Forget Me Not

Get ready for a very picture-heavy post.  This one has a very different, very long, very sweet (maybe too sweet?) story attached to it.  And I'm trying to figure out the best way to tell it, without coming across as a crazy person.

Even though, you know.  We're all crazy.  In one way or another.

But anyway, that's a discussion for another time, another blog, another lifetime.  Today we're talking "Forget Me Not," and not just the flower.  But how pretty!

Latin name: myosotis sylvatica (or so I am given to understand).

But this song originates from the word for the phrase in a completely different language: the Sotho language, which they speak in a small, landlocked African country named Lesotho.  Here:

See?  Tiny, tiny, compared with the rest of the continent (and the world).  But beautiful nonetheless, and sad.  It has one of the highest rates of HIV infection in the world, and it's tragic because everyone deserves to live a long, healthy life.  Well, except for really bad people, but I don't think Lesotho has that many of those.

So, how did I get to writing a song based on a phrase in the Sotho language?  Here's where the long story part comes in.

Earlier this year (March), I fell in love with the House of Windsor.  To date, I have read thirteen books (just this year!) about the House itself, and about its various personages, and I could rattle off the names of every British king - or queen! - since Queen Victoria in the late 1800s.  (But I won't.)  And the history interests me, but so do the people, and who they are today.  And part of who they are today is their charity work, so when one of the books mentioned Prince Harry co-founding a charity for Lesotho (with the nation's own Prince Seeiso), inspired by his trip there during his gap year, I was interested and looked it up.  It's called Sentebale, and it has a beautiful, noble mission: to support and enrich the lives of vulnerable children (particularly those affected in any way by HIV).  And I was moved to action.

Worth noting: in the Sotho (or Sesotho) language, "sentebale" means "forget me not."

I donated some money, but it felt impersonal to me (and I also don't have enough to give, or I'd give everything away), and I wanted to do something sensitive, more heartfelt.  And so I was inspired to write this song (only now am I realising how flimsy it sounds, compared to the fact that donating money might actually help someone live, and live well).

I became obsessed with making this a perfect song, researching the nation (so the natural imagery in the first verse is accurate) and weighing the merits of every word I chose.  I tried to make it multilayered, and I'll explain more after I put it here.

Forget Me Not

you might find me, where the sunshine meets the stone
you might find me, where the grass is overgrown
but few every really come to this spot
you might find me, where the mountain scrapes the sky
you might find me, where shadows come to hide
and although I'm out of sight, forget me not

CHORUS:
there's not a single petal of life too young to care about,
nothing too small
and the more forgotten the seeds, the louder the sound,
when they fall
so when you reach out your hand, hold on with everything you've got
and never let the last word, fall from "forget me not"

you might find me, waving in the wind and in colour
you might find me, with my sisters and my brothers
and although I'm one of many, forget me not
you might find that sometimes, beauty has to bow its head,
where there's only darkness to face instead
and sometimes, it only comes as an afterthought

CHORUS:
there's not a single petal of life too young to care about,
nothing too small
and the more forgotten the seeds, the louder the sound,
when they fall
so when you reach out your hand, hold on with everything you've got
and never let the last word, fall from "forget me not"

you might find me, where old footsteps lead the way
you might find me, where tomorrow begins today
and although I'm not here long, forget me not

BRIDGE:
plant just one seed and it will grow for you,
a dozen flowers of the brightest blue
forget me not, forget me not

CHORUS:
there's not a single petal of life too young to care about,
nothing too small
and the more forgotten the seeds, the louder the sound,
when they fall
so when you reach out your hand, hold on with everything you've got
and never let the last word, fall from "forget me not"

So you see, hopefully, what I mean by multi-layered: "I/me," the narrator, can be the children the foundation is helping, or the flowers (in which case, it would be a delicate kind of metaphor), or the country of Lesotho itself.  As I said, the natural imagery in the opening verse is fairly accurate; then, the second verse introduces just a little bit of a sinister tone, but then it changes right back with the third half-verse, in which optimism mixes with just a little view to the past (the charity is dedicated to both founders' late mothers, which is where "old footsteps" come into significance).

And, of course, with the bridge, it manifestly talks about flowers, but it really doesn't mean just flowers: you don't ever help just one child, because there's a snowball effect of good.  At least, that's what I like to believe.  The chorus was the trickiest part, whereas I was wary of being too heavy-handed about it.

Of course, the actual flower of forget-me-not doesn't actually grow in Lesotho, I don't believe.  But I do rather like the poetry of the whole thing.

...

(The remainder of this blog post has very little to do with music.  So, you have been forewarned, if you do find your attention wearing thin at some point.)

So, to continue on with the narrative with which I started this post (a long, long time ago, doesn't it feel like?), I then decided I would not only write the song, but actually make it count somehow.  So I did something crazy, and wrote a letter to accompany it, and, on 10 June of this year, sent it to Clarence House.  To Prince Harry himself.

It was a rainy morning, and my hand was shaking as I dropped the envelope into the mailbox.  Then I tried my best to forget about it.

(Next, I'm planning to send it the Sentebale headquarters in London.  I just haven't written a good enough letter yet.)

But of course I didn't forget about it, and I kept imagining my letter, with the envelope on which I wrote Prince Harry's name and address by hand in purple ink, as it travelled across the ocean and continued its journey to a city where I myself have not yet been.

And, on 2 July, I got a reply.  FROM BUCKINGHAM PALACE.

I know it's childish to be so excited about this, and you're probably sitting there, rolling your eyes and just about to exit this webpage.  But my hand was, again, shaking as I took the envelope out of the mailbox, amid bills and junk mail, and up the stairs into the kitchen.  The envelope, by the way, had these stamps on it:

(I am, obviously, not including a picture of the entire envelope, replete with my name and address on it.  We are not that intimate with each other, you and I.)

I took a few deep breaths, and I think I even managed to convince myself that it was no big deal, so that when I opened the letter I think I had a split second of a hipster-like moment of just a mild, "Oh, cool," before I very nearly screamed like a fangirl.

Because what followed was this:

Sorry the lighting is so bad.  I would take a better picture of the letter, only I don't have it with me at the moment.  Maybe I'll go back and edit it in later.  But here's a transcription (I left out the address, for she greeted me by name).  (Claudia Spens, M.V.O., is the head of general correspondence for the younger Mountbatten-Windsors.)  She wrote:

Prince Harry has asked me to to thank you for your letter and enclosure of 10th June in connection with your gift for songwriting. 

It was most kind of you to take the trouble to write as you did.  His Royal Highness was touched by your words of support and encouragement and has asked me to thank you very much indeed for the copy of your beautiful song, "Forget Me Not." 

Prince Harry has asked me to send you his warmest thanks for writing and his very best wishes. 

So, yes, I have no idea if HRH actually read it.  But she did, Ms. Claudia Spens read it, and for me, that's enough.  And the letter has Prince Harry's beautiful initial/crest on it, which is nice.

See?

I apologise if it seems as though this post is dripping with self-importance (I assure you, it was not my intention), but I just felt as though the story went with the song, and I wanted to be true to it.

Anyway, that was my drama for the summer.  My moment of glory, me touching a corner of greatness.  There was a time I carried the letter around with me wheresoever I went, but I don't anymore.

Much love, and thank you for the musik,

Just Another Ordinary Girl

The smallest parts of who you are, are everything to me.

Finding out you're only human is hard / I want to change the world, but I don't know where to start / and I am fool enough to believe, there's hope among the ruin...