The Circle Game

As I was getting ready for bed, this song came into my head.  It's a song I haven't heard in about 10 years--it was one of my favorite songs we would sing around the campfire at Kettleford when I was a counselor...

Yesterday a child came out to wonder
Caught a dragonfly inside a jar
Fearful when the sky was full of thunder
And tearful at the falling of a star

Then the child moved ten times round the seasons
Skated over ten clear frozen streams
Words like when you're older must appease him
And promises of someday make his dreams

And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
We're captive on the carousel of time
We can't return we can only look
Behind from where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game *

Sixteen springs and sixteen summers gone now
Cartwheels turn to car wheels thru the town
And they tell him take your time it won't be long now
Till you drag your feet to slow the circles down

And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
We're captive on the carousel of time
We can't return we can only look
Behind from where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game

So the years spin by and now the boy is twenty
Though his dreams have lost some grandeur coming true
There'll be new dreams maybe better dreams and plenty
Before the last revolving year is through

And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
We're captive on the carousel of time
We can't return we can only look
Behind from where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game

I turned 20 that summer, the last summer I heard this song.  I had a very difficult time with that birthday, I recall.  Others have trouble with 30 or 40--for me it was 20.  Probably because a few years before, I'd told myself I would never make it that far.  But, I did.  And now, as I approach 30, I find myself reflecting yet again on my life.  There have been several unexpected twists and turns, especially in the last year or so.  But, I am and will be better for it in the end.  The seasons of my life are changing, yet again and while I do not know what lay ahead, I know that I will not be alone in the storm.  I have found haven in the people and places I have come to know.  I am loved, trusted, and needed; something, the last time I led this song, I could not say for sure.