Here's to the Sun

Good news, folks!  It turns out you can turn being neurotic into something positive! See this article: link to article from the Huffington Post.

Some neurotic people, it turns out, are conscientious neurotics. I like that. They manage to take all their worrying and anxiety and crazy and turn it into something good.

Conscientious neurotics.
I think they make good teachers.
I think if I'm very careful and try very hard and make a thorough checklist, I might be able to be a conscientious neurotic, but I'm not completely sure and it's a little upsetting. Do you think I could be?

Sometimes we don't know how messy things are until we turn the light on. This winter was like that for me. I don't think I even knew how tired and dark I was feeling until we went to Hawaii and I remembered what I'm really like. Not grouchy. Not worried about clearing off the gosh darn countertop 24/7. Not craving chocolate like I was an addict. Not staying up too late and drinking coffee all morning to make up for any authentic rest.

But then we came home and it was still winter. In April.

Last Wednesday I was hitting the wall. More snow. Sometimes it all seems so hard. Getting the piano kids to play well and have good tone and learn to read and oh yeah. . . save time for scales and theory. And what actually happens 25% of the time is that you just sit and practice with them because. . . oh yeah. . . they forgot to practice on their own. They just want to play.

And performing seems so difficult. Sometimes.

It would be so much easier just to get the countertop cleared off.
And organize the sock drawers really well.

I was thinking about this a lot.
A lot.
How easy life could be.

I went to church for the Lenten service.  I sat there alone and thought about my dad a little and a little more about how easy it would be not to. . .

And then something happened. After the service a stranger, I know only by her first name, Nancy, came up to me and said, out of the blue, remember when you played the Beethoven Sonata for Emmett's funeral? That was really special. I bet he really liked that. 

That was a couple years ago. What?

I thought that was a little God incident and it made me smile.  Little angels in our midst. It cheered me up.

Then I went on to choir practice and another person I know only by her first name asked me if I ever played solo in public. I said I did, but I should play more because I get so nervous because I don't play enough. She looked at me straight on and I'm not kidding, she said with a slant in her eyebrows--don't you ever quit. Like she was my mother.

That wasn't really a God incident. It was more like God slapping me in the face. Lutherans aren't exactly known for complimenting each other ad nauseam. And here we had two folks, two angels, in the course of a few minutes. On the day, I thought about quitting.

I guess I'm not going to quit.

Sunday the sun came out and the snow started to melt.

Sunday I went and took a piano lesson. It was lovely. I'm a great student. I love to learn.
I need to keep learning.

Sun. . . day.

Part of the magic of learning is that you want to share your knowledge. After my sixty minute lesson, I wanted to share everything I learned with my students this week.

Sun. Light. Transfer of energy.

Light and energy, to make things easier and take musical life to the next level.
I can do this teacher training thing.
I want to do this.
For myself, for my own kids, for my students, and for the next generation of Suzuki teachers.

I really believe we need to train up good teachers.
I'm asking myself a lot of questions.
I'm thinking a lot about my teaching.
I'm thinking a lot about my playing.
I don't know it all, but I know a lot.
I'm gonna keep learning until I feel worthy of teaching what I know.
The application takes about that long to fill out anyway.

And in the meantime. . . I'm gonna save a little time to plant my flowers and enjoy the sun. . light.
And get more sleep. And not worry about the countertop quite so much.  I'll probably still have some chocolate. Maybe an ounce and a half less than before. (Note conscientious neuroticism. . . )

Here's to the sun.
Here's to the angels among us.
Here's to the light.

Lord, for every time that you send the right words at the right time through the right people, to me--let me also have the courage to bring light, and the right words, to someone else.