It Couldn’t Be Done

It’s graduation season! Never has that been so true for our family as it is this year. Today we’re celebrating the graduation of my step-daughter from college, and in a couple of weeks, we’ll be celebrating my daughter’s graduation from high school and my own graduation from a Masters of Science in Nursing program.

So many times during the past few years, I’ve thought, There’s no way I can do this. It seemed I simply didn’t have it in me to complete all those assignments. Or pass that impossible exam. Or give that research presentation. I’m guessing both my daughter and my step-daughter had some moments of feeling the same way. And haven’t most of the people who’ll be donning caps and gowns this spring?

But they didn’t listen to those doubting voices—not to their own or to those of others. Instead they “started to sing as [they] tackled the thing that couldn’t be done, and [they] did it!

Congratulations Class of 2023!

It Couldn’t be Done

by Edgar Albert Guest (1881-1959)

Somebody said that it couldn’t be done
But he with a chuckle replied
That “maybe it couldn’t,” but he would be one
Who wouldn’t say so till he’d tried.
So he buckled right in with the trace of a grin
On his face. If he worried he hid it.
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
That couldn’t be done, and he did it!

Somebody scoffed: “Oh, you’ll never do that;
At least no one ever has done it;”
But he took off his coat and he took off his hat
And the first thing we knew he’d begun it.
With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,
Without any doubting or quiddit,
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
That couldn’t be done, and he did it.

There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done,
There are thousands to prophesy failure,
There are thousands to point out to you one by one,
The dangers that wait to assail you.
But just buckle in with a bit of a grin,
Just take off your coat and go to it;
Just start in to sing as you tackle the thing
That “cannot be done,” and you’ll do it.