On Love and Music

I read a great post over at Holy Experience about some of her reflections on love and marriage, in honor of her anniversary. She referred to John Denver's classic song, Annie's Song. I had to go over to You Tube and watch the video, as that is a song I love-- a song that takes me back to my own childhood.

I watched a documentary on John's life and they interviewed Annie. She talked about "her song" and how one day she was in some foreign country and they were playing the song in that language over some loudspeakers, and how surreal that was to her. I wondered what that must have felt like for her to know that something that was so private had become so public. Her song has become so many people's song.

I grew up on John Denver and Jim Croce. I will never forget an interview I heard with Jim's wife, as she talked about the song "I'll Have To Say I Love You In A Song." (I apologize for the lame link but it was the best I could find.) She said that they had had a fight about something and he had struggled with telling her his feelings for her. She had gone to bed angry and he had stayed downstairs. Much later he woke her up, sat down on the bed and played that song for her on his guitar. Again, I wonder what that must feel like for that private moment between them to become so public through that song's release. I have never heard that song the same way since I heard the story behind it.

I wonder for both those women what it is like to go through life with those men now gone, still hearing their voice, still living with the evidence of their love for them for all the world to know. I'm thankful they were willing to share.