TH e SONG of CoURAGE
BY HOPE WINDLE
Recently my sister asks me
My teeth are chattering; I’m scared. This is fun!?
I’m stumped and can’t think of mine.
a long, bright orange and white tow rope with a foam handle bar. But they’re not really for me. I know he is the one who wants to ski. He attaches the line to the back of the outboard motorboat. The tide is high, the water quiet. These are the conditions best to ski in. He throws me the life jacket and says, “Buckle up!” Even now, all these years later, I can remember having goose bumps. I don’t want to do this but I do. Super awkwardly I put on the skis in the water. He gives me the signal. I nod. I keep the “tips up.”.He guns the engine and the motor boat snarls into a large roar and I am pulled hard. I am up. I am standing. I am moving really fast behind the boat.
, “What’s your fight song? What’s the song you sing when you’re nervous, or trying to be courageous?” She says, “Some people pick the kind of song you’d hear at the football stadium that gets EVERYONE pumped up.” (Cue:)We will. We will ROCK YOU! Or, she notes, for an old timer like me, it might be (Cue excerpt from Chariots of Fire:) Daaaaa Daaaaaaaaaaaaa daaaaaaaaa. Or recent courage seekers might pick: (Cue Katy Perry’s Firework:) Baby, you’re a firework Come on, let your colors burst Make ‘em go, “Aah, aah, aah” You’re gonna leave ‘em all in awe, awe, awe Or, for the timeless: (Cue the anthem from Rocky:) And then it hits me! I remember it. I wish I didn’t remember it. I didn’t mean for this to be my song. I must have been impressionable, susceptible to ear-worms and pop culture. It is so embarrassing. It started one summer when I was about 12. I’m with my parents and we’re on Martha’s Vineyard at a weekend house party, where I am younger than the rest of the gaggle of kids. We’re on a “lagoon,” which seems to me like an odd word for what this. I mean, the water is flat, and there isn’t a Loch Ness monster in it. But there are older boys present—Jay and Gardiner. To a pre-teen girl, older boys are as terrifying as monsters. The older boys have water skis and life vests. One minute they’re throwing on the vests, the next they’re fighting for the driver spot on the motorboat, a Boston Whaler. I watch another girl, Julie, put on the life jacket. With the skis on, she jumps into the water. Someone says to her, “Tips up!” She gives the thumbs up signal. She is ready! The motor boat snarls into a large roar and they are off, the boat off like a shot, and Julie pulled slowly, then fast, on two spindly legs propped up on skis skimming the water. When we get home, my dad gives me a birthday present I didn’t ask for: water skis, a life vest, and
My teeth are chattering; I’m scared. This is fun!? We’re going really fast. I don’t know if it’s to keep my legs straight or to help me hold onto this fast tow rope, but I start to sing in my head, my song, my song of courage just bubbles up from my inner gut. “Oh I wish I were an Oscar Mayer Weiner that is what I’d really like to beeee, and if I were an Oscar Mayer Weiner, everyone would be in love with me. I am not sure if you can claim your inner fight song. I wish I could. But I feel like this is the moment when mine claims me. This song. This stupid song. It’s not even a song! It’s a commercial, a jingle for god sakes! But it bubbles up in me whenever I am in a dark alley or on top of a really tall mountain or about to do something scary, like telling a true, embarrassing or revealing story on stage. Somehow it works. Don’t believe me? Why don’t you give it a try? Here we go. Tips UP! (Cue Oscar Meyer Weiner theme song:) Oh I wish I were Oscar Mayer’s Weiner. That is what I’d truly like to be. ‘Cause if I were Oscar Mayer’s Weiner, Ev’ryone would be in love with me. Hope Windle is ready to walk or write or draw into the valley of pain with you, now that you know “her” song. During the day, she works at SUNY Ulster as an Instructional Designer.
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