To Err Is Human...

I made a mistake last night. I know that comes as a huge surprise to any one who knows me. Probably the surprise is that I admitted it, right? OK, really! I was visiting a friend out in Tanglewood (for those outside of Houston, west of the Galleria) and had to go from there to a party over in 3rd Ward (again, non-Houstonians, just past the eastern edge of the Medical Center). As I am wont to do, I was trying to figure out the quickest way to get there without consulting a) my Key Map or b) my Human Key Map (aka, The Organist).

My initial thought was to take the 610 Loop south to 288 and around to Calumet. As I passed the exit for 59 I thought, hmmm. It would be far more direct to take 59 north to 288, as they intersect right at Calumet. Remember, this thought process occurred after I passed the 59 exit. So then I thought, well, it'd be a bit of a pain to turn around and catch 59. It'd be a bigger pain, plus a lot more time and gas (and therefore money) to stay on 610.

So I turned around.

In the U-turn at Beechnut, a thought occurred to me. How many times have we/I continued down a path that clearly wasn't the best one for us/me, just because we were/I was already on it? It comes down to the question of what is expedient versus what is best. Doing what ultimately turned out to be the right thing entailed a certain amount of inconvenience. I had to admit my wrong thinking, figure out how to reverse course, actually reverse course, make up the lost distance and finally, get where I wanted to be.

It sounds hard, but it wasn't. I was happy that I had saved a little time and gas and remembered, before it was too late, the best way to get from point A to point B.

Hmmm. I wonder where else I can apply this epiphany? My list is pretty long. Bet yours is too.

Flies time...

Has it been a week already? Where did the time go? Well, that would be where school comes in. Ah, the beginning of a new academic year. When you're out of school for a long time, you forget that New Year's Day really comes in late August/early September. That sense of possibility, of a reasonably clean slate that we're supposed to feel on January 1. Well, depending on what you occupied yourself with on December 31.

Here's the beginning of our occasional series on the Yankee Hobbit's trip to China this summer.

As I expected, the foodstuffs in China were very different from America. And not just the "cuisine." On one of our in-country flights, we were served these hard candies. Since none of us read Chinese (need an abbreviation for that-- it will reappear a lot!) we didn't know until we ate it that it was some kind of fizzy soda candy. Really cool. It felt like that first sip of a really intense, cold bottle of soda. Spent the rest of the trip trying to find some to bring back to the States, with no success. Actually, very few of us intended to eat the things as we had already been fooled once. Turns out there's a flavor of hard candy with a picture of what looked like lemon on the wrapper. SNOURC, that's all we had to go on. Our trip leader, who actually did have some Chinese fluency, handed them out and told us they were lemon drops.

Now, you know what it's like to have prepared your head for one flavor and then your taste buds encounter another. And you know what it's like when those two flavors are not really related to one another. Now imagine that the one encountered by your taste buds is not only not related to the one you were prepared for, but is one that your experience tells you doesn't really belong in candy form. Now you know what it was like to suck on what alleged to be a lemon drop but was really a corn drop. Ack.

More another day. Must raid the reserve shelf at the library!

ta...

Addendum

So, I fell asleep on the couch during the news tonight. Happens rather a lot. If I am supine and the TV is on, out I go. It's a sad thing. The point? I woke up during Letterman, who I like enough to stay awake for, assuming I have not gone horizontal. Woke up in the middle of Letterman, around the time of the musical guest, who tonight was FatBoy Slim. I've heard of him, courtesy of People, Star and other scholarly reading, but had no interest in his oeuvre. Didn't even know his professing genre.

He's a rapper, I guess. But it was very eclectic! Surprisingly and refreshingly so. He actually sang his rhymes all the way through, with a clever keyboard riff (courtesy of Paul whatshisname from Letterman and the band), a DJ, 5-member back-up vocals and a juggler. You read correctly, a juggler.

This being a rap-ish presentation, the juggler remained in my visual background. Besides, I was too busy being mesmerized by the gospel-ish back-up singers. But about a quarter of the way through, I started paying attention: the juggler, Chris Bliss, was juggling 4 balls in perfect synchronization with the singing and (during breaks) the music. Oh. My. Goodness. I was amazed and astounded.

I may just have to check them both out.

And the background light wash? Red.

The color is... RED!

Anyone else remember that great '70s movie, The Wiz? You know, the African-American remake of The Wizard of Oz with an African-American cast featuring Diana Ross (pre-weave), Nipsey Russell (bless his soul) and Michael Jackson (before he was white)? Emerald City is set as this Harlem Renaissance-on-steroids kind of place with elegant people circling and dancing around at the whim of the Wiz, who declares what the color of the moment is. Once he says "The color is... [enter color here]," the entire scene changes color, costumes and all, and the denizens of Oz sing the virtues of the new color and of how passé the old one was.

I guess you had to be there.

Anyway, the color of the day appears to be red. Everybody dance now.

Seriously. We have a RED terrorist alert, thanks to those bozos with the liquid explosives. [Disclosure alert: now the threat is yellow, but don't freeze my flow, ok?] The forecast high today in Houston was 98 degrees with a heat index of 110, which gave us an Ozone alert of RED. It's August, so my bank account is probably riding rather close to RED. I have iritis, which means that my right eye is RED. I'm here in Texas, which as you know is a RED state (to my everlasting chagrin). You get my drift.

But don't misunderestimate me (speaking of red states). I love red. But the good kind. My dream home will have at least one wall in "Ming Red." My pedicure always ends in the application of some shade of red or another. [Lateral annotation: my nail salon uses OPI products. Their marketing people are completely, brilliantly clever. The shades have names like "Friar, Friar, Pants on Fire" and "Mrs. O'Leary's BBQ."] I am currently coveting the Le Creuset Demi Tea Kettle with Symphonic Whistle in red. There are several (ok, dozens) of red items in my wardrobe. In fact my favorite shade to wear is one I endearingly refer to as "Screaming Whore Red." I'm told that is a real shade, but for me it's more of a category. I heard it once and decided, for euphony alone, I had to make it mine. Not sure if it is supposed to be the red that a screaming whore would wear, or if there is a comma missing, as in a red that is both screaming and whorish. I by no means intend to indicate that I am in any way, shape or form a screamer, a whore, or a screaming whore. One can never be too careful where inferences are involved.

Speaking of being careful, I love the way this blog thingy lets you link texts to websites. I like it because it means I don't have to explain everything that might want explaining. The benefit for you is that if you don't need the explanation, you can skip it; which might be difficult if the entire explanation/illustration were in the blogbody (is that a word? You're on your own). Again, I digress. The website with which I chose to elucidate iritis (see above if you've been skipping around this post. Bad Yankee Hobbit Fan!) mentions the fact that it can result in blindess if it is not treated.

Now granted, this is a blog, so it is heavy on my ideas and personal experiences. And I've had iritis 3 times now. Each time it has been one of the more painful experiences I have had, a view I am told is fairly universal to the condition. Almost from the onset you have extreme sensitivity to light (my brother in law the pediatrician calls it photophobia, which is more descriptive) and even if you manage to elude the photons, you generally feel like someone is wrenching white-hot (or shall I say red-hot) pokers into the center of your brain. In exactly what universe would someone not seek treatment for that? Deep sigh of exasperation.

For those of you who do read and follow the illustrations, worry not. Most (80-90%) cases have no known cause, are not connected to systemic illness and resolve fairly quickly (thank God) with steroid drops. I am not, so far, in the minority in this instance.

Anyhoo, supper calls. Have a red-diggety day! In the best way....

Minority Report

It is good to be back! We took an unintended vacation when we left town without our log-in information. Bad Yankee Hobbit. And so much happened this week! Thanks to my newly-minted Canadian sister-friend for pointing out the typo in "Kudos." It be fixed.

I am a minority. Not for any of the obvious reasons either. I am one of the very few Americans who can honestly say that I love my new driver's license photo! This is no vain-diva moment— it is an unusually pro-me moment! I loathe just about every photo of me in existence after about the age of 15 (I'm sure there's something Freudian about that. Or Jungian. Or Whoeverian.). But this photo, taken by some bored State functionary at the end of a very long work day, looks just like I wanted it to look. Imagine my surprise when I tore open that envelope today. And in just 2 weeks, rather than the promised 6-8. Progress, I tell you!

Whilst vacationing in the thankfully-not-melting North, I had the opportunity to attend my mother's Sorority's summer bash (technically my sorority too, BTW). A dinner dance. Those of you who know me know I was not necessarily looking forward to it; it was more of a filial duty kind of thing. Me? Dancing and socializing? With people I either a) don't know or b) haven't seen in close to 20 years? Yum. But fear not, Gentle Reader— I had a blast!

My mother and sister (Bob Vilette, aka The Feng Shui Queen and DIY Diva), both fabulously attired, "gently" coerced me into the Electric Slide. Other than my inappropriate footwear, it was fun. There was another line dance too. I think it was The Booty Call. My grandmother asked me if "they" did this in Texas. I said, "they" might, but I don't get out anywhere where such things might happen.

One incredibly cool thing was seeing all of these people, mostly women, many well over 60, dressed to the nines and partying down. In. Heels. I would love to look that good at 40, let alone 60+. And they looked, the ones I knew anyway, like they've aged Not. One. Iota. Life is completely unfair-- but way better than the alternative.

[Side note on that: Once upon a time, my quasi-long-lost friend the Organist was on an "I want to be a funeral director" kick. So we all went to the National Museum of Funeral History (bet you didn't know 1) there was one and 2) it's in Houston. Consider yourself enlightened). Can't have a museum without a gift shop and this is no exception. They have a line of products emblazoned with their motto: "Any day above ground is a good one.™" Hell of a way to gain perspective, n'est-ce pas?]

Of course, on the other end of the spectrum, today I had my eyes examined. (Head is next on the list...) The ophthamologist's assistant-ette, who looked to be barely 20, said something to me along the lines of, "I say that to a lot of my older patients." Me? An older patient? When the you-know-when did that happen?

My nieces and nephews probably find me old too, but they have an excuse— not a one of them is over 12. It was muy fabuloso to spend time with them. It's a great by-product of "ADG's Home for the Very Juvenile and Quite Aged." Since my mom watches the kiddos on weekdays, I got to hang out with them. They are all brilliant and stunningly beautiful— to a one. The aforementioned Bob Vilette has 3 girls, ages 7, 8 & 11 and my baby sister (aka The Entrepreneur and Jewelry Designer Extraordinaire) has 2 boys, 2 and 4. I miss being around them all of the time, but on the other hand, they are always very different than the last time I saw them.

We took the kids to the Butterfly Conservancy in Niagara Falls, Ontario. Not as large as the Cockrell Center in Houston (which, in the spirit of full disclosure, I have not actually been to), but verrrrry cool. They are everywhere in there. My 2 year old nephew is still in the vocabulary gathering process, so they were all "bees." As is pretty much any flying insectoid object. The older kiddos were as fascinated as he was. As we all were. I was particularly taken with the blue swallowtails. Lovely! Getting there was also fun; we took the scenic route along the Niagara River, which goes- as one might imagine- right by the Falls. When one lives so close to one of the great natural wonders of the world, one tends to forget their majesty. Thank you for the reminder— it was completely awesome. As was not wrecking the car trying to see them while driving.

Okaaay. Off to study modes, scales, Augmented 6th chords and the other instruments of torture known as Music Theory. Big placement exam tomorrow. Thanks for the link, Joan!

Kudos

Brevity, being the soul of wit, dictates (thanks, Beth!) a short post today.

Big-ole shout outs to:
My student for singing one helluva great recital this afternoon. Anaemia rocked! (As did just about the entire affair.)

My dear friend of long acquaintance who has been recommended for tenure in the Diplomatic Service of the U S of A (Veuve, baby, Veuve!).

My Organist, who with a random call prevented me from completely having my first wedding blank-out.

My friend and coach KW who reminded me not to scream at the end of the Strauss trio.

My lungs for holding out during same.

Whoever finds (and RETURNS!) the pearl bracelet I lost at the Hobby Center this afternoon.

My various airport transport teams this summer!

As my nephew says,

Peace out...

Welcome to the Land of Expectations

In fifth grade, I encountered what would turn out to be one of the most enduring loves of my life. No, not some hot pre-adolescent, but a book: Norton Juster's The Phantom Tollbooth. My teacher, Mrs. Langmeyer, decided to have the class read it as a project. Ultimately, we turned it into a play and performed it for all of City Honors School. Or maybe just all of the fifth grade. Memory is a tricky thing.

There was once a boy named Milo who didn't know what to do with himself─ not just sometimes, but always.

When he was in school he longed to be out, and when he was out he longed to be in. [...] Nothing really interested him─ least of all the things that should have. *

Talk about an opening hook. The book goes on to describe how Milo comes home from school one day to a large box with an enveloped addressed "FOR MILO, WHO HAS PLENTY OF TIME." The box turns out to be a tollbooth, complete with tokens, a map, three precautionary signs ("to be used in a precautionary fashion") and "One (1) book of rules and traffic regulations, which may not be bent or broken."*

And with that, he is off on the adventure of a lifetime, one that challenges all of his assumptions, shifts his paradigms and generally reorders his life. The first place he comes to is Expectations, where he is met by the Whether Man.

"What kind of a place is Expectations," inquired Milo... "Good question, good question... Expections is the place you must always go to before you get to where you're going. Of course, some people never go beyond Expectations, but my job is to hurry them along whether they like it or not."*

Wow. I tell you, I love this book. I've probably bought six copies, because I keep giving them to people. It's a book I read every couple few years, just because my understanding of it changes according to what's going on in my world. Like that last paragraph for example. I've been reading that one for 30 years and it has just now hit home. Probably because I vacillate between having a summer home in Expectations and driving past it completely.

I know summer is drawing to an end (well, calendar-wise anyway─ we're stuck with this weather 'till Christmas), but you have time to squeeze in one more book.

For the record, I portrayed the Undersecretary of Understanding. You'll have to read the book to get the details.

Some other books I adored (and have spent my adult life re-procuring):

Mélisande (Margery Sharp and Roy McKie), "the pictorial memoir of... a dog... who becomes a famous opera singer and the darling of musical society." I loved this book waaaayy before I ever considered being a singer. How's that for prophetic? (Well, obviously not the part about the Met.)

James and the Giant Peach (Roald Dahl), which was later turned into a Tim Burton film. Pretty much all of Dahl's books are on the list.

Horace, the Friendly Octopus (Richard E. Drdek), a way before its time tale of what really makes a family.

If you didn't already know, I am a serious reader. I will read just about anything. My middle sister the Feng Shui Queen and Home Improvement Diva teased me for years because I found the deed to the house and got into it. It is mostly my mother's fault. She is and always has been a voracious reader and got me started somewhere around the age of 2 with a love of words and books. Then in third grade, Ms. Clements (truly a hipper teacher than any class deserved to have─ even in the '70s), read to us most afternoons. By then I was truly hooked. And hope to stay that way.

OK. The running of the toilet is yanking me back to reality.

*Juster, Norton. The Phantom Tollbooth. New York: Random House, 1961.

Martyrdom?

Clearly, martyrdom is no laughing matter, but on the other hand...

I have a friend who is the funniest person on the planet. She's the kind of person you never spend time with when you have a full bladder, because it is inevitable that she will make you laugh so hard that you find yourself in great danger of needing clean underwear. Actually, I have several friends like that, but I digress (imagine that, wouldja?).

Anyway my friend used to tell us how her mother (I think) would reply to some whiny comment made in her general vicinity by saying, "Yeah, Foxe's Book of Martyrs Page 17 ." Which I never understood, being unschooled in the ways of the early Protestant Reformers. Or maybe it was her mother who was on Page 17? Details, nevermind.

All that to say, I think I might be on page 954!

As I get older, I realize that I have a strong tendency to do things the hardest way possible and with the most sacrifice on my part. And to what end, exactly? Like in this sublime piece of music on which I am currently working, the final Act III trio from Richard Strauss' Der Rosenkavalier (I'm telling you, you can hear it live, live I say, on Sunday afternoon at 5...).

Strauss was fiendishly brilliant. Wrote lines that can make you weep to see them on the page, let alone performed. He was also really good at the big picture. To wit: on paper, a lot of the phrases he wrote go on for ... days. The key word here is "on paper." Apparently, according to my coaches and conductors, no one actually sings them that way in performance. Not even the iron-lunged Renée Fleming, my personal goddess du chant du moment.

Without that knowledge however, Ms. Page 954, 2006 beats her head against hard surfaces trying to make the line happen the way it looks, at the expense of the beauty intended therein. In short, a breath martyr!

But I'm a work in progress, and I take grace where I find it (or more likely than not, where it is thrust upon me). And with it the freedom that comes from knowing that things are even more beautiful and fulfilling when you can enjoy them whilst they are happening, rather than worrying about outcomes.

A musing on another topic (since I skipped Wednesday. And technically Thursday). What must it be like to have a visceral affirmation of the importance of something in your life? I don't know that I've ever experienced that. Likely because I have not yet, for any reason (please God), been deprived of anything I truly found important.

I have another young friend who is on a sabbatical from her music studies. I met her some time ago, after this sabbatical had been underway for a while. We discussed her musical inclinations and the fact that at some point she wanted to get back to them, but there was no urgency to the conversation.

Today, unbeknownst to me, she happened by during a dress rehearsal I was conducting. I took an unscheduled break and saw her there, visibly upset. We took a moment to chat and she said something to the effect of, "I just miss singing so much!" Her reaction to the musicmaking was a clear, gut-deep indicator that something integral to her being was lacking in her life.

For a moment I was─ I don't know─ envious? Assured? Awed? I presume that the things I do/am/have are what really keep me going, but how do I know? How do any of us know? Maybe in my case it's the little affirmations (ok, sometimes not so little) that let me know I'm on the right path. I have to admit though, a quasi-Damascus-Road-kind-of-moment would certainly make things easier!

For whom the bell tolls...

Well, here it is the next day. Great record so far. And a great day. I taught a good voice lesson today. My student is doing a recital Sunday, so we've started rehearsing with her accompanist, an excellent Organist friend of mine. She (the student) is doing really well, so if she's reading this, fret not! You are not the direct inspiration. He (the accompanist) is also doing a fabulous job. (This means, essentially, that they more or less do what I want. And since I'm in charge...)

In addition to being really good, they are both really young. Which is the direct inspiration for this-- or at least the trigger that reminded me of a past "rant." Most of my students are college-aged or slightly beyond. Meaning that they are significantly younger than I. Basically, the next generation (as odd as that is to say). And I find, as I discuss with my friends who are old farts like me, that all of the technological advances we are witnessing are not being met by similar advances in what we used to call general/common knowledge. The bottom is dropping out!

My students and their contemporaries can tell me lots about IMing, HTML, blogs, music downloading, CG movie and game technology, but they can't tell me a story.

Once upon a time, a bear family lived in the woods. There was a Daddy Bear, a Mommmy Bear and Baby Bear...

Story-telling used to be something everyone did and everyone knew. Our parents told us stories, their parents told them stories. I know some of us tell our kids stories. But the kids I teach don't seem to know how to tell them. Sure, they've heard them, but they can't tell them.

Why is this important to a single chick who sings? As I tell my old fart civilian (i.e. non-musician-- actually in this case, non-singing) friends, story-telling is what separates singers from every other musician on the planet, at least technically. All musicians share notes, rhythms, lines, phrases, form. But only singers tell stories. Once upon a time, that was imprinted on our cultural DNA. You didn't have to teach that part in a lesson. But now upon a time, along with the nuts and bolts, I find myself teaching cadence, pacing, timing-- when and how to deliver a punchline.

Along the same lines, another of our lost cultural genes is the canon of great literature. My wonderful student (who I repeat, is doing a great job) is singing a Poulenc set this weekend. Both she while learning it and her accompanist today required an explanation about Jason, the Argonauts and the Golden Fleece. Another student had no idea who Anansi the Spider was. And I finally had to go out and buy Harold and the Purple Crayon for my studio because NOT ONE of my students had ever heard of or read one of the greatest stories about creativity and imagination that exists today. This is, lamentably, not a new thing for me.

Actually, just yesterday I was in a very tall, large chair in a doctor's office and I mentioned to the phlebotomist that I felt like Lily Tomlin's Edith Ann. She looked at me like I had two heads. "You don't know who that is, do you?" I said. "No," she replied blankly. I just sighed deeply and felt a sudden communion with my elders who probably had similar conversations with me about Milton Berle, or someone similarly iconic.

Sigh. Verrrrrry deep sigh. For whom does the bell toll? Cultural literacy, it tolls for thee.