Published November 5, 2023

Last night I went from song to song in my digital music library while trying to unwind enough to sleep, and I revisited some powerful plot points from my life. I am going to fumble this one a bit because it’s so emotional, so please bear with me.

Amy Grant’s “I’m Gonna Fly” found me during my churchy days. Among the things I liked about her was that we both played guitar. Her songs were different than the ones we played and sang at Mass, and that’s a statement with many layers I won’t get into here. She was well known in some Christian circles and still a couple of years away from breaking into the secular music world, but she was starting to flex those muscles, as you will see. “I’m Gonna Fly” floated into my path on the edge of twentysomething as I seemed on the verge of surrendering to the gravitational pull of life in the Catholic Church.

I carried it with me on cassette tape to seminary, where singing monks and priests took liturgical music to another level for me. And the acoustics in the abbey church … holy wow. Anyway, when I realized I wasn’t going to stay, that I needed to leave, the song spoke to me.

As is the case with most songs, the lyrics were not a perfect match for my crossroads, but like an overlay on a map, you could place the transparency on top of my terrain and notice the common ground thematically. It practically slapped me in the face.

I don’t usually do this (well, not recently, anyway), but I want to walk you through it.

All of my friends are happy to stay
Here in this yard day after day
But something inside me has called me away
I don’t understand, but I know I can’t stay

The yard, at the time, was the seminary, tucked inside 1,100 acres of woods in a part of southeast Louisiana that people referred to as the Ozone Belt. (You should hear that in your head as “eleven hundred.” That’s how people said it in the days before I came to feel like someone who swore a blood oath to the AP Stylebook.)

I couldn’t Google it at the time, but it was enough for me that the air seemed fresher, and the temperature in summer was often 10 or more degrees lower than in the getaway parts of New Orleans. It was a place where, under slightly different circumstances, I could see myself staying forever, trying to be my version of a Thomas Merton, writing things that would get me silenced by the church and waiting for Joan Baez and friends to come and steal me away for a cheeseburger (look it up).

But I knew I couldn’t stay, as I told the closest friend I had there. I sat in my Mazda GLC hatchback and popped in the cassette to let him listen to the song so I could explain.

I’m gonna fly
No one knows where
But I’m gonna fly
I’m lighter than air

I could see on his face that he was trying to work out how the overlay fit what I’d been hinting at, how her words connected to the pull I felt to leave.

Cause I have felt for the first time
I can be myself
No more faces to hide behind
Just a smile and a dream that’s mine
Even if I am the only one who wants to fly

Here is where it gets a little tricky. I wasn’t being entirely honest with myself. Where I saw myself headed from there was back home, with a plan to teach. Teach what? Good question. A lot of possibilities ran through my overstimulated mind, most of them unorthodox and so far from fully formed that it’s not surprising to me that I couldn’t do anything with them.

But it was a good enough excuse to keep me from going down a path that was wrong for me, and it turned into a detour from another path, one that lasted decades.

I’m gonna fly
No one knows where
But I’m gonna fly
I’ll soar thru the air

All my life seems I’ve waited
For the time to start
Being the person inside of me
Unafraid of being me
No more faces to hide behind
Just a smile and a dream that’s mine
Even if I am the only one who wants to fly

I’m going to use a term most trans women I know would understand: My egg was trying to crack. I’ve always preferred the butterfly metaphor, but it’s true there were flashing signs of wanting to hatch, and for whatever reason, I ran away from them too.

My friend’s face was about to light up. I’d been telling him that I’d been thinking about working with young people again, being some kind of teacher, but honestly, I don’t think I even remembered this part when I asked him to listen to the song with me.

If I had my life to live over again
I’d run barefoot, relax a bit more
And I’d talk to more children
And I’d learn how they laugh 
And I’d teach them how I’ve learned to fly

I don’t remember the words or sounds that came out of him when he broke into his big smile, but the vibe I still have from them is a sort of laughed affirmation and glee at what he’d heard. It’s a lovely memory.

The song continued.

I’m gonna fly
No one knows where
I’m gonna fly
I’m lighter than air

I’m gonna fly
No one knows where
I’m gonna fly
I’ll soar thru the air

Listening to this last night in bed, all of what I pushed down and avoided in the 30-plus years that followed before coming out as trans came flooding back to me, but instead of crying, I felt a surge of pride and happiness that despite everything you will never know and a lot of what you do, I did it. There are parts of the song that soar, and they never fail to lift me.

Cause all of my life seems I’ve waited
For the time to start
Being this person inside of me
Unafraid of being me
Even if I am the only one who wants to fly …
I’m gonna fly

My friend and I stayed in touch for another decade or so, but our paths diverged to the point where there’s little connection anymore. Whether he knows about my transition and what he thinks about it are things I don’t know. If we were ever to listen to the song together again, I might walk him through it more intimately than before.

You should know that every time I listen to it, every time, I smile so big and so happy.

It was enough last night for me to reconnect with it alone in my place, perhaps fittingly just after turning back time.

Image of woman with shadow superhero by Ramcreative via Shutterstock.