It's ok, it's ok, it's ok
I’ve been meaning to write about this person for a long time. Thinking back, she was one of the first people I wanted to write about when I started this site in March, 2023. I know this person was an inspiration for me then, and is now.
This person is not an athlete like Tom Brady. It’s not an actor like Tom Cruise (although that was a pretty cool stunt he did at the Paris Olympics). It’s not a politician like Kamala Harris. It certainly isn’t Donald Trump. As hard as it may be to believe, it is not even a singer like Taylor Swift.
The woman’s name is Jane Kristen Marczewski. If you are a fan of the show, America’s Got Talent, you know her as Nightbirde. If you’re not a fan of the show, you may never have heard of her. I am here to acquaint you, because you need her in your life.
I wouldn’t call myself a diehard fan of America’s Got Talent. As a matter of full disclosure, I, currently, watch other talent shows like Dancing With The Stars and Masked Singer. I did watch the first few seasons of American Idol and The Voice on a regular basis. Don’t judge me – no pun intended!
That is why I never knew of Nightbirde during her brief stint on the show.
I first heard of her when I learned of her death sometime in February of 2022 as I scrolled, aimlessly, down one of the online news websites I sometimes check. Sorry for the spoiler.
It wasn’t anywhere near being the top news story of the day. Russia had just invaded Ukraine so that was dominating the news cycle.
I scrolled past the numerous stories of what the invasion meant in the grand scheme of things. Was the United States going to get directly involved? Was this the beginning of World War III?
There was a lot of stuff about some guy Zelenskyy who was now the president of Ukraine, but used to be an actor who played the president of Ukraine on TV. It was really bizarre, but this guy was being touted as a hero for standing up to Putin. Sadly, I thought it was only a matter of time before he was killed. I was wrong.
The whole war thing was too heavy for me. As a standard practice of mine, since my depression deepened four or five years ago, was to make a conscious effort to boycott the news for extensive periods of time. It was just too depressing. Periodically, I needed to detox from the news.
So I, quickly, scrolled past all stories about bombings, death counts, nuclear weapon capabilities, and families fleeing for their lives to Poland. There were other stories about COVID restrictions being lifted in some areas. As a restaurant manager, I was happy about that.
I scrolled past the sports section. Baseball was canceling exhibition games as the players union and owners were threatening a strike or lockout or whatever they wanted to call it. Players were signing $100 million contracts and they still weren't happy. While states were debating raising minimum wages to $15 per hour, the minimum salary for a major league baseball player was upwards of $700,000 per year.
All I cared about was baseball was supposed to be almost starting, and there was a chance the regular season wouldn't start on time. To me, the start of baseball represents the start of Spring. Sports has always been an escape for me. I needed baseball.
I scrolled past the financial section, the science and technology sections, the lifestyle section, and I was just about to move on to something else. But then a picture caught my eye. Actually, someone else’s eyes caught my eye.
It was the top story in the Entertainment section. The headline must have read something like, “America’s Got Talent star, ‘Nightbirde,’ dead at 31 after cancer battle.”
Nooooooooo!
Talk about a one-two punch. I saw the picture first and my reaction was pure love. This lady’s face was radiant. She looked like an angel. Her smile caused me to smile. I needed that. I haven’t smiled too much in recent years.
But, then, a moment later I read the headline that she had died. I felt devastated, but why? Up to ten seconds ago, I hadn’t known this person, but here I was deeply mourning this person who I only knew by the nickname, Nightbirde. I had to learn more. I needed to know her story.
The first thing I watched was her audition for the show. The second thing I watched was her audition. The third thing I watched was her audition. I must have replayed it ten times in a row.
This frail little woman walked out onto the stage with torn jeans and a blouse which revealed her thin arms and prominent collarbone. She looked like she couldn’t weigh more than 80 pounds, but she looked so confident, almost nonchalant.
Judge Howie Mandel started by asking her, “How are you?”
Her response was, “I’m awesome. I am so happy to be here.” After hearing her story, when I replayed the video, I heard defiance in her voice. After everything she had gone through, the disease didn’t want her to be awesome. How dare she say that??
“My name is Jane. When I sing, I go by Nightbirde.”
She was burying the lead. She didn’t mention that most of her body was riddled with cancer. She was given a few more opportunities to play the sympathy card.
Howie asked her what song she would be doing for her audition, and Nightbirde responded by saying that she would be doing an original song that she had written titled, “It’s OK.”
Howie, ever the comedian, quipped, “It’s OK. It is. It’s OK,” not knowing the significance of the title.
Mandel continued the line of questioning by asking what the song was about. Surely, Nightbirde would mention her lengthy battle with cancer now.
But no. She responded, simply, by saying that the song was about the last year of her life. She wasn’t about to give any further information, unsolicited.
Mandel then asked who had accompanied her from Nashville, Tennessee, to California to support her during this monumental, possibly life-altering opportunity. She replied, with a little bit of hurt in her eyes, but with a strong voice, “I am here by myself.” More on that later.
Again, Howie took the opportunity to try to get a cheap laugh by shrugging her answer off with a quip, “It’s OK,” referring to the title of her song she was about to perform.
Howie then asked her what she does for a living and Nightbirde had to come clean. She responded that she hadn't been able to work for the past year due to her fight with cancer.
Howie must have felt like crap for making light of her first answers and looked down to the desk and muttered, “Oh, I’m sorry.”
But Nightbirde, quickly, reassured him that it was fine. She didn’t want the disease to define her. She didn’t want anyone’s sympathy. She wanted to be judged on her voice and talent, alone.
That’s why she didn’t disclose her diagnosis right off the bat when they asked her, “How are you?” Most people would have replied right away, “Shitty, thanks for asking. Look at me – I’ve been battling cancer for the last year.”
With hand in pocket, Nightbirde forgave Mandel by saying, “No, that’s ok. I’m ok.” That was a blatant lie. Physically, she was as far away from being ok as humanly possible.
Simon Cowell, who if you don’t know, rose to fame here in the United States by being a brutally honest judge on the singing show, American Idol. In the first few years of the show, he must have been one of the most hated people in the United States. He was hardened to the core. He didn’t care what people thought of his opinion. He was all about the talent. Either you had “it,” or you didn’t.
I think Cowell has softened over the years, but it is hard to forget the jerk that he was over a decade ago. But when the camera cut to Cowell after Nightbirde replied that she was doing ok, you could see him analyzing her. You could picture him thinking, “How is this tiny, frail, little girl in front of me being so strong in the face of the beast that is cancer? Where does she get this courage from? What is her story?”
Cowell took the opportunity to probe further, “And how are you doing now?”
“Last time I checked, I had some cancer in my lungs and spine and liver.” Some?? Any cancer is a lot, and she didn’t have just some cancer, like she said. She was holding back.
Howie, correctly, commented, “So you are not okay, then.” It wasn’t a question, it was a fact.
Howie went on to mention how she had an amazing smile and a glow about her. She absolutely did. She was radiant. To look into her eyes was like looking into an angel’s eyes. Her left eye would squint a little when she smiled. It reminded me of my deceased sister-in-law, Ana. Her left eye squinted a bit when she smiled, as well.
Nightbirde, also, reminded me of Sinead O’Connor. Put aside whatever you may think of O’Connor’s controversial behavior back in the 1980’s, she was beautiful. Watch O’Connor’s video for her song, penned by Prince, “Nothing Compares 2 U,” and tell me she doesn’t have the most beautiful, expressive eyes you’ve ever seen. I’d put Nightbirde’s eyes right up there with her.
I couldn’t help but smile when I saw her smile. It was contagious. I’m sure the weight loss from the cancer had a lot to do with it, but her cheekbones seemed like they were chiseled by Michelangelo, himself.
But more than her looks, her words shook me to the core. She exuded positivity. When Mandel gave Nightbirde permission to start singing, there was a small awkward delay. One of the stagehands came out to adjust the microphone stand to Nightbirde’s height. She looked off to the side of the stage waiting for the music to start. For a split second, it looked like maybe there was a technical issue and Nightbirde looked a little flustered.
But once the music started, she spread her arms out wide like wings. It looked like she had just been ripped free from some chains. I almost half-expected her to float into the air. She looked so light and happy.
Anyone else, at that precise moment, with their whole career on the line, would have felt a lump in their throat and butterflies in their stomach. But not her. She had nothing to lose. She had already won. She wasn’t thinking about the future. She realized that she may not have much of a future to look forward to. She couldn’t afford to worry about the future.
This was her future. This was her now. This was where she was meant to be. Everything before that had happened had led to this one moment.
At this exact moment, she held the world in her tiny hands. All eyes were on her. Cancer didn’t have her wrapped up in its chains. It may have been a short reprieve, but she was going to enjoy the next ninety seconds in a way that many of us would never experience.
That moment the music came on and she spread her arms will forever be etched in my memory. It was more than just the act of outstretching her arms, it was the smile on her face as she looked up high. It was as if she was looking up at her fellow angels in heaven and saying, “Look at me.”
What came next was a bonus. I was really rooting for her to sing well. Please, please, please. As soon as she opened her mouth, I was like, “Oh my Lord!” Not only did she look like an angel, she sang like one, too. She sounded a bit like Halsey to me. That sealed it for me. This girl really was an angel.
When she finished singing the last lyric of her song, “It’s alright to be lost some time,” she backed away from the microphone stand and reached her hand to her mouth as she looked around at the crowd.
I don’t know if it was due to editing or not, but there was two or three seconds of silence. Maybe the crowd didn’t know the song was over.
Nightbirde continued to look around, unsure of what the crowd reaction would be. You could sense a moment of self doubt as she waited for what must have felt like hours for the audience response.
The camera cut to Cowell staring, blankly, at the stage. Once it fully registered what he had just witnessed, he responded with one simple word, “Wow.”
It wasn’t an exclamation wow, it was a soft whisper wow. It was as if he had just witnessed an other-worldly performance. Maybe he, and everyone else, had.
Here was a man who had seen hundreds of thousands of auditions and performances, yet here he was speechless.
Then it was the crowd’s turn to erupt. All four judges stood up and applauded. Cowell looked around, sheepishly.
Mandel was the first to speak and he said that there was an authenticity to her performance that could not be manufactured. Cowell echoed the sentiment when it was his turn.
“There was something about that song after the way you almost casually told us what you were going through,” Cowell began saying, before getting choked up.
Nigthbirde chimed in with another quote that will resonate with me forever, “You can’t wait until life isn’t hard anymore before you decide to be happy.”
The camera switches to Cowell, who takes a few seconds to let her words settle in. A smile slowly comes across his face as he fully understands the words she just said. Maybe a weight was lifted from him at that exact moment. Maybe he had just been exorcised. You could almost see him think of something that had pissed him off that day. Why did he allow that one little thing to ruin his day? How many days do we have on this earth? Should we let something stupid ruin even one of those precious days?
Cowell turned aside and took a long sip from a straw of his Big Gulp drink. It was a delaying tactic as he gathered his thoughts. He was probably reminding himself , for the first time in a long time, about how fortunate he is. He has so much to be grateful for. How silly was it for him to be upset about anything in his life at this moment after listening to what this woman had gone through, and was going through? Yet, she had a smile on her face and no bitterness in her heart. I am sure a moment of guilt washed over him.
Maybe Cowell was transformed in that precise moment similar to how Ebenezer Scrooge was transformed on Christmas morning after being visited by the three ghosts. Not only had he been exorcised, he had been transformed by this frail woman who was auditioning for a TV show. Did he ever expect that when he woke up that morning?
What comes next is irrelevant. Cowell teases her about how many other talented singers auditioned prior to her before advancing her to the next round of whatever. Uncharacteristically, the once cold-hearted, insensitive Cowell walks up to the stage and gives her a heartfelt hug.
Maybe this was the first act of the newly transformed Simon Cowell. Maybe this was Ebenezer giving the boy the money to go buy the biggest turkey and take it to Tiny Tim's house.
When Nightbirde exits the stage, she reveals something that she kept a secret from the judges. “I have a 2% chance of survival, but two percent is not zero percent. Two percent is something, and I wish people knew how amazing it is.”
Think about that for a second. I don’t wish a terminal illness on myself or anyone else, but what she says sure got me thinking. What kind of a beautiful person who has only months to live, instead of being bitter and feeling bad for herself, actually, feels bad for healthy people who will never feel what she is feeling. She managed to turn the tables on cancer.
That is amazing. Even as I write that, I need to pause for a minute.
Nightbirde would never get a chance to perform again on the show. Things happen for a reason. Maybe it was meant to be that she only sang that one song on the show. That one performance will live on forever. It won't get watered down, or lost, by other performances. That song was pure perfection and it was meant to be that it stands alone.
She would appear on the show again, but only via a video call, months later, in which she revealed her condition had taken a turn for the worse. She managed to look even more radiant than ever when host Terry Crews informed her that her performance of “It’s OK” had gotten over 200 million views. Her smile was as big as ever, as was Cowell’s.
Cowell’s emotional attachment wasn’t contrived just for TV. His relationship with her extended off screen, as well. He, genuinely, was moved by her story.
In an interview with Extra’s Terri Seymour, Cowell tells a story of Nightbirde coming to his house and how they discussed her music and “what she wanted to do going forward.” He noted her determination to beat the cancer, and when he found out she died, he said it hit him very hard, citing that it was so unfair.
Indeed it was unfair. This world needs more Nightbirdes, not less. It is one of the many things that brings me down… and keeps me down. I will never understand why bad things happen to good people, and vice versa. Why was somebody like Charles Manson allowed to live a half century longer than Nightbirde? Adolf Hitler and Osama bin Laden were allowed to live a half century longer. Just do the math. Add the numbers and see how many more years of evil walked this earth than good. Then we wonder why the world is getting more violent, less courteous, more selfish, and, quite frankly, dumber.
Usually, when I dig deeper and research young people’s deaths, the more I get depressed thinking about why were they taken away from us so soon. Too soon. It’s not just celebrity deaths, either. Oh no.
I have a habit of, periodically, checking the local funeral home obituaries. Whenever I see a young person’s obituary, I have to put on my detective cap and try to find out how that person died.
Sometimes the “in lieu of flowers” closing paragraph gives it away. If the family asks to donate to some cancer treatment group, that is a giveaway. Sometimes they ask for donations to an addiction facility. Other times, it may be the Samaritans.
If there is a tribute video attached to the obituary, I will sometimes watch it for any clues. I also want to know more about the person. Their life is more than one single picture and a 500 words in an obituary.
Rarely, the guestbook section of the obituary will provide clues. I always hope it doesn’t. I can’t think of anything more insensitive than someone posting something like, “Oh, no. How did they die?” But it happens. Most times I will see clues like “They battled for a long time. They are now at peace.”
Also, if the first line of the obituary says a young person died suddenly, it strongly suggests to me suicide. I will then look at the person’s picture for an extended amount of time. If I look long enough, I can almost feel their pain and internal conflict.
I make the effort to get to know the person. Yes, sometimes I may even look up their social media or just do a regular google search of them. Call me a stalker if you like, but death fascinates me. I also feel I am respecting the deceased person by getting to know them and giving their life value.
Maybe it is a result of all the deaths that have been close to my heart that I have had to endure in recent years, including my mother’s. Especially my mother's. Maybe I am looking for answers.
Maybe I don't want people to forget about me when I am gone. Maybe I am looking to give my life some sort of value.
But with Nightbirde, my emotions were confused. The more I learned about her life, the more I felt inspired, not sad like I usually do. I felt like her cancer diagnosis lifted her from a life of anonymity to, like I mentioned earlier, immortality.
I don't remember who I heard say it, but I remember someone being interviewed who had been diagnosed with a rare illness – one of those one in ten million type. The person said for the longest time after the diagnosis they kept asking themselves, "Why me?"
But after a while, that person said that they came to the humbling realization of, "Why not me? What makes me so special that I shouldn't have been that one in a million person to get this?"
I am conscious of the fact that I need to be careful here. I mean no disrespect. I know I am walking a tightropehere. I am being very careful not to sound insensitive.
Nobody wants to get cancer, but is it fair to say that had Nightbirde not gotten cancer, she wouldn’t have been inspired to write one of the most beautiful songs I have ever heard – a song which, like Terry Crews referenced, had been seen by hundreds of millions of people? Is it fair to say she would never have had the courage to just go for it, and audition for America’s Got Talent? Maybe she would have been satisfied just doing small little gigs in Nashville. Maybe she would have been happy being just another face in the crowd.
Nightbirde's life teaches us that there is positive than can be taken out of any bad situation, even one as dire as hers. She teaches us to take the power away from the bad thing – don't let it rule your life. Instead use the experience to enjoy life more, to appreciate each day, each hour, each minute more. Tap into it to inspire you to creative heights you may not have reached before because you have a rare perspective that few will ever have. Use it to make a positive change and leave an impact on the world.
Remember earlier when Howie Mandel asked Marczewski if anybody had accompanied her to the audition and she said no. I wrote that there would be more about that later. Well, here is why she was by herself. Brace yourself.
Marczewski got married in 2015 to a fellow musician, Jeremy Claudio. From what I’ve read, it was a turbulent relationship. She kept a blog in her final years and she wrote, “In the beginning of 2020, I was diagnosed with cancer, given six months to live. Two weeks later, I went through divorce. My husband said he didn’t want to do it anymore.”
She wrote about how she made 90% of the income in the relationship as well as doing 100% of all the household chores. Despite that, she wrote that “he was impossible to please and controlling and extremely critical.”
She said she was too naive to realize at the time that the relationship was abusive and unhealthy. She questioned if the relationship led to her getting burnt out and her body breaking down, possibly opening the door for cancer to enter.
Unbelievable. So much for “through sickness and in health, til death do us part.”
But Marczewski got the last laugh.
Who knows where this Jeremy jerk is now and who cares? I am confident he is laying on some ratty, cigarette stained couch in a living room littered with empty pizza boxes and dirty underwear. Maybe he fooled some other woman into thinking she is in love with him and supporting him.
But enough about him. He is a loser. He represents all that is wrong with the world.
I presented the failed relationship just to show how resilient Marczewski was, as if we needed anymore proof.
Again, why do jerks like him continue to walk this .earth and she is now gone? It sucks, but he will continue to be a nobody and she will always live in the stars.
Nightbirde didn’t want anyone to feel sorry for her. Instead, maybe we should feel sorry for ourselves. We may never be able to see the world through her eyes. We may never be inspired like she was. We may never feel as close to our Creator as she did.
Simon Cowell wasn’t the only media personality to be smitten with Nightbirde. CNN anchor Chris Cuomo did a couple of moving interviews with her around the same time she left America’s Got Talent.
She told Cuomo that she had received some shocking news a week earlier about her cancer coming back, stating that “her liver was now more cancer than liver.”
She said she was still planning her future and not her legacy. She called it “rebellious hope.”
I’ll end this article with my favorite quote from Nightbirde. She first made it during an interview with a local Ohio news station.
“I always believed that if something so impossibly catastrophic and unimaginably awful can happen, then doesn’t it also mean that something impossibly beautiful and impossibly redemptive can happen?”