Yesterday afternoon my favorite curmudgeon told me, “They’re taking me to respite, tomorrow, at 10:00 a.m.”  I said, “I’ll come see you on Wednesday, after the commotion settles.”  He replied, “I’ll want to see you by then.”  I wasn’t sure I had heard him.  “Would you prefer I wait, to come visit?”  He raised his voice a bit.  “No, no.  Come tomorrow, come Wednesday.  I will want to see you.”  I told him I would be there; I told him I loved him.  He said, “I love you too, honey.”  I don’t know if he was crying but I most certainly felt tears on my own cheeks.

Last night my dear friend Cindy called to see how I felt.  She wanted to know more than just whether my heart still beat as it should; she wanted to know what pain sat on my soul.  We shared worries, we shared yearnings.  We connected with one another’s spirits and soothed one another’s anxieties, not just for the space of the call but beyond.

This morning, I drove to court in fresh sweet morning air, 76 degrees, the wind blowing through the open window of my car.  My cares hovered just below the surface.  I suddenly remembered a gathering in my senior year of high school — Ring Day, I think; or baccalaureate, possibly.  I know my mother attended.  The song played at that event as the seniors processed onto the stage resounded in my mind as I drove.  My cares receded, for a time at least, giving way to a resurgence of hope and belief.

Here I give you links to two different but equally marvelous renditions of the song, “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, from the musical Carousel, by Rogers and Hammerstein.  Enjoy.

The incomparable, original, Mahalia Jackson singing as you’ll rarely hear the song done:

Mahalia Jackson, “You’ll Never Walk Alone”

And I don’t usually like mix videos, but the singing on this is pure and clear, and k. d. lang has the voice of an angel:

k.d. lang “You’ll Never Walk Alone”