I did it, I did it!
A few months ago, I made some lofty goals for myself. One of those was to sing in public. For those who know me well, the many times in the past that I have tried to do it, I’m plagued with things such as unstoppable shaky knees, dizziness and situational laryngitis. Yep, trying to sing in front of a bunch of bright, smiley people scares the voice right out of me. Oh, and it’s pretty embarrassing too. But, I love singing so I knew I needed to give it another try.
Instead of letting my goals shoot up like a brilliant firework that quickly dissolves into the night sky, I made firm plans. It was a month or so before Mother’s Day and I had this crazy idea. I have a friend named Jenni who is a brilliant pianist and her mother plays a mean violin. I thought it would be fun to do a double mother-daughter thing, where they played and we sang – and we’d perform in one of our wards on Mother’s Day. Plan in place – check.
As with any good plans, there were some bumps in the road. After weeks of planning, coordinating the schedules of four busy women and just a few practices, Mother’s Day came and went before that grand idea came to fruition. Prep work – check (sort of).
Instead of May 8th, yesterday was THE DAY.
As luck would have it, our last practice was supposed to be last Tuesday but Benjamin had a fever; I didn’t want to infect Jenni’s whole household, so we called off our last – and much needed – practice. And, of course, Dave & I both got B’s cold. AND – my mom got huge fever blisters from an extended stint in the sun without sunscreen. So, as Sunday approached, I was becoming a bit apprehensive about our grand performance – and whether or not it would even happen. But, the show must go on! Especially if you are performing in a ward conference. And, especially if the other two performers are the wife and the daughter of the stake president.
Dave and Benjamin accompanied me up to Camano Island on a beautiful, sunny Sabbath day, despite the fact that both were very tired and still suffering from our family cold. I was congested, but I downed a lot of water in hopes that I would flush it out. We were able to run through our song a few times, but then the congregation filed in. I whispered to my mom that I was afraid it was going to happen again. She gave me a nice pep talk and suggested deep breathing. And, she added that if I lost my voice, we’d just go sit down or she’d sing my part through the end and I could mouth the words – or whatever.
After the sacrament was passed and after the bishop finished his talk, we were up. At that point, Benjamin had officially lost all sense of decorum and was screaming like a caged monkey; Dave rushed him in to the foyer and some ushers quickly shut the doors behind them. I marched up to the stand with my mom and hoped I didn’t hyperventilate from all of the deep breathing.
Intro notes from the piano began. We sang unison for the first few measures, but our split parts were fast approaching. Instead of singing the alto part, she came in with me and sang until I got my “sea legs”, then she broke off into her part. The rest of the song? Easy as pie. High “F”? No problem, lots of support, breath and control. My feeling? Euphoric.
We had to leave afterwards due to a little meltdown with the kiddo, but my mom & Jenni both reported that they received a lot of positive feedback. While that was great to hear, I was just happy that I had reached my goal… and had survived without hyperventilating! Mission accomplished – check!
