A Pattern in Music When MP3s Shuffle

Growing up in Detroit there was a radio program on WJR entitled “Patterns in Music”. Each Sunday morning a theme would be gently explored through song. Out walking with an MP3 player in hand and “shuffle” mode in gear I noted something probably far less than a pattern, but all the same a good reflection among a pairing of songs. “Many times I’ve been alone, and many times I’ve cried … anyway, you’ll never know the many ways I’ve tried … you left me standing here a long, long time ago …”

My first impulse was a very selfish and, I’d like to think, a very human one. I thought of people to whom I might like to express this sentiment. Then, in an instant, my focus changed as I considered the possibility that there might be someone that I’ve hurt who could easily recite and apply this lyric from the Beatles’ “The Long and Winding Road” to me. I wondered about people that I may have “left standing [t]here, a long, long time ago …” I thought about those to whom I may have been a cause of tears and disappointment. I thought about how hurt I have been by individuals that did not seem to appreciate or “know the many ways I’ve tried”, and then reflected on the discomforting likelihood that I, too, have unfairly discounted the many ways, unknown to me, that others have tried.

It was a good reflection for a walk on Memorial Day this 2011.

Then another lyric began “There are people in your life who've come and gone, they let you down and hurt your pride … better put it all behind you; life goes on, [if] you keep carrying that anger, it'll eat you up inside … I think it's about forgiveness …”

I realized what a cold, cold world it would be if everyone held grudges and no one said “I’m sorry”, truly. I realized what a cold, cold “world” some of my relationships had become because of my own unwillingness to apologize and my own unwillingness to forgive. Of course, I thought of songs that reflect on this theme of the difficulty in sincere apology. I came to appreciate one of the reasons saying “I’m sorry” and genuinely meaning it is so difficult is not so much in the speaking of the words, but rather in the acceptance of the unspoken intention … a taking possession of responsibility for having done wrong. That is a vulnerable place to be, often, in the heat of a moment at a time when, or with someone with whom we would least like to be vulnerable.

No one likes to admit to the shortcoming that having done wrong infers.

I was forced to reflect on the likelihood that some of those I had left “standing [t]here a long, long time ago” had forgiven me absent my sorrow … coming to terms with a wisdom that had eluded me, not for lack of repetition and awareness but for lack of character and maturity; that it is in forgiving that we, too, are forgiven.

Now, I suppose the whole “pattern in music” was blown as the strings of one Don Henley song faded into the irreverent quacking of “Disco Duck”, but that didn’t happen. Instead the music gave way to a momentary opportunity to reflect on the chance that we all are at some place on a long and winding road not intended to be rife with sadness and disappointment, but to be flowered with a richer happiness than we might dare to believe possible. I wondered how many times I’ve settled for something less. I came to reflect that some people are at places on that road that I have been and some are at places I may one day find myself. I was given an opportunity to recognize that the oftentimes scary task of presenting a genuine apology, with no expectation of reciprocation and with no certainty of how the other individual(s) will respond, is an opening to a far less burdensome way than the “rewards” of resentment, begrudging, bitterness, and blame.

I’m uncertain of the therapeutic value of noting this “pattern in music”, but it seems the long and winding road may be lined with the fruitful growth that forgiveness yields, or it may be littered with the hurtful waste that antagonism cedes.

Whatever the “pattern in music”, I was impressed by the possibility that forgiveness along the long and winding road is an option that largely influences the condition we are in when we arrive at where we are going … and we get to choose.