Winter Break

For the first time in my career as a teacher - I have completely blown off work over Winter Break. I mean, I've gone into heavy relax mode before - but this time I haven't been to my office once, nor even checked my e-mail. Of course, living with an infant and having moved into a house that is over twice the distance from school has something to do with that... But it's more than just visiting my classroom or e-mail. My work life seems like a distant dream.

Huh? I have a job? Oh yeah, I do! Umm... Monday... right....

Until then I'm going to continue to spend my days napping on the recliner with my baby son bundled up in a blanket, asleep on my chest.

*sigh*

At The Closing of the Year

If I cannot bring you comfort
then at least I bring you hope
for nothing is more precious
than the time we have and so
we all must learn from small misfortune
count the blessings that are real
let the bells ring out for

at the closing of the year Christmas
let the bells ring out for Christmas

at the closing of the year

Last night was the last caroling engagement for my advanced choir. 40 kids on a crowded little So. Cal island community. The one person whose absence weighed on me was one of my senior sopranos - she had been out for all of the winter season for health reasons (and when I say "health reasons" I mean a combination of pneumonia and concern over possible heart condition) She kept e-mailing me and apologizing for missing so many events, including the winter concert. I kept telling her that she needs to take care of herself, and not worry about us so much.

At the same time, I also know that it killed her not to be able to perform with us. Caroling is half the reason these kids are in the advanced choir to begin with. And this particular kid - a good Christian girl with an off-the-scale level of congeniality, sympathy and compassion... well, it was a severe disappointment not to be there with us.

That's why I decided that if she could not help us bring holiday cheer to the masses, we'd have to bring some to her.

I called her parents and asked if it was okay that we came by the house on our way down to the island and drop off a few goodies. They gave us the thumbs up, so we assembled about a third of the group outside her house, and surprised her with a chorus of "O Come All Ye Faithful" - a bouquet of flowers, a couple of gift cards, and a little something from Build-A-Bear. We just about put her in tears.

If we sang no where else this year, this one tiny performance would have been enough.

Happy Holidays, everyone.

Adventures in Caroling.

* It's becoming painfully obvious that my "advanced" choir is in a rebuilding year. It's not that I don't have talent, it's that I have an underabundance of leaders. The new people are kind of clueless - about having to learn parts (and what that means, exactly), about rehearsal etiquette, about stage professionalism. We were caroling over the weekend at a community event when three of my freshman failed to meet us after a break. Ten minutes into our last set they rejoined us, with slices of pizza and sodas in their hands. We had to have a little talk.

* First gig of the season - caroling down a busy boulevard for the local holiday "walk." Every year we compete with more and more rock band who set up in just about every nook and cranny that can fit more than three people along the busy street. We resorted to going into restaurants and cafe's to sing. One of them asked us to leave because we were making it hard for the servers to get around. Bah Humbug.

* Second gig of the season - singing at a veteran's hospital for people who are sick and/or dying. I forget how powerful this can be. I took my kids through the halls, singing to open doors. Every once in a while I see people propped up in their beds, unable to even turn towards us and watch us walk by. The kids manage to keep going, but I get too choked up to sing after a while.

* Third gig of the season - later that same day, we sang at a holiday party at the local performing arts center for a group of high-powered investors. Despite our decidedly mediocre performance, we were showered with praise and gifts (including a couple bottles of wine for me). The poignancy of the contrast between the lush, pristine setting of this event and that of the hospital just hours earlier was not lost on me.

*

"Dear Mr. Maestro, I'm sorry for not contacting you sooner. My daughter, Miss K will not be able to perform tomorrow at X event. She has an important test coming up, and I don't want her to miss class. Thank you for understanding - Mrs. K"

"Dear Mrs. K. Thank you for e-mailing. Don't worry about it. No problem. In fact, given that Miss K misses over 2/3 of the caroling gigs, we stopped relying on her over a year ago. Happy Holidays to you and yours! - M"

* Four more gigs to go - I wish the kids would discover he benefits of ironing their concert attire in between engagements.