Jody, sounds like your cup runneth over kind of a conference! I know Shirley, Goodness and Mercy are following you! Thanks for sharing your lovely poem and epic time!
HA! I spilled my coffee on the table in the back of the room where I met you. Amy was gracefully quoting Psalms and I was back there trying to figure out how to sop up the mess with the inside of my jean jacket so no one could see, and no one else would have to clean it up later. What a great weekend!
I love the last stanza of your poem, especially this phrase: "incarnation/ Of holy hope in a fallible container" Very nice! So glad I found you here on the web!!
Oh, Janna, then you can relate :-) Yes, it was a great weekend, spills and all! I'm so glad to be connected here, and thank you for the comment on the last lines.... They just sort of poured out (a bad pun).
Jody, I am just learning how Substack works. This comment about the symphony was something I wrote a while ago, but your poem brought it to mind. The comedy of being human and fallible, or just clumsy, as I am.
My father wished to instill in me a serious love of classical music. It began with “A Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra”, a 33-rpm record, which on the cover featured a nice-looking boy about my age, around 7 years old, with a French horn. After teaching me to identify the instruments and the seating chart for the orchestra and explaining that you never applaud after the first movement, he took me to a live performance. In our hometown, the Pottstown Symphony Orchestra did not have a venue with plush seats and a fancy balcony. The musicians were seated on 3 tiers of risers in a community room with folding chairs for the audience. No matter, I was going with my father to the orchestra, and he had high hopes for the evening.
There was that friendly, discordant miasma of sounds as they tuned up. Something I hadn’t heard on the records we listened to together. The conductor entered, the baton was raised, the music swelled, and then it happened. The cymbalist dropped his cymbal. And it didn’t just fall, it crashed down all 3 tiers with an awful sound. Like the gingerbread man yelling, “you can’t catch me!”, the poor, red-faced cymbalist vainly tried to stop the runaway disk.
For me, this was better than a Tom and Jerry cartoon. I tried to suppress my laughter because my father was not pleased. This was supposed to be the culmination of my early music education, but it remained a hidden delight to me even after I controlled myself. However, this mishap has done more for me than a flawless performance. The conductor kept conducting, the orchestra kept playing, the ringing noise eventually faded away, and the symphony ended harmoniously. I have thought back on this event many times and realized that the worst things I fear may happen won’t be as tragic as I imagine. I have been humiliated, embarrassed, often wished that runaway cymbal would stop, but the music keeps playing, and the final chord will be resolved. I’m just a member of the fallen human race. It’s just the Pottstown Symphony Orchestra, after all.
Oh my gosh, Marcia, what a delightful story! And a perfect illustration of grace and quick thinking!
Thanks for sharing :-)
I love The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra--I have a Leonard Bernstein record of Peter and the Wolf that was part of that ((I think)). Such a great recording!
Peter and the Wolf scared me. My imagination was quite vivid. The duck quacking from the wolf’s belly! That duh-duh-duh-duh duh duh theme still gives me chills!
Oh Jody, I see myself in this, too!
Oof! I relate to this poem so much! I love these lines:
"Here, in front of God and everybody,
My humanity is confirmed, incarnation
Of holy hope in a fallible container"
Oh, this is so very relatable!
Jody, like all of us, you are a delightful mess! Hope that you enjoyed the conference in any case. Your poem made me smile this morning. Thank you.
I like that--a delightful mess! Thanks for letting me know how my words landed for you today, Matthew.
Jody, sounds like your cup runneth over kind of a conference! I know Shirley, Goodness and Mercy are following you! Thanks for sharing your lovely poem and epic time!
HA! I spilled my coffee on the table in the back of the room where I met you. Amy was gracefully quoting Psalms and I was back there trying to figure out how to sop up the mess with the inside of my jean jacket so no one could see, and no one else would have to clean it up later. What a great weekend!
I love the last stanza of your poem, especially this phrase: "incarnation/ Of holy hope in a fallible container" Very nice! So glad I found you here on the web!!
Oh, Janna, then you can relate :-) Yes, it was a great weekend, spills and all! I'm so glad to be connected here, and thank you for the comment on the last lines.... They just sort of poured out (a bad pun).
Jody, I am just learning how Substack works. This comment about the symphony was something I wrote a while ago, but your poem brought it to mind. The comedy of being human and fallible, or just clumsy, as I am.
My father wished to instill in me a serious love of classical music. It began with “A Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra”, a 33-rpm record, which on the cover featured a nice-looking boy about my age, around 7 years old, with a French horn. After teaching me to identify the instruments and the seating chart for the orchestra and explaining that you never applaud after the first movement, he took me to a live performance. In our hometown, the Pottstown Symphony Orchestra did not have a venue with plush seats and a fancy balcony. The musicians were seated on 3 tiers of risers in a community room with folding chairs for the audience. No matter, I was going with my father to the orchestra, and he had high hopes for the evening.
There was that friendly, discordant miasma of sounds as they tuned up. Something I hadn’t heard on the records we listened to together. The conductor entered, the baton was raised, the music swelled, and then it happened. The cymbalist dropped his cymbal. And it didn’t just fall, it crashed down all 3 tiers with an awful sound. Like the gingerbread man yelling, “you can’t catch me!”, the poor, red-faced cymbalist vainly tried to stop the runaway disk.
For me, this was better than a Tom and Jerry cartoon. I tried to suppress my laughter because my father was not pleased. This was supposed to be the culmination of my early music education, but it remained a hidden delight to me even after I controlled myself. However, this mishap has done more for me than a flawless performance. The conductor kept conducting, the orchestra kept playing, the ringing noise eventually faded away, and the symphony ended harmoniously. I have thought back on this event many times and realized that the worst things I fear may happen won’t be as tragic as I imagine. I have been humiliated, embarrassed, often wished that runaway cymbal would stop, but the music keeps playing, and the final chord will be resolved. I’m just a member of the fallen human race. It’s just the Pottstown Symphony Orchestra, after all.
Oh my gosh, Marcia, what a delightful story! And a perfect illustration of grace and quick thinking!
Thanks for sharing :-)
I love The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra--I have a Leonard Bernstein record of Peter and the Wolf that was part of that ((I think)). Such a great recording!
Peter and the Wolf scared me. My imagination was quite vivid. The duck quacking from the wolf’s belly! That duh-duh-duh-duh duh duh theme still gives me chills!