IrishOboe

8:30-10 Yoga (when I can)

10-11:30 Music History (800-1300)

12:15-1:15 German for foreigners

Music history is sometimes a great challenge for me because of the complicated German used and my total lack of historical and medieval musical knowledge.  Today was good but last week I was totally lost.  I guess a 50% hit or miss rate isn’t so bad.  When I’m not lost I enjoy it very much.  I suppose it would do me a great deal of good to try to boil down the main ideas and present them to you, but that’s hard to do when you are lost . . .

In German we mostly speak and then work on grammar points that come up as a result.  It’s not a bad thing for the level I’m at.  I hope to catch some frequent mistakes of mine before they become too engrained.

Tonight I went to Annie’s for an Indian dinner with six other Schola girls.  It was lovely.  I brought ingredients for mango lassi and we had a regular feast of tandoori chicken, naan, chapatti, okra, and more.  We had a lovely time talking then we played a funny game and the three of us who stayed last spoke of spiritual matters.  Conversations like that remind me that no matter how much I like to enjoy life and laugh and carry on, I cannot live on that alone and the sharing of deeper matters is so important to me.  Another girl put it so well.  She said something about how musicians are a sensitive and emotional bunch and we have a need to be comfortable, to connect, to share and be open to other musicians in order to play well together.  I identify with this need to share and understand and be understood and I don’t think everyone has that need, or to the same extent.  In this case, she used it as an illustration of how a musician’s life makes it hard to remain faithful to one’s spouse (since their work involves becoming emotionally involved with other people over concentrated periods of time as in rehearsals, concerts and especially tours).  Once again I was told that American and Canadian men are much more faithful than European men.  How somehow faithfulness is a value nearly extinct in the European mind.  I survived nearly a month without being exposed to the seedy side of the artistic world, or the world in general.  In all honesty, in these cases, I’d rather stick my head in the sand, but I suppose it’s good to have fair warning of some of the cultural difference I might have to face if I find myself attracted to someone who is not from my side of the pond.  But I fear I am coming dangerously close to making xenophobic statements and the excuse that I was parroting Europeans is not a very good one.  As long as I’m generalizing, I’ll say that so far in my limited experience I find Europeans much more open to opposing points of view.  It is nice because I can share my faith without fear, but it is frustrating because in general, they don’t care.  Strange that hostility might be easier to take than apathy.

I forgot to write about Tuesday night Bible study.  We had MBudget (the store brand sounds it sounds better in Swiss German) pizza with extra goodies on top and we proceeded to study Daniel.  It seems to be the book of the year, and not an easy one for my first Bible study in German.  I managed to following along and could tell some interesting discussion was going on, but couldn’t quite catch the points.  I followed along well enough to answer a question or two when they were addressed to me and I learned a lot of words that have to do with faith that I don’t hear anywhere else because I go to an English speaking church.  The main word for the day was Fürbitte, which means intercession.  I’m sure as time goes on I’ll have to look up words like grace, mercy, sin, repentance, etc. less and less and begin to follow better.  I met a singer from Germany who I thought was a native English speaker, though she just learned in school and later study abroad.  Of course, Mom has shown I’m not the best judge of hearing native intonation now.  I accepted a Christmas Day potential gig because so far I have no other plans and it will pay most of December’s rent.  Again the most beautiful part of the evening was singing together.  This time we sang Mozart’s Ave Verum Corpus and will be shown a liar since I love this piece but claim to dislike Mozart.  I usually say I like his opera works but not his solo and chamber works, so I might be excused.  Or it might be favorable emotional circumstances.  In any case, my heart melts hearing it and it reminds me of some of the most precious times at church growing up.  We sang it our choir director’s daughter’s wedding and I was allowed to join even though I was too young to officially be in the adult church choir.  Singing it again I imagined a ghost of the future flying to the 11 or 12 year-old Janet and presenting the picture of where she will be the next time she sings it.  I had a free imagination, but I don’t think I ever dreamed anything close to it.  It is funny how things go.  Sometime during the week I was full to overflowing with the knowledge of how incredible lucky I am to be doing what I am doing.  If I can’t have a family, or at least not yet, then what a grand life to have instead!  I miss family and home terribly still but instead of whining about how much I want to be with everyone for Thanksgiving and how I burst into tears reading Mom’s itinerary email and how lonely I am I think I’ll use the energy to connect to the people I love and who love me no matter the distance!

Hugs and kisses