018 - Singing in the Shower

Several years ago I attended a volunteer day at the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center in idyllic Occidental California, because I had been told that their biodynamic gardens were among the most beautiful in the world. This turned out to be largely true, and I spent the day outside, a good part of it sitting beside a vegetable bed weeding it by hand as hummingbirds zipped through azure sky above me, the clip of their wings like feathered two-inch fighter jets. Sitting together about ten feet from me, and close enough that I could follow their conversation without straining, were two other volunteers, one of whom was a singing instructor.

At a certain point in their conversation, a propos of what I do not know, the singing instructor said to her friend, "Everybody can sing. Every single person I have ever met who thinks they cannot sing has been told by someone that they cannot sing."