I watched the horses run, wild and free and unmoving across the stretched canvas. A young one, somewhere between foal and colt, led the small herd, her gangly, undeveloped limbs at odds with her dominance.    Wonder if that one is still alive.   I didn’t know when the picture had been taken…any longer than a couple of decades back would mean that most of the herd were already gone. But maybe the young one had escaped the confines of color and paper into the wildness of her being, the small streak of white between her eyes now a full blaze still bleeding into her chestnut forelock.    I once spent an April afternoon with a little girl and her family. We had become connected through my For The Sender project, after her mom handed me a bundle of letters after a show. Those letters inspired songs and stories, which made their way into the second For The Sender book and album.   The family invited me over one Easter Sunday, and the little girl was full of joy, dancing and singing along with the songs I played in the backyard. She was the light of her mother’s life. Everyone’s, really.   A handful of days ago, that light went out.   Yesterday, a friend sent me an older video of that little girl singing along to a For The Sender song called ‘Never Alone.’ She’s in her car seat, swaying and pointing at her mom as she yells the words.   I would never leave you I would never leave you Even in your pain  You are never alone    I think that song has it both right and wrong. Right, because the light of her physical presence is gone, but she’ll burn forever in the hearts of those who loved her, and in this way, they’ll never be alone.   And wrong, because she did leave. She’s with that young horse now, having both escaped the confines of color and paper into the wildness of their being, the small streak of white between their eyes now a full blaze still bleeding into their chestnut forelock.    I watched the horses run, wild and free and unmoving across the stretched canvas.   Be free, Skyla.   Wild and free.

I haven’t been on the InstaTwitFace in quite a long time. Folks in my ecosystem know this, and every so often they’ll send me whatever rare gem they might find in that wasteland of digital dystopia.

Like today.

The video is short and shaky, shot across a Nashville airport bar at 9am. A bubbly bartender dances around the foreground, shadowing the only two people at the bar, a man and woman both on their phones. And behind them, the sterile terminal light frames travelers passing by an internal window, extras in a scene played countless times every day. 

In the no-man’s-land between the window and the bar, a young man plays a guitar in front of a microphone, like so many of us do, in what we believe is the requisite paying of dues to get somewhere other than where we are. 

The corner of the coffee shop in the early afternoon, where no one is listening. The club on a Tuesday night, where no one is listening. The airport bar at 9am, where no one is listening. 

The man takes a call and moves away, and now we see that there’s not just one person at the microphone.

There’s two.

The singer has his hat turned backwards and is standing off to the side of the mic, as if he just walked up there.

Which he probably did, on his way to somewhere other than where we are. I’m guessing he saw this guy playing guitar in the corner, and asked if he knew a particular song.

A rhetorical question, because this singer is a legend in the musical circles that matter, his imprint deep on songs we’ve all likely heard.

Like the one he’s singing now, a #1 Billboard hit, accompanied by an aspiring singer-songwriter whose barely-contained incredulity suggests he just won the lottery. 

These moments are all around us, if we look up every once in a while.

Like in an airport bar at 9am, where no one is listening.