Joy - To Bring It, Sing It

Last Palm Sunday's service included the glorious soulful sounds of Dominion, a local gospel choir, singing a capella (meaning with no instrumental accompaniment, to you non chorus types)their joys and triumph over sorrows and about the importance of faith and living fully in the present moment.

For me, it was better than any sermon or morality play. I snapped up ten copies of their cd, recordings made by well meaning amateur techies during live shows so the quality of production wasn't up to studio standards and my sensitive ear had to be coaxed out of pouting about it. Nevertheless, I played that cd over and over in my car yesterday, as the rain lashed like a rod curtain across the freeways and metal car roofs, adding a nice percussive line. I started to belt out along with the singers and sure enough, little by little, my heart was leaping to a new beat and I felt a surge of gratitude for the beauty around me, for the hills of my new little home town, for being alive and this side of the petal-strewn spring rain-sodden ground.

To think that what we do or say has no effect on others is a great error. To experience joy through song in this simple way was remarkably exhilarating, freeing tangled parts of me in surprising ways. I felt a shocking surge of forgiveness and love that nothing else has been able to bring about so quickly. So now I know: when I need to bring on a sweet dose of joy, on purpose, like an aspirin for a headache, I'll just sing out loud to a gospel cd. Not sure how the Highway Patrol will view it, but I'll take my chances on getting a ticket for driving under the influence of joy.