Saturday, October 11, 2008

It's got to get better

Just a note, added later: Upon rereading this post, I'm noticing that it's very "me, me, me" -- especially the parts about the funeral. I just want to mention that the family was very gracious when I spoke with them and apologized (profusely) afterward.


So I've had a hacking cough for a few days now, enough to be annoying during the day and keep me awake at night (as if having Jamie in the house wasn't enough).

Yesterday I started to lose my voice after playing and singing (and coughing through) weekly Mass with the parochial school kids and a funeral immediately after.

There's a hole in the knee of my favorite jeans.

This morning I had to play another funeral at a neighboring parish. I thought it was at 11:00. When I got there at 10:20, the priest was already singing the Gospel Acclamation. Without accompaniment. Because the organist (me!) was late. Because the funeral apparently started at 10:00.

I dashed up the stairs to the choir loft and proceeded to announce my presence by dropping a hymnal on the keyboard as I was frantically trying to set up for the next song. I am not kidding. I dropped a freaking hymnal on the freaking keyboard. Can you imagine the lovely sound that reverberated through the nave? It's a good thing Fr. Mike likes me.

I croaked my way through the rest of the service, and redeemed myself fairly well until ... well, let's see if I can explain what happened next. I was to play a lovely song called "Eye Has Not Seen." The accompaniment books at this other church do not have the full organ arrangements, they only have the melody and chords. But "Eye Has Not Seen" has a beautiful introduction, and I've played it enough that I know it by heart. So I started playing the intro, then realized that I was not playing the intro to "Eye Has Not Seen," I was playing the intro to a completely different song, and not only that, but this completely different song was in a completely different key than "Eye Has Not Seen." So it went kinda like this: play play play play (me: oh, this is great, I'm so glad I'm remembering this beautiful introduction) play play play play, start singing (me: oh crap, this song is in two sharps, why am I playing in three flats, oh NO that was the intro to "We Have Been Told" guess I better just start playing the right song) complete tonal shift play sing play sing. What a train wreck.

Then I grafted the toe of my first Charade sock knit purl knit purl instead of knit purl purl knit so instead of a lovely invisible seam, it's got a row of purl bumps across the toe. I could scream.

But this morning Jamie laughed out loud for the first time, and hearing that after a sleepless night was like a tonic, and hearing it again this evening before his bedtime routine got started made the whole day go away.

It sounds like I'm complaining and I'm really not. The day just got to a point where it was just ridiculous how wrong things were going. I just had to laugh and list them all down because it truly was unreal. I'm grateful for these little problems, especially when I realize that if a few sleepless nights and embarrassing moments are all I have to worry about right now, then I am truly blessed.

2 comments:

Joanna said...

Reminds me of the 'Always Look On the Bright Side of Life'

Magikjaz said...

I'm sure you covered the wrong intro up beautifully! your talent always amazed me!

xoxox