Why Lullabies?

(Print and image via PenPen Paper)

I’ll tell you a (slightly embarrassing) secret: One of my first dreams as a child was to be — no joke — a pop star. To croon and perform like my idols, Paula Abdul or Mariah Carey. (In their prime, of course.) I loved music, I loved to dance, and I loved to sing even more. Before majoring in journalism in college, I even followed that passion briefly and studied vocal music. Yet, like many people’s earliest dreams, my pop star ambitions didn’t come to fruition. (I don’t own a horse farm, and I’ve never been on an archaeological dig, either.) Life intervenes, plans change, passions evolve. At times I think that maybe I should get back at it and join a community choir. But for now I simply nurture that inner songstress with a jam sesh in the car… the shower… or any chance I have the house all to myself. And while I do still from time to time fantasize about what it would be like to have a gig and, you know, actually sing in public, I recently told my husband that all I really want is the undivided attention of an audience of one: To sing my baby to sleep with a sweet lullaby. It’s not glamorous and there will be no accolades, but it would be more than enough for me.

Somewhere, over the rainbow,

way up high

there’s a land that I heard of

once in a lullaby

Somewhere, over the rainbow,

skies are blue

and the dreams that you dare to dream

really do come true