Seven Years by Norah Jones
Spinning, laughing, dancing to her favorite song | A little girl with nothing wrong is all alone | Eyes wide open always hoping for the sun | And she'll sing her song to anyone that comes along | Fragile as a leaf in autumn | Just fallin' to the ground without a sound | Crooked little smile on her face | Tells a tale of grace that's all her own | Fragile as a leaf in autumn | Just fallin' to the ground without a sound | Spinning, laughing, dancing to her favorite song | She's a little girl with nothing wrong and she's all alone | A little girl with nothing wrong and she's all alone
(You can listen to the song here.)
Fragile | (c) M.M. Hewitt 2014 Downloading this image for any use without written permission is strictly prohibited.
This song was more or less my personal "anthem" while in late high school and all through college. There are many facets of its lyric that spoke to me on different days in different ways. Even now, even when I'm surrounded by the family I have created, I still feel this song is about me.
But really this song is about all young women, women, older women and of course seven year old girls. There is a fragility to our gender. And not in the way one usually thinks of fragility. Our bodies don't break down as easily as history has recorded. As a living organism we are very strong. Our fragility is hidden within ourselves, in the way we think of ourselves, our self worth. Our gender is the hardest on ourselves. We feel the most self loathing, either because we don't look like so-and-so on the cover of what's-it-what's-it magazine, because we aren't stacking up to whatever ridiculous Pinterest pinboard of organization and self-revamping we have created, or whatever it is. All we want is to be ourselves and yet we feel that we have to be whatever everyone else wants of us. And inevitably we find ourselves in a paradox where the world is telling us to do just that, be ourselves, and then we still find loneliness whenever we are being just that. And as before we are mired again in self-loathing.
There is nothing wrong with you, us. All we want as women, girls, females, is to share our song without criticism, either from others or ourselves.
What is it that you want to share with the world?
Whose "song" can you listen to?