Well, That Just Happened

Now that I’m not watching news on TV, there are only a few programs I record so I can view them at my leisure — and fast forward through the commercials.  One of those is America’s Got Talent.  And, indeed, America does have a great deal of talent. In the preliminary rounds, however, the talent ranges from OMG entrancing to, shall we say, erratic.  And there is always Simon Cowell, creator of the show and one of the four judges, who often adds a cynical edge to the proceedings.

Midway through one preliminary show a twelve-year-old girl was singing her heart out when Simon interrupted.

“Stop!” he practically shouted.  She was startled.  “The sound track you’re singing over is horrible.  Absolutely rotten,” he said.

The girl didn’t know what he wanted, or how to proceed, so she ran to the side of the stage.  I couldn’t tell if she was going to regroup, or abandon her singing career, perhaps forever.

Then, almost offstage, she said to herself, “Well, that just happened.”  Then she turned around and marched right back to the center of the stage.

“Start your song again, please.  This time acapella.  No soundtrack,” Simon said.

After a brief pause, she began the song again, and she sang well.  She sang so well that each of the four judges, including Simon, voted her into the next round.

We each have moments, such as this, which are turning points.  In one of my favorite plays, The Rainmaker, the deputy sheriff is divorced and lonely.  In perhaps the most poignant line of the play he says that when his wife was walking out he knew that if he just told her he needed her and asked her to stay, she would.  But he was ashamed to ask.

In the movie We Bought a Zoo the father is counseling his teenage son about asking a girl to go on a date.  “You know, sometimes all you need is twenty seconds of insane courage,” he says, as he tells his son about the first time he saw the boy’s mother sitting in a coffee shop.

Whether it’s living in the moment as with the young singer, an opportunity to be vulnerable and speak your truth as with the deputy sheriff, or twenty seconds of insane courage that the father shared with his teenage son, at pivotal times we all face a wonderful chance disguised as a scary choice.

In these moments it’s easy to flinch and miss the best opportunity of a career, or for a loving relationship.

Or, we can follow the example of the twelve-year-old singer. We can forget what seems to be rejection as well as our own fear, live in the moment, and recognize, as she did, “Well, that just happened.”  And then move on.

We might remember the words of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in his first inaugural address delivered in the midst of the Great Depression.  FDR said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

Alan