The Cape Celebrates All Who Believe
Life is just a leap of faith
FreeForAll Wednesday is a one-note essay, slim in its words, vast in its impact. Possibly my favorite-ever tune. My tear ducts adore it. Enjoy. And always trust your cape.
I’m doing a talk Thursday night for students attending what’s called EmpowerU. Its stated mission is “to help instill the power to improve decision-making skills in young people. EMPOWERU will encourage the development of educational strategies to improve the quality of life for our youth.’’
They asked me to talk about sports. I said no.
I liked the idea of empowerment, especially in young people. I didn’t see how my discussing how-I-think-the-Reds-will-do would add much to the endeavor. Besides, I have some experience in empowering someone, namely Jillian D. Mavriplis.
After a bit of haggling — “do you even like sports?’’ I was asked — they agreed to let me talk about something else.
Which is a hugely long way of explaining why I’m talking to EmpowerU students tonight about a song that makes me cry.
Frequent Perusers will note my affection for/occasional obsession with music. Nothing else has the same power to make me feel things. Not books I’ve read, movies I’ve seen, artwork I’ve admired. All have their effects and their charms. They don’t make water rise in my eyes.
They don’t open the tear-gates the way All I Ask of You does. (Phantom of the Opera.) In the company of others, book passages or Edward Hopper paintings don’t make me pretend my allergies are acting up. (Forever For You, Hall and Oates, So In Love, the Tymes.) No movie ever made waterfalls run down my face the way one particular tune does.
Folk singer Guy Clark wrote The Cape in 1989, along with Susanna Wallis Clark and Jim Janosky. On the surface, it’s about a guy who believes he’s a superhero, endowed with the power of flight. To prove it, he ties a flour-sack cape around his neck, climbs to the roof of his garage and jumps. The song describes his doomed efforts at each stage of his life.
In truth, The Cape has nothing to with superhero powers and everything to do with the human spirit that emboldens them.
Life isn’t about flying. Life is about the faith needed to try, the effort that faith takes and the effect it all has on everything worthwhile we attempt. Dreaming is good for the soul. Striving is everything. Falling short is human.
Ultimately, the kid/adult/senior citizen takes off on a different flight, one of his own making. The cape has everything and nothing to with The Cape.
He did not know he could not fly, and so he did.
That’s the signature line.
As a Christmas present several years ago, my wife stenciled the line onto a wall in my office at our old house. (Apologies to the current owners. Feel free to paint over it.)
The connections to raising a child with a disability are clear enough. We went into that life-work with no preconceptions, only the naive notion that this child deserved every chance at flying that any other child did. We didn’t know if Jillian would fly. We knew we’d exhaust the possibilities.
The Cape has been recorded by many, many artists. Clark’s original is the 2nd-best I’ve heard. The best is from a two-disc tribute to the man himself, sung here by Patty Griffin.
It’s magic in the way only music can be. Now if you’ll excuse me, I think I have something in my eye.
Great books will take you on a journey, and have you visualizing the story as you read it ...
Great movies will bring you in as well, and immerse you in the story they are detailing on screen ...
Great music, however, will mark the special moments in the story and movie of your life, and transport you back to those moments whenever, and wherever, upon hearing that significant tune. There is nothing as magical, or as powerful, as a great song.
Even if it's not a "great" song, it can still have a great impact. I heard one yesterday while out shopping, "Shut Up and Dance" by the group Walk the Moon.
While the group is not necessarily my cup of tea, the song transported me back to 2014, a father-daughter dance at Fairfield Middle School I attended with my two daughters, and dancing away with them to that song.
It brought a smile to my face recalling that wonderful memory from the movie of my life -- one I'll never forget, and always cherish.
Well said. And, I'll bet equally, if not better said this evening at EmpowerU talk. Good luck. Inspire them as you have so many over the years. Yes you have.