When I was home visiting my family a few weeks ago, the reason I went home was for my mom’s 50th birthday party. I hadn’t been able to get back to PEI from the North in a year and this was more than a better reason for me to visit.
The big surprise birthday present for my mom wasn’t me, she knew I was coming home, it was a 5 band concert that my brother planned for her. My family loves music and it’s a big part of our lives. My brother, who you may remember from his vegan posts, is an amazing musician and for a few years put on his own music festival. Over the past few years life has gotten busy and we haven’t had the festival and my mom loves it so much that my brother decided to surprise her with a small one with some of our close friends playing.
It figures that it was pouring rain the only day of my vacation home the day of the party, so we built her a stage with a roof and sides. Yup. Not only are we good looking and musically talented, we’re also handy.
The rain let up for about 25 minutes all night. It wasn’t fun but the fans stuck it out… for a while… We ended up having to move the party into the house, which wasn’t a big deal because we had a nice little area in the house that suited 3 to 5 musicians and mics and let everyone continue to rock out.
As much as I love music, I don’t sing or play for people. I can pick up the guitar a bit and strum by myself and I’ll sing with my brother with our close family and I do like to partake in playing Rock Band after about 12 beer, but I don’t get on stage and perform, especially not in front of strangers and I never have… Until this night.
On the drive out to our folks place my brother goes, “So what song are we singing together” knowing good and well that I do not sing for people. I laughed and said something to the effect of “yeah, f— you!”. He ignored me and said “How do you feel about ‘Lost in My Mind’ by The Head and The Heart?”. I told him there was no way in hell I was getting on stage and singing and once again he ignored me and proceeded to start to sing while we were driving. He looks at me to chime and and I do. We sang for about a minute and he stops and says “yup, that’s the one we’re doing”.
We didn’t practice the song for any more than that minute in the car while we were driving, so I just did a bunch of random harmonizing with him, but in my opinion, we aren’t half bad. It’s far from perfect but I’m glad Matt called me up on stage that night. Singing in front of people is one of my biggest fears. I don’t have faith in my own voice at all, but somehow he made me feel confident and got me up in front of people.
Singing with him really meant a lot to me and even though he may not know it, that night will be a memory that I’ll have forever.
What fear do you have? How can you overcome this fear? What is holding you back? What are you missing out on by not conquering this fear? I would never have this amazing memory if I didn’t suck it up and get over a fear of mine.
