A Friend I Want You to Meet

Technically, I’ve really only spent about two hours with Taylor. We both attended the same writing event last month together in North Carolina but didn’t meet until dinner. I know where she went to college, where she works and that she can sing. Wow, can she sing. I know I mispronounce her last name most of the time, but when I am playing one of her songs and my daughters ask, “Who is singing?” I always say, “You know! My friend Taylor.”

Because some people really are your friends as soon as you say hello.

At one point over dinner, Taylor thoughtfully said, “I’ve had tears in my eyes all day.”

She had my attention.

“Really?” I inquired. “Why do you think?”

“It’s like I’ve been in a foreign country, and I finally hear people speaking my language here.”

I smiled, knowing exactly what she meant. When I listen to Taylor’s music, I feel the same thing. Taylor has joined the 31 day challenge, and she is writing a song every day in October. That feels overwhelming to me, to not only write a story, but to write chords and a melody with it! Oh and to sing beautifully. I love checking her Facebook page to listen to her daily creative offering.

A few days ago, she wrote a song “in honor of the wonderful and wearying writing process, that holy and horrible feeling of why do I do this?” I especially love this line: “I never know which way to go, which verses make a song. All along, you were making me.”

I want to share a couple of Taylor’s songs with you today and hope you enjoy them as much as I do. (One is a cover of a song that inspired Taylor to start singing because don’t we all love to know where the story began?)

Thanks, Taylor Leonhardt, for the hope you bring!