Song honors life of local mother
Published 11:16 pm Monday, April 30, 2018
On Tuesday at 10 a.m. and 6:30 p.m., local singer-songwriter Diane Colson’s work will appear on WCAG TV33. It will also be on Sunday at 4 p.m.
Colson wrote a song about her mother’s life, inspired by her experience as a caregiver, and the resulting music video will be aired on Wanda Walker’s “You Make the Difference.” She hopes that the song will speak to other people who take care of their parents.
“I always wanted to do ministry and help others, and I never thought about being a caregiver for my mother,” Colson said. “That fall of 2012, mother came to live with me, and so it has been a journey of learning how to be a caregiver and a daughter and putting your life on hold to do the ultimate. It has been a journey for me.”
The video uses a cast of Colson’s family to tell the story of Colson’s mother.
“My mother and daddy, she was from Virginia, and he was from Casita, Georgia,” Colson said. “He was in the Navy in 1946, and he happened to room with my mother’s best friend’s fiancé. That is how my mama and dad met. It was a long-distance thing, and so they wrote each other when he was in the navy in the South Pacific for two years. Then when he got out of the service, he went up to Virginia and met my mother. Six months later they got married.”
Colson was inspired to write the lyrics and later the tune while going about her daily tasks, and the creation of the song and video have changed her perception of what it means to be a caregiver.
“I don’t know where the Lord is going to take me beyond this, but I have a different understanding of caregiving [because of creating this song and video],” Colson said.
“There are a lot of people who take care of parents and elderly people. It appears to be a very thankless job. It is a lot of sacrifice, but the day that I actually heard the tune I felt like the Lord — of course my whole tv show was about the Lord — but I really felt like the Lord said to me that because I’ve done what he needs me to do and taken care of my mother that he was going to give me the desire of my heart to write a song.”
Colson said that her mother loves the song, and she is featured in the video.
“People who have gone through this experience — I wanted to create something as a legacy for [my mother] — but I also wanted to pour into their lives and maybe bless them,” Colson said. “That is the point of it.”
Walker said that she was excited to have Colson on the show.