A Bittersweet Song Punctuates A Perfect Weekend

K had the last six full days off; me – the last five. I’ve been working full steam ahead since I can remember and K’s been juggling two jobs and night school since October of last year. This weekend was the best time we’ve spent together in recent memory. I proudly shirked my blogging duties in favor of our going to the beach and napping. Then going to the beach again. Rinsing and repeating. We forgot about the clock and allowed our time to be earmarked by sunrises and sunsets.

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We saw our moms more in the past week than in the past two months combined.

I forgot about my laptop.

We ate ice cream whenever we felt like it.

We biked down the river path every other day.

And laid in the grass, under a cloudless sky with the cat sleeping soundly in a catnip bush outside our front door.

We listened to Mike Doughty and Soul Coughing CDs until they skipped.

And visited old family in Boston.

It’s times like these that give me pause to ask what the hell I’m thinking. How can I just up and leave all of this for two years? My girlfriend, my friends, my family, my job? How can I go it alone? And what will still be here when and if I came back? My family for sure, but what else? Contrary to what we may hope, the world doesn’t stop in our absence.

It was a bittersweet weekend to say the least. And yesterday, as my five day hiatus wound down, I stumbled across a video for a song that I hadn’t heard in a while – a song that still gives me the chills.

I can’t remember where I first heard Israel Kamakawiwo’s Somewhere Over the Rainbow/What A Wonderful World. I know it was a few years back. And I just couldn’t get it out of my head. Israel seamlessly weaves two of the simplest, most powerful songs about hope, promise, and the simple joys of life into one hauntingly beautiful track. I don’t get choked up easily and I’m not one to wear my heart on my sleeve. But honestly if there’s a more perfect, 4-Kleenex-worthy, bittersweet acoustic song, I missed it.

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