Brigit's Flame Post - September Week 2 - Stripping Gears
So, this is also a bit autobiographical...okay, more than a bit. A couple people will have read the long version of the story; this is a substantially shorter, slightly different take.
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Stripping Gears
It all started innocently enough. All I said was, “Wow! That was awesome! We should do this more often!”
Sometimes a tiny push is just what the Universe needs to set the wheels in motion.
I offered a sincere, unguarded thought, and the Spirit said, “Yes, indeed. I think I can work with this.”
It didn’t happen immediately. Several key pieces were not yet in place-but slowly, inexorably, the gears turned and the pieces moved into place, until there came another moment the Spirit could use.
I really do not know what I was thinking. I really don’t think I was thinking. We were talking after church on Trinity Sunday in the choir room, and my choir master said, “Anyone who wishes is welcome to sing a solo over the summer, in place of an anthem.” He specifically addressed several other people. He did not specifically address me. It would have been easy to just leave it there.
It occurred to me that I have a friend with an amazing contralto voice, and that she’s always interested in singing somewhere, so I asked if she might be welcome. The response was enthusiastic; he loves her voice as much as I do. It would have been easy to just leave it there.
I do not know…no. That is not true, and honesty is required. The deep part of me, the part of me that Knows, the part of me that Listens, knew that this was the time, and spoke. “Or we could do a duet…”
The rest of me thought that simply offering was sufficient bravery for one summer, and that actually stepping up would not be required. Sometimes I think perhaps one of my purposes in life is simply to make God laugh.
It was not long before I found myself back in the choir room, sight-reading a couple pieces with my friend the alto. I was sight-reading pretty well, actually, and we were discovering again that we really do sound awesome together. That was at the end of June.
We booked for August; that gave us six weeks. Surely enough time, yes? After all, a master violin maker can craft an instrument in four weeks…
And that, as it turns out, is what we had set ourselves to do. Not that I didn’t already have a fine enough instrument, not that I didn’t already know a fair bit about how to use it-but I had never seriously considered it a solo quality instrument. My battle-cry was that I was a perfectly competent, happy chorister, and that was quite sufficient. At least, it was sufficient for me…
I picked up the notes to both pieces quite handily, and after that I admit I rather took them both for granted. I confess-I still didn’t realize I was in the deep end of the pool, not until a fateful Sunday in Montclair.
Talk about stripping gears! I had expected to go to church, hear my partner sing a solo, and then practice the two pieces together, now that I’d had some time to learn the notes. Except that suddenly at the last minute the schedule was rearranged, and we had to practice before the service. It was early morning, I was rushed and tired and not warmed up…nothing good can come of such a combination. Nothing good did.
I started having doubts-serious doubts-and it pushed me to work harder, but still not smarter. I kept listening, carefully, to the recording; kept lightly singing on the subway; kept trying to reassure myself that the tone would be there-but still didn’t really understand what I needed to be doing…until a week before our first booked date, when we practiced with my own choir master, and all the wheels fell off.
Any sane person would simply have cancelled, at that point. Any sane, rational person would have realized that this was simply too high to climb, too fast, and would have backed off. Fortunately, I am not-quite-sane.
We shifted again, into overdrive. We worked tirelessly, relentlessly, for a week-not just on technique, but on the little insanities that were getting in the way of technique. Let me tell you, there are days when it is no great grace to have an instrument that is inhabited.
What we found, in the end, was the instrument I was born with, the instrument I am only now growing into. I still don’t entirely understand all of what we found, or how-and the gears are still turning. The creativity we unleashed has a momentum that is carrying it onward and outward and upward. Things in my soul that haven’t shifted in decades are rumbling loose, flaking off their rust and creaking into motion. It is…exhilarating. Frightening as all hell, but…exhilarating.
+++++
Stripping Gears
It all started innocently enough. All I said was, “Wow! That was awesome! We should do this more often!”
Sometimes a tiny push is just what the Universe needs to set the wheels in motion.
I offered a sincere, unguarded thought, and the Spirit said, “Yes, indeed. I think I can work with this.”
It didn’t happen immediately. Several key pieces were not yet in place-but slowly, inexorably, the gears turned and the pieces moved into place, until there came another moment the Spirit could use.
I really do not know what I was thinking. I really don’t think I was thinking. We were talking after church on Trinity Sunday in the choir room, and my choir master said, “Anyone who wishes is welcome to sing a solo over the summer, in place of an anthem.” He specifically addressed several other people. He did not specifically address me. It would have been easy to just leave it there.
It occurred to me that I have a friend with an amazing contralto voice, and that she’s always interested in singing somewhere, so I asked if she might be welcome. The response was enthusiastic; he loves her voice as much as I do. It would have been easy to just leave it there.
I do not know…no. That is not true, and honesty is required. The deep part of me, the part of me that Knows, the part of me that Listens, knew that this was the time, and spoke. “Or we could do a duet…”
The rest of me thought that simply offering was sufficient bravery for one summer, and that actually stepping up would not be required. Sometimes I think perhaps one of my purposes in life is simply to make God laugh.
It was not long before I found myself back in the choir room, sight-reading a couple pieces with my friend the alto. I was sight-reading pretty well, actually, and we were discovering again that we really do sound awesome together. That was at the end of June.
We booked for August; that gave us six weeks. Surely enough time, yes? After all, a master violin maker can craft an instrument in four weeks…
And that, as it turns out, is what we had set ourselves to do. Not that I didn’t already have a fine enough instrument, not that I didn’t already know a fair bit about how to use it-but I had never seriously considered it a solo quality instrument. My battle-cry was that I was a perfectly competent, happy chorister, and that was quite sufficient. At least, it was sufficient for me…
I picked up the notes to both pieces quite handily, and after that I admit I rather took them both for granted. I confess-I still didn’t realize I was in the deep end of the pool, not until a fateful Sunday in Montclair.
Talk about stripping gears! I had expected to go to church, hear my partner sing a solo, and then practice the two pieces together, now that I’d had some time to learn the notes. Except that suddenly at the last minute the schedule was rearranged, and we had to practice before the service. It was early morning, I was rushed and tired and not warmed up…nothing good can come of such a combination. Nothing good did.
I started having doubts-serious doubts-and it pushed me to work harder, but still not smarter. I kept listening, carefully, to the recording; kept lightly singing on the subway; kept trying to reassure myself that the tone would be there-but still didn’t really understand what I needed to be doing…until a week before our first booked date, when we practiced with my own choir master, and all the wheels fell off.
Any sane person would simply have cancelled, at that point. Any sane, rational person would have realized that this was simply too high to climb, too fast, and would have backed off. Fortunately, I am not-quite-sane.
We shifted again, into overdrive. We worked tirelessly, relentlessly, for a week-not just on technique, but on the little insanities that were getting in the way of technique. Let me tell you, there are days when it is no great grace to have an instrument that is inhabited.
What we found, in the end, was the instrument I was born with, the instrument I am only now growing into. I still don’t entirely understand all of what we found, or how-and the gears are still turning. The creativity we unleashed has a momentum that is carrying it onward and outward and upward. Things in my soul that haven’t shifted in decades are rumbling loose, flaking off their rust and creaking into motion. It is…exhilarating. Frightening as all hell, but…exhilarating.