If you wanna sing out, sing out!

I love music of all kinds…on my iPod and Kindle I have worship music…Adele…Jimmy Buffet… Weird Al…my music tastes are eclectic and tend toward older stuff.

My favorite is Alison Krauss, with or without Union Station. I saw AKUS years ago. Clint bought me 4 tickets to see them in Branson and I took my friends Carolyn, Sherry, and Toni. We had a grand time. I drove and I discovered something about myself. When we would exit a parking lot onto the infamous 76 strip with its terrible traffic, I would nose my black Expedition out onto the road. I would make eye contact with who ever was driving toward me. Often it was a man and I would smile and say under my breath “he’s gonna let me in, he just doesn’t know it yet.” Then I would smile even bigger and wave my fingers at him and he would stop and let me in. Then I would pull out onto the road, smiling and mouthing thank you and getting a smile and wave in return. This caused great laughter around me. I didn’t see what was so funny, as this is the sort of thing I do all the time. I do the same thing when I’m walking into Walmart or the mall..I look toward a coming car and I smile and they slow and let me walk across. But it became a staple saying that weekend, every time we pulled out of a parking lot..”he’s gonna let me in, he just doesn’t know it yet.” we would say in unison and he WOULD let us in and we would smile and wave. Tis a fine thing to be a southern woman. I haven’t been to many other places. I wonder if it would work up north or would they think me a loon and honk at me and perhaps give me the finger. I shall try it someday and report back to you.

I think I like Alison Krauss because I can sing harmony with her. Her voice is so high, crystal and pure. I cannot sing as high as Alison, when I try it comes out shrieky and weird. My voice is low and untrained. My Preston side of the family can all sing or play instruments or both. The first time I went to a church as a child of 8 and a woman got up and sang and just BUTCHERED the song, just yelped and screeched and caterwauled as sometimes people do…no one will tell you not to sing if you are willing to get up there and do it..…I looked at my mother in HORROR and whispered “what is WRONG with her voice?”. She shushed me and I sat and listened, feeling almost sick to my stomach and embarrassed for the lady up there just a yelling away. I didn’t understand that not everybody could sing, not everybody sang with their sisters and brother while hanging clothes on the line or doing dishes.

I sing harmony along with Alison. It’s really my favorite thing to do, sing harmony and blend and make that sweet sound. I told people for years I was an alto and then I started singing in the choir at my church and realized to my chagrin that I do NOT sing the alto, I sing what I HEAR and it’s not the alto, it’s the tenor part OR the bass and baritone an octave up. This makes for a hard time for me singing in a structured choir, as my voice tends to be soulful and unruly and does it’s own thing. How do you know there’s an alto at the door? She doesn’t have the key and doesn’t know when to come in, goes the old joke. But I soldier on and fake my way thru the alto part, working very hard during choir practice, only to forget it due to nervousness and sing what I hear in my head. Sigh. Tis my lot. Sorry, Bro. Tim.

My children and I would sing whenever we drove anywhere and when you have young teenagers you drive them EVERYWHERE and so we would sing. “Jesus Freak” was a favorite and Casting Crowns…Tara doing the lead, Trevor doing the tenor, me intoning my weird, low harmony. We would get up and sing at church and people marveled at our harmonies and sound. Trevor hates to sing and will just about refuse to even practice with us. He’s content playing the drums with the band at church. But…his wife Mykka has a gorgeous voice and sang at Tara and Daniel’s wedding. I’m working on her now….she’s gonna let me in, she just doesn’t know it yet.

Tara can sing higher than me, I suspect that’s from her youth and practice. She sings with her husband Daniel. He plays guitar and leads our worship at church. The thing I like about worship songs is they are free-er, I can throw my head back and just sing my harmony like I want to. I can’t hit the notes I used to..not that they were all that high, but I could at least hit them. I can’t now, my voice seeming to get lower and lower on the register. I remember hearing my Granny Viv sing and she had that strange, low, beautiful sound. Perhaps that shall be me and someday my grandchildren will write about Granny Lichea and her weird voice and penchant for reptiles and all things sparkly.

So, today…while puttering around the house, picking up things and putting them back in their places…dusting and sweeping…I am harmoniously singing harmony with Ms. Krauss..



“this old house is falling down around my ears-

I’m drowning in a river of my tears-

when all my will is gone, you hold me sway-

I need you at the dimming of the day”

“Dimming of the Day”



That song is on her latest cd. The first time I heard it, I knew all the words. I really did. I searched my memory, but didn’t remember knowing that song at all. I even knew the harmony, when to rise and fall with her voice. I told Clint about it and asked if that ever happened to him, did he ever hear a song for the first time and know all the words. He looked at me like he always does, bemused… he reminds me of that dog that’s got his head cocked sideways listening to the old Victrola… and said “how would I know all the words to a song I had never heard before?” and I said “that’s what I’m asking! how do I know all the words?” I finally went and looked it up, finding out it came out in 1975. I would have been 5 years old. I found the original version, but it didn’t sound familiar to me at all. But, I must have heard it somewhere, sometime, and along with sitcom theme songs and my old home phone number, it nestled in my brain to be coaxed out by AKUS’s version.

Sometimes, I can’t quite find the note I’m searching for and I’ll try several, cringing when the harmony note I’m attempting is discordant and raw. But eventually, I’ll find one that fits and is pleasing. Tara and I have this thing we do where we start on one note and slide up to another note and we stay in harmony the whole time. We do this without practicing or knowing where we are starting. I can’t do this with anyone else, but I’m working on it with Mykka and we are making progress. I listen where Mykka’s voice goes and I follow. She’s gonna let me in, she just doesn’t know it yet.

Once, Tara and I were watching TV and there was a boring part on the show we were watching. At the very same time, we starting singing the same song, Tara doing the lead, me doing the harmony. It was a commercial jingle…”I am green today, like the cricket sounds” or something like that. It was the strangest, most wonderful thing. We laughed about it later and tried it again several times, always knowing the note the other was going to sing before it was sung. We demonstrated it for Clint. He said we sounded good, but I don’t know if he understood that we were, in essence, reading each others minds about the key we were going to sing in. Tara let me in, she just didn’t know it yet.

I find in my life, I sing harmony with everything I do. I rise and fall in the conversation and mood of my friends, finding the “thing” that balances and soothes and smooths. I shy away from discord, finding my spot to come in, finding the note that goes and makes it sound better. So, that’s me. I want to find a note, a spot, a place to come in and be harmonious to you. There are some people that I’ve tried to do this with and it didn’t work. This always leaves me confused and distressed. Some people refuse to let you sing with them, they WON’T let you in no matter WHAT note you try. I liken this to teaching a pig to sing. You waste your time and annoy the pig. There are so many people who will sing with me, loudly and with abandon. So I keep away from people who’s souls don’t sing with the same joy mine does. So, dear reader, I invite you to sing with me if you are able. Not with our voices, but with our lives, with our friendship and laughter. I must tell you, dear reader, as I smile and wave. You’re gonna let me in. You just don’t know it yet. 