My New Song
The sting of unreciprocated support and the expectations we carry for our art.
Sheila was complaining to her friend Rose that their mutual acquaintances, players in the Nashville music scene that they all inhabited, had not taken more of an interest in her latest song.
“But Bob said he liked it,” Rose said, playing devil’s advocate. “You told me that.”
They were having scones. The café bustled with people grabbing takeaway coffees. A line snaked out the door. It was noisy in that cheerful café way and they had to raise their voices a little to be heard.
“Yes,” Sheila agreed. “But he didn’t love it. And he didn’t … he didn’t do anything.”
Rose nodded. “But what about Roxanne? She did say she loved it.”
“She kind of says she loves everything. Plus, she didn’t pass it on to anyone. She didn’t give it a helping hand.”
Sheila made a face. “She’s dealing with cancer!”
“Of course!” Sheila said. “Still, if she really loved it, it would have been easy for her to drop her pals a note and get the song noticed a little. She knows everybody!”
Rose shook her head. “They deal with so many folks and so many songs, people like Roxanne.”
“Still? This one has hit written all over it! If it could just get in the hands of”—she named three famous country-western singers—“they’d be scrambling over each other to record it! How can Roxanne say she loves it and then not do anything? I don’t get it.”
“Maybe it’s on her to-do list. Maybe you need to check back with her and remind her.”
Sheila waved that idea away. “I’ve texted her, emailed her, left her phone messages—all super-polite, all super-professional—and nothing.”
Rose gave optimism a last try. “And what about Larry?” she said. “He did reach out to his label. You told me he did.”
“He did,” Sheila agreed grudgingly. “But he didn’t follow up with them. He just reached out once.”
“But—“
“Only once. He reached out just once.”
“You know … ” Rose bit her tongue. She didn’t want to open a can of worms. But Sheila was starting to rankle her a little. She took a deep breath, then spoke. “You know, that song of mine, about that girl with the needle tracks. You loved it … ”
She didn’t complete her thought, which would have been “and you haven’t done anything for it, you haven’t even added it to your open mic playlist.”
“I do love it!” Sheila exclaimed.
They fell silent.
“I’ll play it on Saturday!” Sheila suddenly exclaimed. “I promise!”
Rose nodded. They had reached the end of the road. Each had their remote job to attend to, the one that paid the bills. They left and went their separate ways. Later that day, it rained hard—and each wondered if it was the weather that was getting them down.
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