Dream Faithfully

Success Will Find You

On Saturday, 11 April 2009, an unemployed 47-year-old woman no one would call attractive stunned the world in eight pure notes of defiance and hope. She was overweight. Her hair was a Brillo pad of black shot with grey. Her pale-yellow dress bore a pattern more appropriate to the family sofa than a moment in her nation’s spotlight. The satin bow around her ample waist was a pathetic homage to fashion. She wore a serviceable watch on her wrist and a totally unremarkable necklace.

Contestant 1432 was a caricature of working-class ambition. She made her debut in Britain’s Got Talent 2009 Episode 1.

The audience and the judges settled into an amused quiet as she lumbered gamely onto the stage. Her saucy responses to introductory questions from the judge raised her from the level of pathetic to interesting.

Here is how Susan Magdalane Boyle looked when those first eight notes flew from her mouth with a purity that can never be forgotten once heard. In 5.46 short minutes, the strength and range of her exceptional voice caused cynicism to die in splendor in the arms of aspiration, hope, and beauty.

Credit. Britannica

And here was her courageous love letter to a world that to that pivotal moment so easily had overlooked and discounted her. She chose the anthem of the quiet yearning of the underclass in Les Misérables and any other time of tumult and social disruption.

I dreamed a dream in time gone by
When hope was high and life worth living
I dreamed that love would never die
I dreamed that God would be forgiving

Then I was young and unafraid
And dreams were made and used and wasted
There was no ransom to be paid
No song unsung, no wine untasted

But the tigers come at night
With their voices soft as thunder
As they tear your hope apart
As they turn your dream to shame

He slept a summer by my side
He filled my days with endless wonder
He took my childhood in his stride
But he was gone when autumn came

And still I dream he'll come to me
That we will live the years together
But there are dreams that cannot be
And there are storms we cannot weather

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

And here is how she looked 30 minutes later when fame came to her. After all those years.

Credit. Will Leitch-Medium

Susan may have slept with fate’s terrible tiger, but life did not kill her dream.

It is so very important to remember to hope. And to dare.

There is no storm faith cannot weather.

And every good dream can come true.

Election 2026, here we come.