the story behind my song 'big pharma'
BY VIVIAN GENDERNALIK
Brief story why I wrote 'Big Pharma'which you can view here on my Music Videos page.
Many years ago I worked in an office and a co-worker brought in her two kids after picking them up from school. It became routine they worked on their homework, and in that time when I would just drop by their table to give a greeting to the kids, I was greatly troubled how there was something missing from them. The impression was to me like zombie kids, the life, that spark that animates kids, drained from them.
From some polite indirect questioning to the mom, my co-worker, I soon learned their 'behavior' was controlled, successfully the parent thought, by pharmaceutical drugs for hyperactive kids. But my eyes could see otherwise this was not good.
I say this having had an older friend a quarter of a century before who did have a child who was diagnosed as hyperactive and she dealt with this child the old fashioned way before such drugs: she just handled it day by day. She wasn't especially good at it, sometimes she was overwhelmed by it, but through it all the most important thing was always there: that child had joy. That child had eyes full of life.
This child was as hyperactive as an energetic monkey, a lot of jumping up and down and not staying still too long. Sometimes the young child, around 7-8 years of age at that time, would scream out in delight at times that would embarrass my friend. I clearly recollect one time as I strolled down a dark movie theatre isle to join my friend who had gotten there earlier, when the child spotted me from the front seating where they were, how he leapt right up, screamed in delight the nickname he had given to me and ran to my arms, a true bundle of joy, never mind the movie was going on and the theatre was packed. That child grew up to be a responsible contributer to society, holding the same job for many years even so till the last time I heard a few years ago, never turned into a zombie, never robbed of that joy in the eyes.
The story of my co-worker's way of handling her kids, having followed the advice of someone in the healthcare community who had advised her drugs would solve the issue, that it was an issue that could only be resolved by drugs, from which I had learned in my talks with her weren't in anyway truly hyperactive as my friend's child was, but difficult, moody, as the teens they were can be, this particular story happened in the days it was in the beginning of the times when these prescription drugs were getting introduced as behavior solvers. Through the years I could pick such children out by looking at them, the normal gone, that natural spark not there.
After one suicide too many story getting attributed to such drugs, and the drugs themselves giving such things as 'possible side-effects' this made me want to write a song to give the perspective, from a Christian viewpoint, if these drugs had been available centuries before how much mankind would have been robbed, because for sure if this scenario I paint in this song had occurred today, this is how it would most likely have been addressed, because it is the god today in the homes of many.
What Got Me Started Writing Music
by Vivian Gendernalik
The testimony behind my testimony about my first album 'GODacious', amateur I most definitely admit and warn, or rather consisting of only of my songwriter's raw versions of each song before a studio would do them, some of which I did have done since then and were changed considerably once professionally demoed, but it was the first step forward in faith to which I've not looked back:
When I had for sale the album through CD Baby, which I no longer am doing because the Lord has led me in a different direction than some of my earlier Christian songs, on the album's page I wrote about how my album 'GODacious' came about as a result of a blessing from tithing, but what I didn't add, and what I didn't realize at the time I wrote about is an amazing fact to also praise God about revolving the unplanned official release date, which was November 5th 2013.
That fact I discovered just a few hours ago when I finally sat down to send to my pastor my testimony letter about how the tithing song inspiration I had sent her a pre-testimony about in 2012, standing in faith on an album when I hadn't even hummed or played any instrument in the last 10 years, had become a reality, was that the pre-testimony letter I had sent to my pastor was dated exactly one year to the date prior to the official release date of 'GODacious'. How is that for God's timing?
My pre-testimony letter I had sent in faith I found was dated in my letter to my pastor, and in my computer harddrive as November 5th, 2012. This blew my mind when I realized that the unplanned official release date of the album I had given up on due to limited musical skills was November 5th, 2013, one exact year to the date.
This is especially powerful when you realize I had put all my music writing on the backburner this past summer, which I had put in writing to a fellow churchmember. In other words, I had given up on my plans to put out an album with my songs definitely in the near future and had assigned it to sometime in the future faraway, God willing. That was July 2013.
Well, 3 months later, as in Father, Son, Holy Ghost number 3, not only was my music off the backburner, but I had finished an unexpected 4 new songs, and was moving full-steam ahead to give birth to an album despite a mouse-size shoe string budget and still limited music skills. I got stuck plenty of times, took it to Jesus, and right away would have my solution, with a melody, lyrics, whatever was my stumbling block. I can more readily say I cried my way to God through the creative process and he came through everytime with instant fixes to my blocks and inabilities. The partnership soon became clear: it didn't matter if I couldn't in any of the things, because Jesus could in everything.
Certainly GODacious is not a music masterpiece, but it is a show piece how the Lord's strength excels in great weakness and a faith masterpiece how by stepping out in faith and continuing in that belief, I found there were no limits to what the Lord could lead me through.
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