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Beers and shots were flying in the Costa Rican bar. Had to be 100 people milling, smiling, laughing, chatting it up.
It was an open air bar. Short walls, no roof to speak of, giving us direct access to the dry, caressing breezes of the Costa Rican night.
Thrown up on a large theatre-like screen behind us were lights and words. Words to a song.
Unbeknownst to us, we had wandered into a karaoke bar.
There were Argentines in the bar, and Japanese. There were Americans, Canadians and Swiss. We met French and Chileans and Brits; all in this karaoke bar.
Song after song rang out, the mic passed like a torch from crooner to crooner. Men and women, fake rockers leading the charge. Songs sung in English accented by every national flavor.
And they were good. Good singers, I mean.
The guy who sounded like Bob Seger. The bearded man who sounded like Pharell. The woman who could have been Sheryl Crow.
People were into it.
Together we sweated out the really bad singers. (Strange thing about karaoke bars; the bad singers need the most encouragement, but it's the good singers that get it.)
I've not "okied" much in my life, but I sat in wonder. Strangely, everyone, people from all over the world, seemed to recognize each
American hit one after another.
Gusto fueled by beer, laughter and music, barreling on song after song producing this unfettered moment. Jokes, joy, smiles.
"Who are these people?" I thought. "Where are they from? What are their lives like?"
Leave it to me to get introspective at a karaoke bar.
Suddenly the familiar opening strains of Sweet Caroline.
Really, when Neil Diamond penned that song in a lonely hotel room in Memphis, Tennessee some fifty years ago, did he picture it being sung by some full throated amateur surrounded by people of every make and size from all over the world in a bursting-at-the-seams karaoke bar in Costa Rica?
Did he envision for a moment the problems his song would suspend?
Could he conceive that people of most every nation in the world would know it? Did he fathom for a moment the togetherness it would emulate?
I suppose not. Nor did Bob Seger, Pharell or Sherly Crow of their songs. Nor the Beatles for that matter.
Contemplating exactly zero of the complexities and challenges of life, a fellow from Switzerland seized the mic and boldly dove into the song like it was his own.
And 100 people erupted in sound.
(I will tell you that there exists a video of yours truly singing gustily along, but you'll never see it.)
And I think that to solve life's problems, to establish peace, to put an end to the bickering, the insanity that has ever existed, we should take all the people of the world, put them in a karaoke bar, give them a shot and a beer and crank up Sweet Caroline.
Look closely. Even the terrorist will be tapping his foot.
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