Love Lifted Me

In the late 1930's , when I was somewhere around seven or eight years old I had a friend named Jimmy Cargill who had an older sister about the same age as my sister Frances. Her name was Neva and, like Frances, she played the piano. But unlike Frances, Neva was a big girl; really big. With three older brothers at home and a reasonably attractive older sister our house was often filled with their friends. It’s a cliche, but true, that poor people of those times made their own entertainment much of the time. One of the fun things they did was get together in someone’s house and make music and if was available, pop some popcorn. One of the boys who usually showed up could play guitar, Frances and Neva played the piano and they all fancied they could sing.

Neva Cargill was a regular in those “sing-a-longs.” She and Frances took turns playing the piano. Now Neva was a musician who “felt” her music. As she played, she bounced broadly, freely, and rhythmically on the piano bench. One night Neva began pounding out a lively old camp meeting hymn called “Love Lifted Me.” Moving heavily, but sprightly the way some heavy-set girls can, she began bouncing on the bench while belting out these words.

“I was deeply steeped in sin, sinking to rise no more . . . .”

When she came to the chorus, the words were a repetition of a profound spiritual assertion. They were:

“Love Lifted Me, Love lifted me.

When nothing else could help,

LOVE LIFTED ME.”

As I looked at Neva and contemplated her size and weight while listening to her musically telling us that love had been the only power that was able to lift her, I marveled at the power of this thing called “love.” I did not know much about it and had never heard anyone talk about it; but I reasoned, “If love could lift Neva, it had to be a very powerful force and I was going to make it my business to be allied with it.”

The picture of Neva and all that weight rollicking at the piano while being “lifted by love” still hangs on the walls of my mind.