Reflections on a Singing Valentine

Last year False Alarm made arrangements by email with Adam, who lives in Chicago, to present a Singing Valentine to his girlfriend MaKenzie, who lives with her parents in Roswell, Georgia. It was a joyful event, and her parents glowed with pleasure as she listened to Adam's loving message.  This year Adam arranged for us to sing for her again, but this year was different - Adam was flying in to be present for the event.

We arrived at the house on a crisp Saturday afternoon, and it was a pleasure to finally meet Adam - an earnest, friendly, and cheerful young man of perhaps 20 who never stopped smiling and was clearly sublimely happy to be there with MaKenzie as we delivered his special Valentines message.

MaKenzie is a year or two younger and seemed deeply moved by the moment. As we sang she held Adam in her arms and lowered her head onto his chest and closed her eyes. We didn't exist. Only the reality of Adam's presence did. The whole engagement reminded me of something but I couldn't put my finger on what it was. Her face against Adam's shirt, the large and beautifully furnished house, our decreased significance in her eyes this year? What was it? Only the next morning did it come to me - a passage in The Great Gatsby.

Gatsby has made a success of his life and has bought a Long Island mansion just to be near his former love, Daisy, now married to another man. He has sat through many nights by the water, staring across the bay at the end of Daisy's dock, where a green light burns - his only connection to her. Now finally she has come to him, and he shows her his house and his possessions. She cries to see and touch the expensive shirts in his wardrobe. She presses her face into them because they belong to him, saying "I've never seen such - such beautiful shirts before!" Then they go outside, where

... it began to rain again, so we stood in a row looking at the corrugated surface of the Sound. "If it wasn't for the mist we could see your home across the bay," said Gatsby. "You always have a green light that burns all night at the end of your dock."

Daisy put her arm through his abruptly, but he seemed absorbed in what he had just said. Possibly it had occurred to him that the colossal significance of that light had now vanished forever. Compared to the great distance that had separated him from Daisy it had seemed very near to her, almost touching her. It had seemed as close as a star to the moon. Now it was again a green light on a dock. His count of enchanted objects had diminished by one.

A year ago False Alarm had been the bridge to Adam. He was so far away, and the words sung by a quartet there in her house were all she could have of him. Now we no longer served that function. He was there, his love enveloped her, and that was everything. We were just a green light on a dock.

What a special Valentine's Day it was for us to be a part of this moving moment in the lives of these two young people.