"Mr. Kelly, I'm having so much fun" Joshua said as he picked up the mic. Joshua is a student at Spring Valley school. He along with the other students were getting ready to perform "We're The Young" at the annual winter program at Spring Valley School. It's been 25 years since I wrote that song. It was for one of the very first shows I put together. So much has happened over those years. So many performances. So many kids.
What is amazing to me is that the kids at Spring Valley were just as excited about performing as that first group was. They were just as enthusiastic about "We're the young, we are something to believe in" as any others over the years.
There are some things that never change around the holidays. One of my favorites has become "we've lost the real meaning of Christmas". There is never a shortage of people who feel that something has been lost. To be honest, I'm a lot less sure about the real meaning of Christmas than I was when I was younger. Yet I still find the story of a child in the simple setting of a manger so compelling. Whatever the historical truth of that story might be (or might not be) there is no doubt that we do look at the young with the hope that our world will be a better place.
This is what I think about when Joshua tells me how much fun he is having when he is on stage. This is what encourages me to keep trying to share the gift of music with so many of my young friends. This is what makes me smile when I look at my own two children and encourages me to give them a chance so that I can that they won't let us down.
No comments:
Post a Comment