just to listen to the words coming from her sweet lips. She doesn’t let me stop for long, but when she does I hear the song anew. And I am inspired. I am inspired for her but as I listen, I am inspired for me. It is a song about not believing the simple reality around you but believing the magic in your heart. It is a song about not giving up. It is a song about dreams. It is a song about believing in something bigger than you. I want that for my children but I want it for everyone. I want it for me.

I have heard the voices and I have heard them too many times to ignore them. I have heard them too many times to forget them, even when I wanted so desperately to do so. I have heard them too many times to believe those who told me that they weren’t real. So I may be a girl figuring out her life, but I still have my dreams and I think at the end of the day, that is the Rainbow Connection

Why are there so many songs about rainbows
And what’s on the other side?
Rainbows are visions, but only illusions,
And rainbows have nothing to hide.
So we’ve been told and some choose to believe it
I know they’re wrong, wait and see.
Someday we’ll find it, the rainbow connection,
The lovers, the dreamers and me.

Who said that every wish would be heard and answered
when wished on the morning star?
Somebody thought of that
and someone believed it,
and look what it’s done so far.
What’s so amazing that keeps us stargazing?
And what do we think we might see?
Someday we’ll find it, the rainbow connection,
the lovers, the dreamers and me.

All of us under its spell,
we know that it’s probably magic….

Have you been half asleep
and have you heard voices?
I’ve heard them calling my name.
Is this the sweet sound that calls the young sailors?
The voice might be one and the same.
I’ve heard it too many times to ignore it.
It’s something that I’m supposed to be.
Someday we’ll find it, the rainbow connection,
the lovers, the dreamers and me.
La, la la, La, la la la, La Laa, la la, La, La la laaaaaaa

Thanks, Paul Williams. Thanks, Kermit. And thanks to the late but great Jim Henson. I’m still dreaming thanks to you.