
As I sat there enjoying that beautiful tribute to his wife (who was my friend), he suddenly started talking about me. He mentioned how composers create songs that may bless people's lives, and yet the composers themselves may never know how much good they have done. Then, out of the blue, he asked me how many songs I had written. That took me by surprise. I had no words.
My daughter, who was sitting right beside me, piped up, "Oh, she's written hundreds of songs." And he went on, "See, I know Betsy writes music for Children's Theater shows that have blessed many children's lives. And I know she writes music for choirs and soloists, and who knows what else. She probably has no idea how many people her work has blessed over the years." Then fortunately the comments turned to other topics.
But, it is true that composers really have no idea who uses their music in the broader context. Sometimes I run across a YouTube video that someone posted who used one of my songs. Occasionally someone will contact me asking a question about one of my pieces. Once in a while, someone will comment about how their choir loved one of my chorals. Those are rare phenomena indeed.
My writing career has been long enough now that even I don't remember all of the songs I have written or arranged, let alone worry about who has performed them. I was curious about how many songs I'd written or arranged and started counting once, but it became overwhelming. So I just gave up. So many pieces were written for some long forgotten quick projects that I never even thought to engrave them and post them to the website. I haven't even saved legible copies. They are just among the forgotten songs now.

Another forgotten song...