So, you think you can sing? Try a Sarah McLachlan song. I dare you. She makes it sound so easy.

Who else from Halifax Nova Scotia sings with such hopeful pain as Sarah? Shania’s not really a Twain, and as popular and sexy as she can be, Sarah’s the real Canadian singer.

Maybe I simply identify with any torch song that has Stupid in the title.

Stupid

Night lift up the shades
let in the brilliant light of morning
but steady there now
for I am weak and starving for mercy
sleep has left me alone
to carry the weight of unravelling where we went wrong
it’s all I can do to hang on
to keep me from falling
into old familiar shoes

Chorus:

how stupid could I be
a simpleton could see
that you’re no good for me
but you’re the only one I see

love has made me a fool
it set me on fire and watched as I floundered
unable to speak
except to cry out and wait for your answer
but you come around in your time
speaking of fabulous places
create an oasis
dries up as soon as you’re gone
you leave me here burning
in this desert without you

Chorus

everything changes
everything falls apart
can’t stop to feel myself losing control
but deep in my senses I know

This is the pain of love lost put to words and voice.

Someone wrote in Sarah’s high school yearbook that she was destined to become a rock star. Whatever singing career that’s better than a rock star is where Sarah is.

If there’s one thing we find out as adults, it’s that life is not Black and White. We want it to be, but it’s not. Sarah knows.

Black and White

Unravel me
a distant cord
on the outside is forgotten
a constant need

To get along
and the animal awakens
and all I feel is black and white

The road is long
the memory slides
to the whole of my undoing
put aside
I put away
I push it back to get through each day
and all I feel is black and white
and I’m wound up small and tight
and I don’t know who I am

Everybody loves you when you’re easy
everybody hates when you’re a bore
everyone is waiting for your entrance so
don’t disappoint them

Unravel me
untie this chord
the very center of our union
is caving in
I can’t endure
I am the archive of our failure

And all I feel is black and white
and I’m wound up small and tight
and I don’t know who I am

Everybody loves you when you’re easy
everybody hates when you’re a bore
everyone is waiting for your entrance so
don’t disappoint them

Everybody loves you when you’re easy so
don’t disappoint them

Don’t disappoint them

So, my challenge remains. Not many can sing one of Sarah McLachlan’s songs and make it sound close to the original.

I tried to sing Stupid, (as opposed to stupidly, which is my normal method) mostly because I identify so with the lyrics. My voice carries well.

Someone called the police.