I think that if you have lost something or somebody you can find it or that someone again by listening to Billie Holiday. The voice is all the colors of life. There is grief in all kinds of loss.
It is the heaviness of missing, but with that can also come the sweetness of the kind of haunting that is memories.
Billie Holiday’s voice gave color to every possible emotion. She sang about life and sang life all at once and into and with every single precious note and breath she took and let flow back out. In any musical moment of Holiday, I think you can find a someone or thing that has colored your life. Lover or elder, guardian, or the immensity of a friend. Holiday lived all of your experiences and more. The depth of the capacity of her voice’s ability to have a place for you to set down contemplatively is charmingly accommodating, and embracingly welcoming.
If it has been a while, listen to her now and find your it or someone again.