Several years ago I was shopping at the GAP.  The music was playing.  I was handling the jeans.  The store was full.  Lots of chatter, motion.  Billie Holiday began singing “Stormy Weather.”  A young mother with her child stopped.  She told her daughter to settle down.  “Shhhhhh.”  The like-no-other singer gathered in my heart.  I put down the jeans.  The mother said to her daughter, “Just stop for a minute.  Just listen.  It’s important.”  She didn’t know I heard, but I felt it too.  And I stopped.  We listened.  Billie Holiday gathered us in the GAP.

It has stayed with me.  I hope I never forget the moment.  Just listen.  It’s important.  Oh, and it is.  It is so important.  Maybe now more than ever.  I hope that I, we, can take that time to just listen.  To your daughter’s dreams.  Your mother’s hopes.  The haunting tones of the music.  The thoughts of those around us, different and the same.  If we can feel it – what they are saying, thinking, feeling, seeing, creating, hoping… then we can be more understanding, forgiving, and maybe we can not only hear, but we can see… we can see through the storm…we can see that we have more in common than just our jeans…and oh when we see, with all of our senses, then we are living.  So today, just stop for a minute.  Just listen.  It’s important.