Susan Boyle lifts us out of our smallness, cynicism

She calls long-distance to ask if I would "write a column for her," and I feel a familiar anxiety. See, when folks "assign" ideas to me about columns or songs I might write, I always feel awkward and helpless. Because it just doesn't work that way for my Muse. Either something engages The Boys In The Boiler Room or it doesn't. And I never know what will or what won't.

But she asks, nonetheless. She wants to know if I've seen the video clip of Susan Boyle.

How could I not see it? Susan Boyle's unlikely and truly instant celebrity was pingponging across Diane Sawyer, Larry King, Anderson Cooper and YouTube like a sudden hailstorm. She was a contestant on "Britain's Got Talent," a British echo of "American Idol." And, yes, the infamous, condescending jerk-for-hire Simon Cowell is a judge on both shows.

Let me be clear that I'm not accusing Simon of being an actual jerk. But, he plays one on television. That's how he earns his living. Odd job description, but it works for him.

Anyway, Ms. Boyle stepped onto the stage. Rather, she frumped onto the stage. If she was your librarian, or your nanny, or your pediatrician, or your grocery cashier ... well, you'd count yourself lucky to be in the company of someone so absent guile and pretense. So charmingly self-deprecating. So endearingly nerdy.

But Susan stands onstage as a professional entertainer about as naturally as I would take a snap at quarterback for the Green Bay Packers. Which is to say not naturally at all.

She has no "pro" polish. Zero panache. No shtick. No fluid idiom.

She is cognitively disabled as a consequence of being starved of oxygen at birth. She is not quick-witted or facile with words. As a schoolgirl, she was relentlessly ridiculed by her peers.

She never married. Says in interviews she has never been kissed. She has runaway eyebrows, helmet hair, two chins and a square head out of which pours an effortless, pristine smile and dancing eyes. She giggles a lot.

And, when she opens her throat to sing, it pleases heaven to pour choirs of angels across her vocal chords and out into the light. I'm serious. Your jaw will drop into your jockeys. If you hate classical music, still, you'll stop breathing for the first few moments of listening to her sing. If you're an idiot without an ounce of class or culture, still, you'll be able to recognize the beauty of Susan Boyle.

As Susan walks center stage, you can hear and "feel" the energy of the audience. A collective, pained "You've-got-to-be-kidding" murmur floats up. Two of the judges do their best frozen, polite smiles. Simon has long stopped such pretense of decorum.

Susan can barely articulate the name and description of her current place of residence. She's 47, she says, and then blurts out "and that's just one side of me" while she shakes her ample booty and hips in a parody of sexuality.

Eyes roll. Faces reflect anguish and scorn. Simon looks like a man who sees there's no way out of eating a raw, dead frog.

"What's your dream," asks Simon, like, I'm just so sure someone like you has a dream, let alone an attainable dream.

Susan says simply and sincerely that she wants to be a professional singer, but that "nobody would give me a chance before, but here's hoping that will change."

Here's hoping. Hope. Hope is a dangerous thing. It requires uncommon depth and courage to hope. Cynicism is cheaper, easier, and, in this culture, socially rewarding. People count it as sophistication and intelligence.

How perfectly ironic that Susan chooses to sing "I Dreamed A Dream" (Michael Ball) from "Les Miserables":

I had a dream my life would be/ So different from this hell I'm living/ So different now from what it seemed/ Now life has killed/ The dream I dreamed.

The first eight bars slap everyone in the face. No one can hide their shock and surprise. Like a miraculous healing, Susan's voice relieves the audience of "mean and bitter," forgives them for it, and leaves them speechless, humbled and grateful, gaping in the presence of True Beauty.

It's Beatlemaniaesque. Meaning, quickly Susan's gifts aren't even about Susan any more. Suddenly Susan's beauty belongs to all of us. People stand in delirious applause -- yes, because of Susan's talent, but even more because it is such a relief to be dragged out from under the smallness and the cynicism that we hipsters normalize and call "human."

See for yourself: www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY.

Steven Kalas is a behavioral health consultant and counselor at Clear View Counseling Wellness Center in Las Vegas and the author of "Human Matters: Wise and Witty Counsel on Relationships, Parenting, Grief and Doing the Right Thing" (Stephens Press). His columns appear on Sundays. Contact him at skalas@reviewjournal.com.