The world of music did not lose its crowning jewel when I opted to major in economics.

I couldn’t have been a contender. But maybe I could have been a chorister.

ZING!

My grandmother taught piano and gave me my own upright as a thirteenth birthday present, which meant my parents’ occasional threats to cease paying for lessons if I wasn’t going to practice were then enhanced with guiltosamine and stubbornation. I enjoyed piano lessons but couldn’t shake the feeling that they were a waste of time if I wasn’t going to turn out to be a prodigy. So I took lessons up until high school graduation, entered exactly one competition, and was promptly terrified by the sound of students who played better than I.

And then I quit.

Occasionally, I’d sneak into a practice room in college, where I’d try to summon up my best memories of Beethoven despite months of atrophying skills. I’m generally good for about ten measures of the third movement of the Sonata Pathetique, and then it’s like someone came along with a magic eraser and scrubbed those memories right out of my head. I’d fiddle around for a little while, until I could hear an Actual Musician practicing in an adjoining room. They probably thought I was SUCH a LOSER. How EMBARASSING. I probably shouldn’t have even BEEN THERE. My classes were in a whole other BUILDING.

You can see that I’ve made peace with this chapter of my past, I’m sure.

I sang in any group that didn’t require an audition, and even ended up in charge of a couple of them. But it wasn’t until after my father died that I decided it was time to quit being stupid and just let somebody hear me sing, already. I survived the tryout for our local community chorale and spent several years learning what terms like “put the D in the rest” mean. Appogiatura. Oh, that other thing. Melisma? Calliope?

Like any good yuppie parent, I want more for my children. Actually, I want less – less fear, less self-consciousness, less obsession with perfection.

Christopher has started piano lessons this year, and although there’s an occasional bit of whining, he’s really enjoying them so far. Mary Margaret has started the recorder. My husband has started clarinet, the baby sings the blues, and I’m back to practicing piano.

I figure it’s far more likely that my son will meet his practice goals if I meet mine, and my goal is lofty: Practice. Ever. So far, I’m meeting that goal at least twice a week. We often practice everything at the same time. Coincidentally, our neighbors on the one side just moved out and left no forwarding address.

But singing – that’s the thing. You know? It’s scary, it’s pure, it’s eminently portable, and the neighboring diocese has one of the top chapters of Pueri Cantores IN THE WORLD. The WORLD.

I read in this book (which I’ll partially review someday) that “A need is not a call.” Then I ignored it, and ordered a bunch of materials, and now I’ll be starting the homeschool music Catholic choir class thing with a hardy group of seven or eight kids.

Stay tuned.