Filling the Quiet Spaces

Bill and Sara across Monet's Lily Pond

Some of the legal treats in Amsterdam

Me in a Swanky Paris Hotel

Calvin and my mom are out in Glacier this week. Mary is at band camp. It's just me and Bill here. A small taste of the future.

There are some quiet spaces.
Too quiet.

The MacPhail institute was last week--I got to spend time with the MacPhail piano kids and also my teaching friends. Again, it was a small taste of what it would be like to have a social life. To go to dinner with friends a couple nights a week. It was nice. Piano teachers are nice.

A lot of my projects are complete. Monday morning I woke up with no kids and no colossal obligations. It was like the first day of summer.

I'm dropping Calvin at the University of Iowa three weeks from today.

At the Hotel D'Orsay in Paris there was jazz playing every morning in the glorious Parisian breakfast room with cheeses and honey and croissants. And a silver coffee service. Good cheeses. Good honey. Good butter. Good jazz. Fruit is overrated. If you are trying to be gluten free or dairy free or sugar free I do not recommend France. I did not ask for decaf coffee.

We have come to the close of 5:30 a.m. piano practices, but I'm still waking up at 5:30. Eighteen years of 5:30. It could be that I will wake up at 5:30 for the rest of my life. It's so quiet, I'm gonna put some jazz on for Bill. Never mind that he is not awake yet. I need to fill the too quiet space. We still play CDs on the six CD carousel player. Eighteen years ago on a rainy day in March when the house was being built and I was pregnant out-to-here Bill ran speaker wires through the whole framed house so that we could have music in every room. We didn't know there would be blue tooth. . .and iTunes.

Bill Evans at the Village Vanguard will do. Something with My Foolish Heart. Through the whole house.

There are no speakers on the porch. It's the only room. I can't hear the music very well sitting out here writing.

Never mind, it is filling the space.

Eighteen years. That was a long project. From nighttime feeding to board books to big kid toys to driving.

What if you got to do it all again with what you know now?
I don't think I would have done very much differently.
You do the best you can with what you know at the time.

There are all these things in life that everybody goes through but then when it's you, you wonder how you will do it. Childbirth, death of a parent, teaching someone to drive. Kids going to college.

I'm hopeless. I spent my entire childhood dreading the day my sister would leave for college and fearing losing my grandparents. Those things happened slowly but surely. And, of course,  it turned out there was more joy to come. But it was never the same. A new same. I'm hopeless, but wise enough to not get stuck for too long.

I'm excited for Calvin. He's so ready and it's a whole new glorious world. I loved college. It's just gonna be an explosion for him. I'm also excited for Mary. Calvin got some years as an only child before Baby Sunshine came along, now she will have some years here alone. We all need to be loved alone.

And I'm excited for me and Bill. We love a project and this has been a good one. It's been the best.

My Romance is playing now. Bill Evans has always been my favorite jazz pianist. I can hear it a little.

Filling the quiet spaces.

Dear Lord,
Much of the time there is so much music and conversation and noise. In these quieter times, help fill the space not just with jazz piano CDs but with your presence and reassurance of the joy in change. Thank you for the blessing that family life has been and will continue to be. A new same. The blessings yet to come. Bless Calvin and Janel out in Montana and Mary alone at band camp. Bless Bill and I and our projects. Bless our quiet spaces. Alleluia.
Amen

Eighteen Years of Music and Books and Trains

The kid is eighteen.

Eighteen years ago we headed off to Burnsville Ridges Hospital and came home with a nine pound bundle of conversation joy. At first, Calvin loved music and books and trains....

But then. . . came vacuum cleaners. So many vacuum cleaners.

I didn't know I wanted a boy. I thought I wanted a girl. Then when we had a boy, I thought to myself if I'm gonna have a boy he's going to be a sweet boy.

And he was.

And then I couldn't imagine not having a boy.

And now he will be a sweet man. A good man.

And he still loves music, and books and trains, and he even still loves vacuums a little.

God bless you Calvin!
Happy birthday.

The Happiness Project

Howdy strangers. 

I've been reading Getchen Rubin's The Happiness Project. In the book she feels a subtle discontent and makes it a project to increase her happiness. Reading her words inspired me to think both about happiness and about projects. Fancy that. Being happier was just one of Gretchen's projects. I'm pretty happy but there is always room for growth, and I often have too many projects. Many of us have too many projects. Our next door neighbor has decades of uncompleted automotive, house and garden projects. 

My parents always told me I could do anything I set my mind to. I guess the secret of life over 50 is that I might not be able to do everything I set my mind to. At least not all at once. And the corollary is that I believe that the only time I'm not happy, is when I have so much to do that I can't do my best work at anything. Part of my own happiness project will have to entail renewing some time management boundaries. Subtitled: how to be a high achieving productive person without losing your mind and yelling at your kids and your husband. 

On the train from Paris to Amsterdam I decided to sort my life into projects. My idea was that by sorting and labeling my tasks into projects I could stay more aware of my current commitments. I could set a limit to how much I have going on at any given time by project. I decided to limit my projects to six. You can think about these things when you are up at 3:45 a.m. with jet lag. 

I've recently crossed off the following projects:

• a year in the studio
• downstairs floor refinished and walls painted
• graduation and graduation party and all things end of school year for two children
• Red Pines Chamber Music Festival at my house
• two week trip to Europe with family
• spring yard work 
• church choir accompanist obligations 

Right now the following project are on my plate:

• summer family life including cabin food, college dorm stuff procurement. . . daily bread and laundry
• MacPhail Suzuki Institute including lessons plans, teacher talk, and faculty recital prep
• Paul's mini camp at our house in July--hospitality and food prep
• SAA conference piano planning for 2020 and 2022--helping secure clinicians and sessions
• SAM graduation planning for 2020 including web updates, registration tool and delegating the jobs
• studio planning for 2019-2020 including chamber music, recitals, group lessons and guest clinicians 

When one or more of those projects are complete the future projects are:

• updating and pursuing personal performing, reading and writing goals
• more teacher training
• writing my book about teaching, parenting, music and faith--a day book of 365 wise entries to inspire and delight. . .  
• starting a vlog--a video blog about piano pedagogy with other snippets of my life interests 

Some of the projects are long term, like the French repairing Notre Dame. To me, these are family life, studio planning and personal goals. One of my bigger projects, the church accompanying job, has come to a close. I'm taking a break from that. 

Only six projects. Only six projects. Repeat after me. . . 

The next step is to plug the projects into the year at a glance page in my notebook, which current pop culture calls a bullet journal. Some of us were country when country wasn't cool. I have drawers of ancient used up bullet journals. You want to know what I served for Christmas dinner 2012? I can look that up. And it's not in an app. Think of the fame and fortune I could have had if I shared the original bullet journal system.

I digress. . . putting the projects into the year at a glance will help me to plan the year so that I have fewer pinch points. This visual also gives me a clear path to say no, to new projects and requests, when my project quota is already full. 

In a round about way, sorting my life into projects is my happiness project. Thanks Gretchin for the variation on your theme. I'm only half way through your book but already inspired. She also has a blog and a vlog and a podcast--check them out. You might come up with your own happiness project.