My friends Cara, Petra and Pascal went out to dinner with me last night at Urfa on the Sleepstraat.  We talked easy, we laughed and Cara gave me a Christmas gift – a t-shirt that says “I’m not old … I’m classic”.  I’ve always wanted to be classic!

When the group of us go out, Pascal has the bad habit of paying for everything.  Not last night.  As I got up to go to the bathroom, I looked fiercely at him and said “Don’t you dare pay while I’m gone!” 

I paid.

After dinner we walked over to Salvatore’s on Sint-Salvatorstraat, where I would be singing a song.  I loved that my friends were coming to hear me but their presence also scared me.

I talked about being nervous.  Petra said she admired my courage, and told us a story.  As an 11-year-old, she had to stand in front of her classmates and sing a song.  Afterwards the teacher told the kids that the lowest mark she gives for the singing is 2 out of 5.  Petra received a 2 … and never sang in public again.

Teachers are so important.  They have the power to lift up a child or to squish them.  I’m sad that Petra had to experience this.

I stood in front of twenty people at Salvatore’s and told them a story.  A Buddhist monk announced that he was going to die soon.  The students sitting in front of him lowered their heads in despair, some of them crying.

Suddenly a voice was heard – someone laughing wildly.  It was the monk.  “I could die tonight!”  Shock and awe from the devotees.

Then I sang “The Parting Glass”.  The monk’s story has inspired me for years.  Slowly I’ve realized that as my moment of death approaches, I want to sing this song for my loved ones.

It’s a goodbye, where my friends are raising a glass to me, and I to them, and all of us to life.

I sang.  I felt the tenderness of dying.  I met faces.  I reached faces.

And I sang the last line as if I was breathing my last …

Goodnight and joy be to you all

***

I did it … with a little help from my friends