Whitney
Yesterday, my son heard “I Will Always Love You” for the first time. He’s nearly two, and likes to spend some evenings standing at the window watching birds come into the garden and yelling, “Birds! Birds!” When they fly away, he often asks softly, in a lamenting tone, “more birds? More birds?” He suspects that I am in charge of, or at least that I have inside knowledge of the birds. In this way, last night was like any other.
But then, he heard her. When Whitney’s voice first emanated from our speakers, “If I…should stay…” he turned around slowly with a face of recognition and longing. From where did this beauty arise? Where have I heard this voice before? Is this the voice of my heart? He stood mostly still, except for what looked like a bit of involuntary swaying and a slight furrow at the brow during the saxophone solo.
Then it happened, that gorgeous moment when the song modulates up and Whitney triumphantly sings again, but in a way for the first time, “AND I-I-I-EEE-I WILL ALWAYS LOVE YOU!” He awakens as if from a dream! He takes a step and falls to the ground, hitting his head on the coffee table. He looks up at me from the floor and starts to cry, but before I can help him, he rolls his body in the same way a stunt double might lunge from a car. He pushes himself up and gets to his feet, tears still streaming from his face, as he begins to stomp and spin around and jut his hands up toward the ceiling, a tiny parishioner playing a game of catch-and-release with the Holy Spirit. By the time Whitney jumps the octave on “you” he is flailing his arms ecstatically. This, I understand from many hours observing my child, is dancing. When the song ends and Whitney’s voice disappears again into the heavenly realm from where it came, my son looks back at me, simultaneously exhausted and invigorated. “I know, my love,” I say. And I do.
What caused him to fall on the ground at that iconic moment in the song? Was it the fact that his feet are approximately 30% larger than they were the day before? Did he catch a toe on the corner of the rug? Or was he overwhelmed by the sudden knowing that true love is letting go of who you need the other to be, the role you think they should fill in your life? That true love is sustaining even in the absence of the one who is loved?
What gave him the strength to get up? Was it the possibility that, if we have the courage to sing through our brokenness, our love might outlive us? Was it the feeling that if he didn’t dance, if he didn’t throw his body in the direction of the music, that this beauty might break him?
Am I projecting?
