roar

A remembering:

Katy Perry's song "Roar" came out when? 2013? Five years ago now, I guess. It's one of those songs you know was likely written to be anthemic and a hit and so on. You know --a pop song. I'm predisposed to be cynical and want to hate it because it seems purpose written to push certain buttons.

However ...

I cannot, to this day, listen to that song without bawling my eyes out. It came on the radio the other day while I was driving, and it was a bit hard to see the road, if you know what I mean. I want to hate it, but I don't.

Why not?

Kids. 

Every year at my school, we have an end-of-the-year assembly. Every child in the school (nearly 600 of them, ages 6-11) fills into the multi-purpose room --also known as the cafeteria and the gym with the dividing wall opened up --and spends the majority of the last day of school with the rest of the school. They sit down on the floor and watch teachers being silly and their peers play musical instruments. And there's always a photo montage.

One of the fourth grade teachers puts it together with photos taken throughout the school year of kids doing what they do: playing, learning, having fun. Every child makes it into the photo montage. People manage to get photos of the shy kids somehow. They manage to capture still moments of kids who never keep still. She edits it  and uses songs that are currently popular (incidentally, this is how I learn songs that are currently popular --I wait until June every year and get them all at once).

So flashback to what must have been 2013.

Picture nearly 600 kids singing every damned word of that song. They all knew it. They all loved it. You should have seen their faces, belting their little hearts out, watching their memories on the big screen. Every single kid --and when I say every single kid, I am including kids that may not always have that chance at joy and kids who have trouble fitting in sometimes. And not one of them was doing it because anyone else was doing it; they were singing because they felt it.

And I blame Katy Perry for making a school full of kids feel like champions, at least for a little while. And I blame her for every time I think of that song and start crying.

Damn Katy Perry.