The Days I Had A Voice

On my car ride home tonight, I realized how much I miss my singing days.  I remember how honored I'd feel when I was able to belt out a tune in front of an audience and leave them in awe by the end of the show.  I remember the amount of times I was June Carter Cash in a smokey bar room filled with rowdy bikers.  By the end of the night, the bar would be silent.  Yes, it's true, 4'10 with a voice like that.

I pride myself on my voice.  The strength and emotion I can pour into any song I sing gives me satisfaction of knowing I can empathize.  I can empathize with the singer I am portraying for the few moments I sing their song.  People can empathize with me when they watch me sing it because they know I sing from my heart.

I remember a song I sang a few years back.  I can't remember where it was but it was for the fallen soldiers in Iraq as the war started to heat up.  A lot of the people in the room at the time were either veterans or had relatives and friends fighting the war and by the time I was done singing, there wasn't a dry eye in the room.

They say you can tell a singer by the way they talk.  A singer talks from the stomach, where a normal person talks from the chest.  But I know I sing from my heart, no matter what the song, written by me or otherwise, I sing from every bone in my body to every ear willing to listen and every heart willing to feel.  I sing for every mind willing to analyze and every eye willing to dampen and every soul willing to enlighten.

I don't know why I stopped singing.  I guess life got ahead of me and got in the way of what once was a passion of mine.  I saw myself singing at the Grand Ol' Opry one day...being on the big stage with the big lights.  I know I didn't do it for a reason and the reason I feel I've yet to discover it at times.  Could I have really lived on a tour bus?  Jumping from hotel room to hotel room?  Never calling a house a home?  I don't think so.  I'm way too stable and quiet of a person to live such a lifestyle.  But it is still nice to dream.  It's nice to remember the days when I'd bring in a few hundred dollars on a Friday night for singing a few tunes and enlightening a few people.

Maybe I'll get back into my bar room singing.  Yeah, call it trashy, call it what you want, but it's so nice to see the looks on peoples faces when I step out and slowly bring a different aura to the bar room, an energy it had never seen before.  Now that I'm thinking about taking guitar lessons from my boss, maybe I won't have to get a guitarist and worry about another person singing with me.  Maybe I can start writing my own songs again and give people a reason to listen to my music.  Maybe I'll make someone's day by singing something they relate to.  Maybe, just maybe, it'll be you...