| Always on Your Side |
In the warm and sunlit summer of 2006 my mother and father flew to Europe to attend my wedding in Belgium. A
month later they threw a second reception for us in Bellingham. How lucky I am to have such loving and
supportive parents, and to have had them with me to celebrate the most important moments of my life. Nothing
can match the sheer enthusiasm and energy of my father, nor the quiet strength of my mother, and the knowledge
since earliest childhood that in life she will always be on my side.
I have not lived with them since 1982, and indeed have lived on a different continent since 1987. That distance
has often been difficult, but became especially hard to bear when my mother was diagnosed with cancer in the fall
of 2006. We altered Thanksgiving plans to spend time with her in November. But how difficult it is to break from
routine life and express what is going on in the heart! How can love be held in the mind and expressed in simple
everyday words?
I feel tongue tied on the telephone, and family get-togethers seem to turn into the assemblies of go-getters they
always have been, with my mother the perpetual nurturer, a lady somehow overlooked among all the Reay men
Junior Woodchucks. For Mother's Day 2007 I put some songs on a CD, some of which I have long associated
with my mother, some of which so captured the essence of our relationship I was left breathless and in tears the
first time I heard them. These are some of the texts from that playlist. Songs about my mother and me.
month later they threw a second reception for us in Bellingham. How lucky I am to have such loving and
supportive parents, and to have had them with me to celebrate the most important moments of my life. Nothing
can match the sheer enthusiasm and energy of my father, nor the quiet strength of my mother, and the knowledge
since earliest childhood that in life she will always be on my side.
I have not lived with them since 1982, and indeed have lived on a different continent since 1987. That distance
has often been difficult, but became especially hard to bear when my mother was diagnosed with cancer in the fall
of 2006. We altered Thanksgiving plans to spend time with her in November. But how difficult it is to break from
routine life and express what is going on in the heart! How can love be held in the mind and expressed in simple
everyday words?
I feel tongue tied on the telephone, and family get-togethers seem to turn into the assemblies of go-getters they
always have been, with my mother the perpetual nurturer, a lady somehow overlooked among all the Reay men
Junior Woodchucks. For Mother's Day 2007 I put some songs on a CD, some of which I have long associated
with my mother, some of which so captured the essence of our relationship I was left breathless and in tears the
first time I heard them. These are some of the texts from that playlist. Songs about my mother and me.
Songs about my mother and me
Always on your side - Sheryl Crow
My yesterdays are all boxed up, and neatly put away. But every now and then you come to mind.
'Cause you were always waiting to be picked to play the game,
but when your name was called, you found a place to hide.
When you knew that I was always on your side.
But everything was easy then, so sweet and innocent.
But my demons and my angels reappeared.
Leaving only traces of the man you thought I'd be.
Too afraid to hear the words I'd always feared.
Leaving you with only questions all these years.
Is there some place far away, some place where all is clear?
Easy to start over, with the ones you hold so dear?
Or are you left to wonder, all alone eternally? This isn't how it's really meant to be!
They say that love is in the air. Never is it clear how to pull it close and make it stay.
Butterflies are free to fly, and so they fly away. And I'm left to carry on and wonder why.
Was it you that kept me wonderin' through this life?
Even through it all, I'm always on your side.
My yesterdays are all boxed up, and neatly put away. But every now and then you come to mind.
'Cause you were always waiting to be picked to play the game,
but when your name was called, you found a place to hide.
When you knew that I was always on your side.
But everything was easy then, so sweet and innocent.
But my demons and my angels reappeared.
Leaving only traces of the man you thought I'd be.
Too afraid to hear the words I'd always feared.
Leaving you with only questions all these years.
Is there some place far away, some place where all is clear?
Easy to start over, with the ones you hold so dear?
Or are you left to wonder, all alone eternally? This isn't how it's really meant to be!
They say that love is in the air. Never is it clear how to pull it close and make it stay.
Butterflies are free to fly, and so they fly away. And I'm left to carry on and wonder why.
Was it you that kept me wonderin' through this life?
Even through it all, I'm always on your side.
A Whole New World - Peabo Bryson
I can show you the world, shining shimmering splendid.
tell me princess, now when did you last let your heart decide?
I can open your eyes, take you wonder by wonder, over sideways and under, on a magic carpet ride.
A whole new world! A new fantastic point of view!
No one to tell us no, or where to go, or say we're only dreaming.
A whole new world! a dazzling place I never knew.
But now from way up here, it's crystal clear that now I'm in a whole new world with you.
Unbelievable sights, indescribable feeling! Soaring, tumbling freewheeling through an endless diamond sky.
A whole new world! (don't you dare close your eyes)
A hundred thousand things to see (hold your breath, it gets better!)
I'm like a shooting star, I've come so far I can't go back to where I used to be.
A whole new world with new horizons to pursue. I'll chase them anywhere, there's time to spare.
Let me share this whole new world with you.
A whole new world, that's where we'll be. A thrilling change, a wondrous place for you and me.
I can show you the world, shining shimmering splendid.
tell me princess, now when did you last let your heart decide?
I can open your eyes, take you wonder by wonder, over sideways and under, on a magic carpet ride.
A whole new world! A new fantastic point of view!
No one to tell us no, or where to go, or say we're only dreaming.
A whole new world! a dazzling place I never knew.
But now from way up here, it's crystal clear that now I'm in a whole new world with you.
Unbelievable sights, indescribable feeling! Soaring, tumbling freewheeling through an endless diamond sky.
A whole new world! (don't you dare close your eyes)
A hundred thousand things to see (hold your breath, it gets better!)
I'm like a shooting star, I've come so far I can't go back to where I used to be.
A whole new world with new horizons to pursue. I'll chase them anywhere, there's time to spare.
Let me share this whole new world with you.
A whole new world, that's where we'll be. A thrilling change, a wondrous place for you and me.