Selfish and Part Time Lovers

Music – It chisels us in an unusual way, leaving behind its marks on our psyche and revealing its affect on our character.  Character, thankfully, can be reshaped but sadly it can manifest as frozen prisoner entombed within a cold stony heart sculpted and buried by a series of life experiences.

I found a song quite by accident on YouTube today.  The song “we’ll sing in the sunshine” {Gale Garnett} was a monster hit in the mid 60s.  Multitudes of people liked, or identified with this song on some level.  Why I wonder?  Did they (whether male or female) relate to the ideology of this song?  Or perhaps they were victims of a person who is like the subject she sings about?

This song really made me think.  I remember singing the chorus over and over as a child.  I think it must have been a record owned by my parents because at the time it was released, I was only 11 years old.  My young mind didn’t comprehend the meaning of the song way back then.  I simply loved the melody, and I thought the song was about happiness and sunny days.   However this morning when I listened to it,  I really “heard it” for the first time, and frankly,  I felt sad.  Her lyric “DON’T CLING TO ME” is telling.

Gale’s owns words about her song:  She considered the song “a happy approach to personal independence.”

As I listened afresh to the words of this song, I thought about the thoughts and emotions embodied in her music.  Where did those thoughts and emotions come from I wonder?  Did her Daddy really raise her this way?  If we believe the lyric then we have to assume her family life was not all that happy.   Another alternative would simply be that she was a selfish “taker” who simply would not ever give enough of herself to make a lifetime commitment to any man.  Further, if she had become selfish, why?  What hurt caused this flaw in her character?  There is, of course, the possibility that there was no personal motivation but rather just words on paper which held no personal meaning for her, but I doubt that.  She could have just been writing about what she saw mirrored around her in other people’s relationships.  In any event it is a song which bypasses the superficial revealing the emotions within.  The song could be about a woman or a man, but certainly it is about misshapen love.  The lyric reflects the inner reality that in ones inability to truly give, one misses the blessing of receiving as well.

So, I wonder, what happens to people like Gale sings about in this song?   What kind of women or men are they really?  Do they continue to “sing in the sunshine”?  Do they laugh every day?  Do they go through life wearing men (or women) like seasonal clothing, tossing them aside when done?   How does it REALLY feel when the relationship ends?   Did either or both sides continue to sing in the sunshine?  They won’t promise lifetime fidelity, they will only promise to stay with you for a “set time”.  They’ll promise to sing to you, but only in the good times.  They promise right up front to merely be fair weather friends.  The question is rhetorical of course, for we all can guess what the future holds for these types of people.

And yet I wonder, what ever became of Gale Garnett?  What kind of woman was she really?  Did she continue to “sing in the sunshine”?  Did she laugh every day?  Did she go through men like yearly coats, tossing them aside when done?    I’ll bet we could find some clues in her books, because like songs, books are written from the overflow of our hearts.  The mind of the author often draws on and creates (true or fiction) largely from life experiences and/or imagined realities.

I wonder, now that she is older and hopefully wiser, what would Gale say to the world through her music now.  I hope she is still singing, and that the sun is still shining in her life, but I hope she is not the embodiment of the lyric in the song, but rather has known true love in her life and been able to give as well as well as receive life’s greatest gift, unselfish love.

Yes, the “cost” of love is dear.  It’s a cost that demands the highest sacrifice.  It’s a love where we must consistently put the needs of another above our own.  It is a cost talked about down through the ages as the highest love one can have for another.  It’s a “laying down our life” kind of love, expecting nothing in return.  It is a never ending unfailing love.

Finally:  This is not a “judgment” on Gale Garnett, her song merely got me thinking about the damage that can be done to our lives when we believe the “lies” of a person (like our dad) whom we respect.  In our young and impressionable minds we can not possibly reason through what they are teaching us by their own words and/or behavior.  And so the die is cast so to speak setting the foundation for future relationships.  We are then left to uncover, and begin the tedious [hard] work of healing damaged emotions.

Think this is all “stuff and nonsense”?  Think again.  Think honestly.  Think about your own experiences with music.  Did it lift you up?  Or did it pull you down to a level you’re not really proud of?

About the composer.  Gale Garnett was 22 years young when she wrote We’ll Sing In The Sunshine.  It was her own composition, and this is what makes me wonder about what ever happened in Gale’s future life since she penned this song.

Wikipedia tells us:

She was from New Zealand, and debuted in 1960, and subsequently signed by RCA records in 1963.  Her monster hit We’ll Sing in the Sunshine is her claim to fame.  She is still alive and has had subsequent albums and is a published author.  She only had one other [subsequent] hit song called Lovin Place.  She peaked in her musical career in the mid 60s.  She starred in the hit movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002).  Hmmm I thought Aunt Zoe looked familiar.  At her peak (like most current celebs) she was sought after for T.V. appearances which were mostly in the 60s and then trickled down through the decades that followed.   Her latest T.V. sighting was 2005.

The latest I could find on her was that she is a published author.  Her published works are as follows:

• Visible Amazement [1999 – Romance] About The seduction of a 14 year old girl
• Transient Dancing  [2003] – About 3 African American men
• The Novella Room Tone [2007] – About Film and Film making in California
• Savage Adoration [2009] – About Family greed after the reading of a will

HERE IS GALE in October 2009

LYRICS – WE’LL SING IN THE SUNSHINE

PART TIME LOVERS:  This song is just more of the same “Selfish Love”.

Excerpt of Lyrics:
Strangers by day, lovers by night, knowing it’s so wrong but feelin so right
Undercover passion on the run, chasing love up against the sun