Counting Stars: Writing Challenge

Once again I'm attempting a Writing.Com 48 Hour challenge. This one required listening and using the song "Counting Stars" by One Republic to inspire my writing. This time I opted for a journal/blog style type of article talking about the thoughts the song evokes in me.

Counting Stars like a lot of other recent pop hits was first introduced to me by the series "Glee" which you can find here as part of a medley (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxrcrw681Tc). This song itself is one of my favorites. The version of the song that I fell in love with though was the late singer Christina Grimmie's rendition. For those of you not familiar with this artist, Grimmie was a contestant on the reality competition "The Voice". She was an amazing singer and took third place during her season. Sadly she passed away last year.

Christina sang Counting Stars alot. She originally performed a cover of the song on her youtube channel before she appeared on the Voice. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JNtB69lIS9I) Later on as part of the competition she was asked to sing a song in a duel with another singer. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s58rQJZkVX4) She nailed it perfectly and I can't listen to the song without thinking about her.

Every time I listen to the song though it reminds me of a scene from the children novella by the French author Antoine de Saint Exupéry. The story basically involves a young Prince who lives on a small asteroid in space falling to Earth.

I never read the story as a child but taking French in highschool I was exposed to excerpts from the Novella. One of the excerpts was a scene where the Prince meets a businessman. The Businessman appears to be counting. The prince being curious asks the man what it is he is counting. The man is too busy with his counting to answer so instead the Prince tries to guess. "Boxes?" the Prince asks. "Pens? Stars?"

At the word stars the business looks up acknowledging that is what he is counting. At first the prince is delighted because he loves the stars himself. However it turns out the man is counting them because he believes that by doing so he can own them something he believes will make him rich. The idea of stars meaning different things to different people becomes explored further in the novella. It leads to one of the great quotes at the end of the story.

'People have stars, but they aren't the same. For travelers, the stars are guides. For other people, they're nothing but tiny lights. And for still others, for scholars, they're problems. For my businessman, they were gold. But all those stars are silent stars. You, though, you'll have stars like nobody else.' -The Little Prince

It's a beautiful quote as is the One Republic song itself.