Maybe some words are needed, or, The world does really come full circle
I have been here over four months. And the one occasion I have gotten homesick was not in August, September, November, or early December. No. It was in late December. It was the past couple days, to be exact. When everyone else in the program was going home, having their lasts... and I still had nine days to go. Okay, so maybe Salzburg was cool (though not necessarily in 10 below temps) and so maybe I had fun showing my family around Vienna, but what I really wanted to do was go home. Go back to where everything was mine. Go back to where language wasn't an issue, where I didn't even have to think about things, I just did them. Go back to the usual Christmas, with my cousins - lots of warmth, lots of food, and lots of love.
And then I went to choir rehearsal. My last rehearsal. The rehearsal for the mass on Christmas morning, Gounod's St. Cecelia mass. The romanticness of it began to rival Puccini's for its prettiness in the first page of the Gloria, which was unusually quiet, and by the end, may have just taken its place as my favorite. Ernestus, the old man who organizes things and who helps me whenever I look really lost and confused, ran up to talk to me the second I walked in the door, and continued to shower hugs and kisses (three at a time, of course, per the Austrian way) on me throughout the break and the post-rehearsal dinner. When Robert, our director, found out it was my last week, he gave me a long thankful speech in front of the entire choir, which thankfully I did not have to respond to, but I understood most of, which was a big triumph.
And I realized that a lot of my experiences here have been shaped and influenced and made by IES people, people who will likely never be together in one place again, much less together in Vienna again. But the Augustinerkirche Chor will always be. And as Ernestus said, "Du musst schrieben. Du musst zuruckkommen und uns mitsingen." You must write. And you must come back and sing with us.
I will.
And then I went to choir rehearsal. My last rehearsal. The rehearsal for the mass on Christmas morning, Gounod's St. Cecelia mass. The romanticness of it began to rival Puccini's for its prettiness in the first page of the Gloria, which was unusually quiet, and by the end, may have just taken its place as my favorite. Ernestus, the old man who organizes things and who helps me whenever I look really lost and confused, ran up to talk to me the second I walked in the door, and continued to shower hugs and kisses (three at a time, of course, per the Austrian way) on me throughout the break and the post-rehearsal dinner. When Robert, our director, found out it was my last week, he gave me a long thankful speech in front of the entire choir, which thankfully I did not have to respond to, but I understood most of, which was a big triumph.
And I realized that a lot of my experiences here have been shaped and influenced and made by IES people, people who will likely never be together in one place again, much less together in Vienna again. But the Augustinerkirche Chor will always be. And as Ernestus said, "Du musst schrieben. Du musst zuruckkommen und uns mitsingen." You must write. And you must come back and sing with us.
I will.