iTunes is having a direct effect on my mental state at the moment. It’s clearly enjoying conjuring up memories and yelling a few 90s throwbacks at me. Anyway, this just played…and I remembered something.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDK9QqIzhwk]
This was our family theme song, growing up. We had quite a few, over the years but…the very moment I hear this song, I am seven years old again. I am in the car with my family. I have Tammy and Cheeky – my dolls and always-companions (siblings who refer to one of these as a word starting with a ‘b’ are slapped over the internet right now #familyjoke). I am jealous of girls with Barbie dolls and I have about a ten percent understanding of exactly what my folks are fighting. I am confused by my mom’s sadness and I have no idea why everyone else’s mom knits and she crochets (this is a true but funny euphemism, that sums up my mom entirely). I am thrown back to a time where I learnt to live in my head and a world of dressup and makebelieve. I am under my favourite tree with my friends and I am okay.
The moment I hear this song, I am there again. I may have been a confused seven year-old but dammit I knew my family loved me. I knew, like the feeling of my favourite jersey, that I was always safe. I knew that, no matter what life threw at my family, we’d be okay.
As the years rolled on, and we rolled with the punches life threw at us, I learnt how to deal. I witnessed strength. I was educated in the ways of integrity. And I learnt that family has nothing to do with bloodlines, and everything to do with love. I learnt that impossible is not a fact…it’s an opinion.
I hear this song now, and I am inspired. I am brought to my knees in gratitude. And I am even more determined than ever to make my daughter’s life dreams a reality. This song reminds me that absolutely nothing stands in the way of love.
As for my little family…we have a few themesongs. Maybe I’ll post them one day. Right now though, I know we’re singing them every day.