2006-07-29

glad to be back home @ 10:38 p.m.

Was talking to Thom last night and musing about how good things feel right now and how pleasantly surprised I am at that. You know, it's easy to romanticize the past. I was afraid that everything I remembered about being here seven years ago was shot through a gentle fuzzy filter and gilded with flower and sweet scent. And that I'd return to find it spoiled and dark. I was pretty out of control then, not having come even close to finding my true center and self.

But I was wrong. It is still the place I remember...and more.

At Thom's urging, I sent an email to the choir master of the church whose choir of which we'd both been staff members. No harm in asking, right?

I hope this missive finds your summer going well. Much time has passed since last we met and I�m hoping that you�ll at least have a hazy memory of me and the short time we spent together in the choir loft at CTK. I used to be -insert maiden name here- and I sung under your baton during the 1998-9 season as a staff member of the alto section before departing for the much cooler climes of Michigan. Well, I�ve finally come to my senses and have returned to the homeland, currently residing since 2 weeks ago right outside the perimeter in Smyrna and my old friend Thom suggested that I contact you about the possibility of perhaps returning to the Cathedral�s choir should their be room for someone like me.

In any event, I�m quite pleased to be back no matter what. Hope to hear from you soon.

He replied:

Delighted to hear from you and would love to talk with you. I am about to go out of town and am not sure we can find any time this week. I could get together with you Wednesday this week, early afternoon, and there may be a window late afternoon on Wednesday as well�.if not I'll be back in the office next Wednesday (8/2).

Look forward to talking with you.

So I hustled over to the church yesterday. It was, in a word, surreal. Much had changed. The addition of a parking garage and an administration building. But still the same. He is a very mellow person, we shook hands, bussed cheeks and he led me back. On the way, we passed the organist's office. We stopped in the doorway.

Look what I found upstairs.

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! YOU'RE BACK! SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

I don't know. -arch look towards CM- Am I?

Much more chattiness ensued, but at that point, no matter what the outcome, I felt all warm and fuzzy that not only did he remember me after 7 years, but that he'd exhibited in such a...fan sort of way. -grins- Nothing about the choir room had changed, nor CM's dark and cluttered office. It felt exactly the same as when I came to talk to him the first time about exactly the same thing: having me on as a staff member. He asked me what I'd been up to musically since last we met and I shared my brief history. Then he came out and said it: that he does not currently have a staff position open, BUT...

There's someone in the spot he wants me to have. What does this mean, you may ask? I will tell you, my sweet little yamlings. Someone who's been there nigh on 20 years refuses to admit that she's officially No Longer Fit To Be A Cantor. Her voice, and I quote, was almost not focused enough to fill the rather large cathedral to begin with and now it really isn't. On top of that, she's got adult ADD/ADHD or something similar and now that she's aging, she can no longer hold her focus long enough to cant the psalms without wandering off in the middle so badly that she can't get back, leaving the poor organist off to try to cover up with a sonata or something. As stern as he can be, he's really a big softie and the few remaining groups she's a member of are all she has and she'll positively flip out if/when asked to leave. He hadn't yet mostly because of that and the fact that he didn't have anyone to replace her with...until I showed up in his inbox.

So now, he's resolving to talk with her, even though "she's going to have a nervous breakdown when I call her because she's been through this before" he mused as he eyed the phone askance. In my opinion, she lacks professionalism because a true professional knows when to hang it up and call it a day. You do it before somebody has to ask you. You do it the minute you feel that slip. That moment when you have no idea what to do when something goes wrong for the first time in your life. You test it out a little while longer to see if it was fluke, but when it happens again, you hang up the toe shoes or whatever it is that you live to do. Find something else. But don't put people through the hellishness of telling you that you are No Longer Fabulous and would you please exit stage right, quietly please? You want then to throw you a huge retirement party. Beg you to stay. One more command performance. But not "shhhhhhhhhh, that's enough, thanks."

So, he asked me to give him two weeks while he marshals his forces, hitches up his balls and dives in (plus he's out of town this week).

Miss B told me that she couldn't believe how different I sound now. How happy and content, like a completely different person.

And I am. I'm happy now. I was right. I said that I could be in a suck ass work situation but if I was in the right surroundings, it wouldn't matter. That is not to say that I am, merely to say that I can feel the goodness seeping back into my psyche.

And that's a damned fine thing.