Survival of the weakest

“Mom, look at her leg,” a child who sat in the front row remarked, followed by a short giggle and a loud hush.  I just began my piece on the piano but my right leg started to shake uncontrollably.  It took all my focus to keep my foot steady on the pedal.  My fingers, automaton, managed the piece without me. Thankfully.  Or not.  Those hours of honing into the emotion of the piece were lost.  When the recital ended, I couldn’t bear to get up and face the audience. I remember thinking they deserved better.  The piano deserved better.  The pretty pink dress my mom painstakingly chose for me deserved better.  That was me at the first recital of the year –  the weakest piano player among my elite peers.Read More »

Friendship

“A true friend holds us lovingly accountable to our own ideals, but is also able to forgive, over and over, the ways in which we fall short of them and can assure us that we are more than our stumbles, that we are shaped by them but not defined by them, that we will survive […]

Photo by Dayne Topkin on Unsplash

Foxtrot in the kitchen

It is the most wonderful thing when a memory catches up with one unexpectedly.  Maybe it’s the balmy summer night air or maybe it’s the sight of a box of waffle ice cream cones that sat unopened on my kitchen counter top.  But, I found myself pulled into a dance that took place half a lifetime ago.Read More »

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

Feeding misery

” Life is really simple but we insist on making it complicated.” ~ Confucius

Have you had a sleepless night before?  I had that kind of night a few months ago, where confusion, anger and sadness were all tangled and mangled into an unrecognizable jumble of helplessness that was me. Read More »