The Piano and Me

Some of my favorite memories about myself are connected with music. In fact they are of me playing the piano, specifically. So I’ll tell you about them:

The first one was when I was about 13 years old. I was taking piano lessons from a lady named Annette. I was a pretty good pianist by then—I knew that I could play anything I wanted to. (I don't know that quite so much now.) So in addition to my regular piano lesson I decided I would learn the first movement of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata as a surprise for my teacher. I had ulterior motives: I wanted her to teach me the second and third movements. Anyway, I worked on it for quite a while, learning the notes and fingering; but more importantly, deciding exactly how I wanted the dynamics to sound—where it should be louder or softer, what notes to emphasize, etc. Finally I was happy with it; after my next piano lesson I told Annette that I had a piece for her to listen to. I played it as I’d practiced and she sat very quietly and still through the whole piece. After I finished she was quiet a bit longer, then she said softly, “That was perfect.”

Wow! What a great moment.

When I was 14 years old I got a job as a ballet pianist at a dance studio. (As a side note, my first paycheck was about $82. Pretty exciting for a 14-year-old!) I also took dance lessons there; so between my piano skills and my knowledge of ballet I think I did a very good job. I worked there until I graduated from high school.

Well, occasionally LeAnn (the teacher) would have “stretch days” where she had her students do a lot of stretching and not much of anything else. A lot of us really liked stretch days, but the one exercise most of the students hated was doing the splits. So when it was time to do the splits LeAnn would always ask me to play a funeral dirge—just a slow piece of music appropriate for stretching to. One day I decided that, for a joke, I would learn a real funeral dirge to play the next time she asked for one. Of course it had to be very recognizable as a funeral piece, so I chose Chopin’s Marche Funèbre, Op. 35 (the one they use in cartoons a lot). It took me a few weeks to work it up, and by the time I was ready LeAnn went through a non-stretching spell, so I had to bide my time for a while.

Finally, one day she instructed the students to do the splits; she turned to me and said, “Loralee, a funeral dirge.” I was ready. The class was standing in fifth position, ready to go; LeAnn set the tempo, “Port de bras, one; two...” And I began playing the funeral march. I hadn’t even finished the first measure when LeAnn started laughing—I mean really laughing; and the more I played the more she laughed. She laughed so hard that the little girls who were on the floor in the splits started laughing too. She laughed so hard that she had to go sit down on her chair at the front of the class; and then she laughed so hard that she fell off the chair! Even better was when she had the next class do the same exercise and I played the same piece. The result was almost the same—except that this time she didn’t fall off of her chair. My joke was a tremendous success! And I still laugh when I think of it!

Another story:

In September of 1985, soon after I graduated from high school, I performed a solo piano recital. My teacher, Cheryl, suggested that I should do one and so we spent most of the year preparing for it. (I don't know why I agreed to do it; I always froze up when I played in recitals.) Anyway, I learned and memorized four pieces of music: part of a suite by Handel (five short pieces); Beethoven’s Sonata Pathetique, Op. 1; Polichinelle by Rachmaninoff, and the Overture to Guarany by Carlos Gomes, a Brasilian composer (that one I learned for my mom). I practiced these pieces for at least three hours a day; I could play any of them flawlessly. I loved playing and I'd frequently stop at any place there was a piano—the mall, the church, friends' houses, etc, and play one or more of my songs—all from memory and all perfectly. Unfortunately in our preparations Cheryl and I didn’t factor in nerves. I could play all day knowing that people just happened to be able to hear me; but to have an audience there just specifically to listen to me was another story. So the actual recital didn’t go as well as we'd hoped it would.

I was nervous to begin with, and then a short way into the first piece I made a mistake. So I got even more nervous and things just snowballed from there; I made mistake after mistake and even forgot small passages. The audience (mostly family and friends) loved it anyway and told me how great it was. I thought they were just being very nice to me. We had tape-recorded the recital, but I didn’t want to hear all my horrendous mistakes, and just put the tape away. It wasn’t until about a year later that I actually listened to that recital. And you know, it wasn’t really so bad—in fact, it was really good! I definitely did not play as well as I could have, but it wasn’t nearly as horrible as I had thought either.

Anyway I was in my mom’s house listening to that tape on a summer day when my brother Gregory came over. He heard the music through the window as he came up to the house and he called to me, “Don’t you wish you played that well?” I was surprised! I told him that it was me playing and he said, “Oh, sure!” All right; OK, I was pretty naïve. I really believed that he didn't realize that it was a tape of me playing the piano. Looking back, I’m pretty sure he did know; but it was still a nice compliment.

Well, I have one more really good piano story to tell, but this is already a really long blog so you'll just have to wait in breathless anticipation until I tell it to you. I'm sure you are on the edge of your seats, but you will just have to wait!

Life

I just finished reading a novel. While it was interesting enough for me to read the whole thing--and even care about the characters somewhat--it was kind of... well, like a novel. A little far-out. It was an LDS romance and the main characters are a young man (early 20's) who, after living a wild and reckless life, was in a terrible car accident that nearly killed him, joined the church and was disowned by his family. He moves to Utah to go to BYU and meets the leading lady, who is raped three days later (by another, creepy guy). Then the rest of the book is about all of the trauma that Leading Man and Leading Lady endure so perfectly together until they all live happily ever after.

Have you ever noticed that the characters in books have lives that are...well, too full of stuff? I am really extremely fond of Jane Austen's novels, but they are kind of far-out too. Nothing really terrible and traumatic happens to any of the main characters; mostly they endure a lot of mental stress before they finally end up happily ever after with the rich men of their choice. Which, I think, is actually a lot more realistic than the novel I just finished this morning.

Have you ever noticed that life isn't really like that? I mean all the disaster. The news would have us believe everything is horrendous. Yes, I do know these terrible things do happen to some people. In fact I am very closely acquainted with someone who had to deal with a truly horrible relationship; his (now ex-) wife did some things that were atrocious. But now things are better and it looks like he will live happily ever after, too. Still, for the most part, most of us have lives that wouldn't make fascinating reading in a novel. Or do we?

After finishing this swell novel, I started thinking about my own life with Bruce (after all, it was a romance novel). Our life has been good, and it is good. We met in highschool and were instantly married. OK. We didn't actually get married or live together while we were in highschool, or anything like that. We just acted like we were married in every other way. Five years after we started dating we really, officially got married. Wow, that was great--I'd do it again! We put Bruce through school together; we moved across the country and lived in Tennessee for three years (a story to tell later); we've had eight kids; we've had some ups and downs. That's the short version.

But maybe if people could read the detailed version it wouldn't sound so mundane. Maybe if others could feel the things we've felt, our life wouldn't look so tame. If our troubles seem small to one person, maybe they seem insurmountable to someone else. And just maybe our plain and ordinary story would be someone else's best-selling novel. I think we could read "amazing" in every life around us--without any of the extraordinary, novel-like sensationalism to accompany it. Just life.

Life is amazing!

Brave, Brave Kaylie!

[Be sure to check out the slideshows of Kaylie's adventures! (below this post)]

On July 1, Kaylie went to ARUP Laboratories in Salt Lake City to participate in a child diagnostics study. ARUP is working with the University of Utah, giving a physical exam and taking blood and urine samples from healthy volunteers (ages 7 to17) so they can have a baseline of what a healthy child looks like. They can then use this information as a comparison when they are helping sick children. The children (and parents) participating in the study can use the exam results for school, sports or scouting activities, and the children are given a gift card as compensation.

Michael, Jason and Lindsey participated in this study a few years ago, so when we found out they were still looking for more kids we asked the younger ones if they wanted to do it. Ryan did not; Brandon did, but they already had enough information from boys his age; and Kaylie, who just turned seven, wanted to go. In fact, she was pretty excited about going--she was looking forward to that gift card.

So this past Tuesday Bruce took her up there. He said she was happy and excited; she'd taken her coloring book and crayons and colored on the drive there.

Kaylie says the first thing they asked her to do was "pee in a container and I couldn't do it, so I had to do it last." Then she had her eyes checked and her reflexes checked ("it feels funny"). She was a little bit nervous about the blood-draw, and she says, "it hurt a little bit. She [the technician] said it would feel like a little pinch, but it was more than that." But her dad held her hand and the phlebotomist was very nice; they took six vials of blood--about 1 teaspoon each, and then Kaylie got her gift card and they gave her some juice. She felt very happy to get that gift card; Kaylie said, "It was cool." After a few more drinks of water and the rest of the exam she was able to produce the urine specimen as well. And then she was happily on her way home again.

I got to take her shopping! I had thought she'd choose some cool place like Toys R Us, but she chose Wal-Mart. We looked at everything! One-and-a-half hours later she was at the checkout buying her new desk caddy (a little box with papers, markers, crayons, stickers, etc. to keep in it). Since she had signed the gift card herself she also had to sign the card-reader pad; she could barely reach it--it was pretty cute.

To sum up the whole experience, Kaylie said, "The doctor was nice; his name is John. It was fun." I'm proud of Kaylie; and I think she is too!

Kaylie plays with her well-deserved prize.

ARUP still needs a few boys (I don't remember what ages) and girls of all ages (7 - 17) to complete their survey. If you know someone who is willing to go, they will get a complete, free physical exam and be given a $30 gift card. Print the flyer (below) for information and please print the referral card to take with you--Kaylie will get another $10 gift card for every child she refers. Thanks!

Kaylie Helps Out at ARUP

Kaylie's Shopping Trip