And we began to sing, "Why should I feel discouraged? Why do the shadows fall? "And Ranola watched Ken rather skeptically for a moment, and then her face began to melt and contort like his, and she went to his side and bent down to lift him up — lifted up this white rag doll, this scarecrow. She held him next to her, draped over and against her like a child while they sang. And it pierced me. I can't image anything but music that could have brought about this alchemy. Maybe it's because music is about as physical as it gets: your heartbeat; your essential sound, the breath. We're walking temples of noise, and when you add tender hearts to this mix, it somehow lets us meet in places we couldn't get to any other way.
The most important work can be birthed from the place where uncomfortable silence seeps between us. In those
moments we're faced with the decision of whether to respond immediately with the assuredness of our truth or to let the
silence work in us. To feel the sadness and anger and grief. To be reminded
that there's more at work in the story of the other ...
