On Thursday evenings during the summer, the Northcenter and Lincoln Square Chamber of Commerce sponsor free outdoor concerts on the plaza between Café Selmarie and the new sandwich shop.

They feature a pretty eclectic sampling of musical genres, from Peruvian folk music to American swing with a popular Beatles tribute band worked into the mix.

I have enjoyed going for years. I’ll bring a lightweight-folding chair (stored in my car’s trunk and ready for any bring your own chair type of event) and will usually buy something to eat or drink there. (The nearby Brauhaus restaurant sells very authentic veal brats from a kiosk in front of their door.)

My experience of this summertime staple has waned a bit because the demographics of my neighborhood have changed.

Instead of old Germans who wish to be by their social clubs and young working professionals who want to be near public transportation, many young families have started to call this neighborhood HOME.

I don’t know if there are actually more kids under five in the ‘hood or if younger parents don’t reign in their kids as parents did when I was growing up, but there is an amazing number of young children running around at these concerts. The boys will often flash long balloon versions of Darth Vader swords and the girls, will dance in their grandmothers’ hippie beads, wearing lots of different shades of purple.

While I don’t want to come down on music lovers and summertime revelers, of any age, the atmosphere, reminiscent of a daycare center right before nap time, can make it harder to focus on the performance.

Just the other week, I got there early so I could stake out a spot near the small stage to see the Martin Metzger Flamenco Ensemble. The group consisted of a guitarist, a percussionist and singer, and a dancer.

Decked out in a floor-length form fitting skirt, hair dramatically pulled away from her face, the dancer miraculously handled a few costume changes during the evening.

Very quickly, I lost my primo view to kids that saw the open space in front of the stage as a good spot for dancing and running around and to Millennials that decided to put their chairs right in front of mine.

The dialog in my head kicked in about this generation; how they move through the world with their ear buds in and their handheld devices on, how they seem single-minded in their focus on their personal agenda. How it seems that the rest of the world is INVISIBLE to them.

The volume of their conversations was high. It was as if they thought of the fine guitarist and singer as background sounds to their banter, not that their socializing was background to a performance. Between the rambunctious play of the children and self-absorbed audience members, I wondered how the musicians were able to concentrate.

I was copping a fowl mood.

Then I saw a little girl standing in front of the stage. Her gaze was transfixed on the dancer.

It was obvious that she had seen flamenco before and that it fascinated her. She wore a red and white ruffled dress and red shoes with a slightly elevated heel. Flamenco dancing shoes. She might not be ready to execute all the steps yet, but she was ready to look the part.

When the group’s dancer did a combination of moves, upright yet graceful in her posture, her legs churning quickly, the insides of her feet almost touching, the little girl mimicked her. Or, at least, she got the stomping part down.

I could almost imagine the thoughts in the young girl’s head.

– I want to be a flamenco dancer.

– I want to be beautiful but I also want to make noise. I want to be noticed.

– I want to honor those before me, those who teach me, but I also want to express myself in my own way.

And, for me, this image seemed to capture decisive moments of all kinds. Whether a person is choosing a career or place to live or someone to love. We can go through exercises of logic when coming to a decision, but ultimately the heart decides.  And it decides in a moment.

Seeing this girl enthralled by the dancer only a few feet away and above her kept my mind from going down the rabbit hole of dwelling on small annoyances.

That an image (and your awareness of its personal meaning) can turn your mood around is no small thing.