I spoke in my last post about taking some time out and I haven’t really. I spent January getting ready for my online gig last Sunday, and was out singing for people. Working on some new songs for it. Takes time and work every day to get my technique around it and it into my body, and then I did my sound checks (‘testing, testing, one, two three’), and then went on to do the whole concert with the backing tracks too loud. People were telling me too but when I picked up my phone in between songs, all I saw was ‘nice, lovely, etc…… and missed the comments during the song of people telling me it was too loud. In the room it was a good balance. I was really happy with how I sang too and the energy I created, so I was not in a good mood all night. It was a lovely concert apart from that so I was really pissed off. My friend in America sent me some screenshots of it.
But I know it’s just a first world problem. People said they enjoyed it, but it was how I felt. Soooooooo disappointed, but life carries on. Not the end of the world. Live and learn. Since then, I’ve been really busy. People asking me to sing on their doorsteps. Birthday visits, little concerts, doing what I can to uplift people. I did one yesterday in bitter temperatures.
What I’ve realised is that people are really getting sick of what’s going on now. If they are willing to come out in below freezing temperatures then it really is saying something. All the street came out where I was yesterday. We created some magic together for 35 mins. It was great. Then I went somewhere else to sing to do the same thing. People came outside their door. Their own front door and someone called the police. I mean ffs. Gets a bit over the top. Standing out in freezing temperatures to have a bit of normality and someone calls the police. I don’t care. I know what I am there to do. I function from my heart for people. My job is to help and be of service, and that’s what I will carry on doing. The police guy was nice. Came and had a chat, told me they have to respond to a call, and that he knows me from Todmorden (wasn’t in Tod), and that it is nice what I do. Good. It could have been worse. I don’t see anything wrong in what I am doing. Creating smiles and helping people. I love it. I sang outside an old folks home in Sheffield.
Got lovely comments back at how much it helped people. I did little birthday visits and had a bit of a chat too and was told how much it helped. I get so many comments from people saying how much it lifted them. Last Sunday I sang in Bacup as a surprise birthday visit. It really was freezing. I couldn’t feel my hands at the end, but the neighbour of the lady I was singing for came out too and just needed to chat. She said she has spent virtually a year on her own and felt desperate at times. Her husband died a couple of years back and she said that she wondered how to carry on sometimes. She said hearing me had helped her to keep going and she felt better. I’m not trying to gratify myself here. ‘Oh, get me everybody, aren’t I amazing’. No. I hear comments like this and it breaks my fucking heart (sorry to swear but you have a passionate woman here). I went to two warden controlled sets of apartments too and was told some of the people have not left their houses all year and are now too scared to go outside. I mean, if that doesn’t seem wrong to you then I just don’t know anymore. Our mental health matters and we are not prisoners in our own homes.
I basically haven’t stopped since May of last year and it’s been amazing. Learning to function from a new place. To come right from the heart, to serve others and to step into my true role. Honestly, if you have that in life you are rich beyond your wildest dreams. It’s like having a continual glow in my tummy of light. I also sang for a dementia radio programme too this week. Had a good chat with the lady who does it. I think it’s a fantastic idea and it’s the second one I’ve done now. All about hopes and dreams. I am a dreamer. I’ve never settled and said ‘this is my lot in life’. I carry on striving for what my gut tells me is coming. It’s in there, literally giving me the drive to carry on, to keep going, to keep reaching for the stars. To fulfil the mission I came here to do.
I had some guy I had met one time in Lytham (who became a bit of a stalker) post some really negative stuff on my Facebook page. I’m glad I am strong enough to see it says more about him. Telling me I will never make it because ‘I’M JUST TOO BLOODY UGLY!’ Oh well, even if I am (never been the prettiest person alive), I have beauty from within. I’ll never be the greatest singer either. Who cares. I will spread my light and that’s what I came here to do….some friends said to me ‘you must be getting somewhere to get posts like that’. Ha ha.
I’m getting some music arranged too by Stuart, the guy who helped me to put my Julie Andrews show together. He lives in Nice. I probably would have taken a trip out to see him there but right now we have to do it down the phone. I want a medley from ‘Oklahoma’ putting together to send to Prince Philip and the Queen later this year for Prince Philips birthday.
That’s what my letters were about and he has said I can send a video to him if I would like (I offered the gift to sing for him), so this is what I am able to do. Apparently they fell in love to the musical ‘Oklahoma’ so that will be the main theme of it with some classical stuff too. Just a short video, but at least I never stop trying. I continually put myself out there and go into things that get me out of my comfort zone. It was nerve wracking writing to them but they both replied and now I will send a video.
I’m singing somewhere today and somewhere on Tuesday and I have a few other things going on but I am going to take a break for a week. No singing. No practising, no thinking about it. Just real time out. I need it. I really do need a break now. Time to recharge, and to get back to myself. I don’t know how to move forward in general now and I don’t care really. I’m not sitting worrying about it. I have a really strong faith inside me and a ball of strength in my gut so I know I will do stuff. I haven’t been worried this whole time, but some time out will do me good too. No use to anyone if my own batteries are not filled up. Put my own oxygen mask on first.
I’ve created so many bonds with people in the last year. This time last year I had laryngitis for four weeks before I did my ‘A Spoonful of Julie’ in Bury. I was in a state of sheer panic worrying whether my voice would come back in time. I had no money and thought for the first time in my life that I didn’t actually have enough to pay the people I had to pay, and had to cancel work because I couldn’t sing still. I had sound guys and a video guy coming to film my show for a demo that would be costing me £2000 and I had no voice. I never want to go through that stress again. I cleaned a friends kitchen and used chemical sprays and I lost my voice from it for four weeks. I can’t stand chemicals around me now. I feel them in my throat straightaway. So this last year has been different to what I expected. My demo has never really been used after spending so much money on it. My life has gone in a totally different direction. I feel more in my heart from it and less in the ‘real’ world we live in. This is my real world now. I know who I am now and what I truly stand for. I’m waffling now. I’ve said these things before so I’ll shut up and leave you to get on with your day. If you want me to sing anywhere and for anyone, just get in touch. It’s what I do and what I love to do……..lots of love to you all….
07838360195 (I like personal contact when people ask me to sing).
About the Grayston gig, it was only 1 or 2 of the songs towards the end where the track was a bit too loud, the rest was perfick sound balance & otherwise, just sayin! Thank you so much for tuning in & out (a bit like breathing, ebb & flow both necessary) and keeping on your path. There’s only one way of life and that’s your own. Biiiig love to you awesome woman, more power to you & other folk with hearts as big, minds as wise and wills as strong and focused as yours.