A Rainbow Without End

I used to think death was the curtain falling for good. I was just a child when I first stared into its face, not in the way of loss yet, but through the lens of performance. On stage, under lights so hot they felt like heaven itself, I’d sing and dance, and the audience would roar like thunder. I was Dorothy, and death was the wicked witch — something to be feared, fought, and ultimately melted away with a bucket of water. That was the story I told myself, and it was enough, for a time.

The Scarecrow’s Heart

There were nights, even then, when the curtain felt heavier. I’d come off stage shaking, not from applause, but from exhaustion, from the weight of expectation. They told me I had to be perfect. That I was their little miracle, their Dorothy, their darling. But backstage, I was just a girl swallowing pills to sleep, another girl swallowing tears so they wouldn’t show on my lashes. I thought death was a monster, yes, but sometimes, I whispered to it like an old friend. If it would just take the pain, I told myself, maybe I’d be free.

The Ruby Slippers

By the time I was in my twenties, the pills had changed, the men had changed, the lights had changed — but not the fear. I lost my voice one night in London. Just like that. It cracked mid-note and I stood there, a broken doll on a stage too big for me. The audience didn’t know what to do. Neither did I. Death wasn’t just a monster or a friend anymore. It was a question I couldn’t answer. I started dreaming of my mother in those years — not the real one, the one I remembered from the hazy corners of childhood. She’d say, “Sing, Judy, sing,” and I’d wake up crying because I couldn’t.

The Yellow Brick Road

Then came the children. Lorna, Joey, and especially Liza. When I held them, something shifted. I didn’t want to die anymore — not because I suddenly loved life, but because I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving them in a world that had chewed me up and spat me out. But even then, I wrestled with it. I’d think, What if they’d be better off without me? Or worse, What if I’m the one who teaches them to fear death too? I began to read — not scripts or song lyrics, but poetry, philosophy, things that made me think past the next pill or the next performance. I read Rilke, who said, “Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.” And I realized I’d only ever let terror happen.

The Other Side of the Rainbow

Now, in the quiet of memory, I see death differently. Not as a curtain, not as a friend or foe, but as a part of the same story I’ve always been living. I think of the songs I sang, the ones that outlived me. “Over the Rainbow” — it wasn’t about escape. It was about possibility. The rainbow doesn’t end. It bends. It stretches. And maybe death is like that too — not an end, but a bend in the road we’re not meant to see around yet. I don’t know what comes next. I never did. But I no longer fear the question. I let it live in me, like a chord unresolved, and I’ve learned that sometimes, the beauty is in not knowing.

Talk to Judy Garland on HoloDream about her songs, her fears, and what she’d say to her younger self.