Survival guide for the pipe organ

"That's a work out!" observed an alto about the organ part for the anthem this week. "Someone should bring her a bagel!" "Or some Gatorade." It was true, I had to swing my legs south to the low notes, alternating with reaching for the volume pedal, then stretching feet way up north to land on unexpected notes again. I must have some specially evolved bench gripping muscles in my butt, because sometimes I don't know how I stay on.

This is piece by John Rutter, that moves at the speed of light, has enough notes to break a wheelbarrow, an organ part that goes north and south while the singers go east and west, and charges helpfully into 7/8s time signature at one point.

I feel like I'm jumping out of an airplane when I begin the intro. Into the mess! Heave ho! Faster louder harder!

Double tasking at its most insurmountable. Watch conductor (somehow, out of my third eye that's not blocked by the massive organ console?), play both feet, play both hands, modulate volume with feet, turn pages with hands, stay adhered to bench. All at breakneck speed.

Somehow our conductor is the nicest man alive and does not fault me for the 35 additional unexpected notes I offered during rehearsal.

I asked him for survival advice, and the best way to live through battle was to not worry so much about the exact notes, but stay in the rhythm and feeling of the thing. Better to leave a few notes out than to try for every one and gain ugly addendum notes in the process.

I practiced this piece doggedly all week, starting with a shapeless lump of clay, and working with it to create some art. The clay starts cold and unapproachable, difficult to mold, and I can watch the process of learning and adapting take place as it becomes something recognizable.

"Phil.   ...   Phil.   Phil!    Phil!"  Its Sunday morning before church and I'm clinging to the bench and paddling away at the pedals and then realize there is a gentleman staring at me. And his wife is trying to get his attention. I'm practicing the finale of the choir piece. "Its just so exciting!" he gushes and then his wife comes over and we three realize we have similarities of gardening and places we've been before. I do love living here.

All this work for 3 minutes of glory Sunday morning. Or at least 3 minutes of adrenaline-pumped energizing praise. We do not over-rehearse in this choir, aiming not to exhaust the singers over too many details. Efficiency and preparedness instead. Everyone's still excited about the piece this way, a little raw, like that energy of a first kiss. I draw on that which I cultivated as a horse girl--Forced Calm--where the horse can feel what you're experiencing and magnifies it. Such on the pipe organ.

They sang. I expressed notes. I landed the final tower of a chord and that was glorious; the director made the International Relief Sign at me (brow wipe) and that was that.

After the smoke cleared I realized my sparkly scarf was shimmering with movement, my heart beating so bigly that the scarf picked it up. I'm rarely nervous anymore (history knows this has not always been the case, one of the unexpected boons of having "grown up"), on the pipe organ or elsewhere, so its kind of a novelty for me. I just wish I could work to be more present at these times when all I see is flames. But the afterward felt really grand.

The Beatles In Pennsylvania

Well here we are again folks, as my dad would say. Its 4:50 in the morning, and that's what one says when one has been lugged roughly into it from the bliss of sleep.

It feels like I should go to the airport now.

But instead I am driving to Pennsylvania.

Life of a research technician in crops and soils. I don't actually mind my task today, it is one of helping and following directions and not making my own decisions. My own project and grant writing and telling others what to do can wait--and this is why I like this job so much for its diversity--and instead my role is as Helper. Graduate Student #5 in our lab, or The Clever Irreverent One, has a beetle diversity project in two different locations, one being the foreign and incorrigible land of Pennsylvania. We're looking at how different densities of organic corn and soybeans influence beetle population and weed seed predation. All week I've been focusing on this project with Clever, as its Northeast Bug Week or whatever, and I've spent much of every day setting out little round plates of appealing weed seed snacks for beetles to browse. Then we, or rather, some other unfortunate research assistant, will count what's left to determine what was eaten.

One of my favorite little portions of this job, which I didn't expect, is serving a support role, a little bit being the mom of the lab. I've been a consoling ear to overwhelmed and upset grad students, I've made people eat my backup banana chips when I've noticed them get stoic and silent and hungry during field work. I've helped with all things logistical.  "How do I get the biomass samples taken and get the seeds counted all before my class at 2pm?" It's logistics. "It's not a crisis: it's a puzzle," I'll say and we calm down and accomplish things.

So Clever and I are driving south through thick morning fog, talking about artificial intelligence, listening to the BBC or Sirius radio. The light is growing imperceptibly up through the fog, even a thick gray fog seems bright in comparison with the black early morning.

Clever groans about Pennsylvania; "careful yuh don't git spit on", he'll say, as everyone seems to be chewing tobacco, 
or roll his eyes about the hunting shops and diesel mud-spattered pickups idling in the gas station parking lot, the occupants eating massive sandwiches.

But for all the redneckosity and the mines, and granted this is not all of Pennsylvania of course, there are some beautiful bucolic vistas, low mountains rolling and crossing, views down into valleys green with crops.

The research site in Pennsylvania is a testament to the power of organic weed management, ie, tine weeding, because it had none. I'm walking through the corn plots, the lambsquarters and pigweed as tall as I am, pornographic terrible trees these things are, leaning aggravatingly into the rows. I'd traverse through, flapping blindly through the corn leaves, pulling myself thru these grabbing weeds, like combing dreadlocked hair. I'd put out my little plate of seeds for the beetles, then turn around and exit that plot and comb everyone the opposite direction again.

Clever and I arrive in the dewy morning, a large research cornfield of work in front of us. "It's sunny and beautiful!, put on your rain gear everyone!" calls out Clever. This is because the dew here is insurmountable, as if every leaf were supporting a thin flat pond; walking through the plots would soak us. So we kit up and slosh through the plots. My feet carry a sludge of mud, water, and weed seeds. We're itchy from the grabbing weeds and work stoicly, hours on end of going into every single one of the hundreds of plots, doing the same little task systemically and carefully.  Champions of Science.

When we finish, Clever and I are hooting and cheering, and there's muddy high-fives and yah! how happy are we to have finished this experiment. A latte, shower, rest, lunch, whatever, becomes immeasurably more satisfying after something like this.

100 miles of rain musings

I write this sitting in my bed, listening to the rain. This is an appropriate way to appreciate the rain right now, in a distant non-interactive format. Because I bicycled 100 miles in it today, circling Cayuga Lake, for the AIDS fundraiser ride.

My socks became as sponges in my sandals (laugh you may, but my feet must breathe); the fenders which had for the first 10 minutes been my pride and pleasure now guttered drainage directly into my feet. The raincoat wicked water over my arms, clammy extensions that they were, though blessedly my torso stayed dry. Water beads conglomerated at the rim of my helmet and slid smoothly to and fro, primary glinting things in my vision.

And I was really quite happy. I settled into the rain and it eroded out of my priority. I was drinking electrolytes, which I've not treated myself to before (astonishingly!) and now I know why they are called sports drinks. That sugar and salt plumbed itself directly where it needed to go and my legs churned on.  Gone now are those days of finishing a long ride feeling starved but also pregnant, the equivalent of 7 meals sitting heavily and unactualized in my gut.  Liquid calories! I must have consumed thousands upon thousands of them today, and I felt fierce and fine. I was a hummingbird.

Humming along, i had lots of time to think and gaze out over the still misty lake, and so I decided that for me, biking in the rain is a little like learning to live with a heart break or sadness. And it has been a year of falling for and trying to get over unattainable people, so I've had plenty of fodder. Both rain and heart sadness can be startling at first, and uncomfortable and you resist it. But then, eventually, however long it may take, you come slowly to accept it. Then you look out and notice the farm houses and the misty lake views. But you're still wet, though it may not overtake all your thoughts, its still a backdrop.  Sometimes it may pour, others it may only drizzle. Disappointment or sadness may in fact make the rest of the experiences more compelling or poignant in comparison. Who knows, I'm still working on this.

I was quite happy with my 5:30am decision to don myself in a sparkly sequins shirt under my raincoat, appearing ready for a dance party, and one green bicycle tall sock and one block bicycle tall sock. "Hey sparkle lady" one rider called out, and an older man, upon seeing me, cracked this huge smile: "your outfit! This totally makes my day! Thank you so much." Also, lots of: "love the SOCKS" as people passed or I passed them. I realized these non-standard wardrobe choices are a way of interacting with the world, and I was enjoying this easy excuse to look up from the pavement or away from the corn to connect, however briefly, with some other riders.

7 hours and 51 minutes in the damp saddle, and somehow the time never dragged. I celebrated reaching the top of the lake, I noticed the switch from quaint cottages to farm houses and double-wide trailers as we rowed around the Seneca falls inland area. I enjoyed the company of my indefatigable uncle, where we talk or not talk. But a lot of the ride was in solo silence, not really having thoughts concretely or intentionally ("and now I shall think about THIS") but instead sitting with my life. 

I sat with how blessed I am to have so many FRIENDS, really sat with this and was warmed in the rain. And also how supportive everyone has been with their donations to this ride. Thank you! And also how this lake and Ithaca have always actually been a section in my life: as a child coming here to float whimsically around on my grandparent's sailboat, the child's imagination burgeoning of pirates or pilgrims or Columbus. Ithaca itself meant the science center, feeding the ducks, Lego's and spaceships with my highly novel boy cousins. Being shuttled around by parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents, to enjoy the time with other family members.

And now I am here as myself, forging ahead with a "grown-up" job, making friends, tending my apartment, going out and walking the commons at night if I want.

Its amazing that two very different versions of myself have existed here. I thought about that in the rain too. 

Thoughts from the Mom Van

Science needs to happen! Cover crops to cut and bag. Soil to core. Weed-free plots to make weed-free. Soybeans to count. Ah, studying sustainable agriculture. And for all this to happen our lab has hired a number of undergraduate research assistants this summer.

Which means I am now a supervisor.  (!)

I have never really served this role before, and had you told me that I’d be doing such even a few years ago, I’d be mighty surprised.  Myself and Master Chris, (lab manager and brilliant with any farm implement), work together to make science happen. “Champions of Science!” Co-worker Brian called us one day, and I’m kind of adopting the moniker for our lab team, in a way laughing how us Champions of Science spend our days ingloriously hand-weeding, counting soybeans, and identifying various grasses to species.  Not flashy work, but the quiet pumps behind the goal of making agriculture as sustainable and efficient as possible.  

It’s no small task to help coordinate the field work that needs to happen in a number of experiments, helping the grad students if they need it, partitioning the research assistants out to different projects.

When we first had out group of new assistants on board, and I was realizing that I would be Supervisor, I wasn’t sure at all how to deal with this. These first weeks were wearied confusion, as I wondered about authority and strictness. Should I be maintaining distance and mystery like a classic field boss? But it was too tiring moderating myself all the time, wondering what was the Correct and Conservative way to be.

And then I decided this was stupid. I was going to be myself.  (how trite, right, a Disney movie take-home message, but sometimes in this life—thanks to mores and all—surprisingly difficult)  I played loud beatsy happy music in the van while I drove people to and from the field site, pumping the brakes to the beat while approaching a stop sign. I teased people playfully and joined in jokes. I brought chocolate to share. I shared stories of embarrassment, hilarity, or heartbreak from my own life. And others did too.  Instead of quietly keeping my four-leaf clover finds to myself I victoriously crowed out and gave them to people, not caring if I seemed eccentric.

I enjoyed our field days so much more now, and I think our group did too.  People were bringing ice-cream and watermelon to share. We left the key in the van and listened to music while we worked in the field. We had long discussions about relationships and travel and personalities. “I love this lab!”, “I’m going to miss this so much when the season is over!” the research assistants shared. Our field work sometimes felt like hanging with a group of friends (just friends who I frequently reminded to be more efficient). I’m going to miss our group too.

Some funny faces in the field.

It makes me wonder about group dynamics. What makes for a “good group”? A certain pivotal member of good humor? An underlying subculture of spirit and pride? Everyone realizing that everyone else is participating with dedication and that becomes the norm?

But in all this fun I still am the one who paces about the field, suggesting ways to be more efficient (“you know, having one dedicated bag-labeler instead of everyone reaching for the sharpie might be a good way to go”) and encouraging people to drink plenty of water.  I also recommend people pee in the non-research corn field (“go sidedress the corn!”) rather than driving all the way back to the field house for bathrooms. “Just pretend you’re camping!” 

When I was a child, we had an imaginary town called Beanville, where we each had a play-family of Lego-people and farms and played commerce and trains and town meetings. Because our game moved through time, we decided to have Night and Day occur at the same time for all of our play-families.  Somehow, little Sandra became The Night Mayor (this word-play delighted us) and would strut around, arbitrarily calling out when it was day and night and we all had to scurry our little Lego people to bed or out to milk their little plastic cows in the morning.

And now, relating to time, I noticed that lunch-break would continue endlessly because nobody was mindful of the time. So I took upon myself the responsibility of getting everyone back into the van after lunch. A Lunch Mayor of sorts. “With great responsibility comes great power” one of the grad students pointed out to me. “Five minute warning!” I’d herd everybody.

For all these people we have both a big aggressive 4-wheel drive research truck and a white maternal van for going to and from the field, lugging soil probes, bags of samples, and people. “Which vehicle would you like to drive?” Lab Master Chris (my compatriot supervisor). “I don’t care,” I replied, “I can be a badass or a mom.”

And most of the time I am the mom, whizzing around in the van with music blasting and kids in the back singing and dancing. I joke about soccer practice and ballet lessons. The assistants told me, “we’ve decided we’re like a big family: you’re the mom, and Lab Master Chris is the dad.”  “What about our professor?” I asked (who is mostly writing and thinking about cover crops from his office, rather than playing in the field). “Oh, he’s the Wizard” they responded.  

There was no room in the mom-van, so Mom rode in the back.

Southeast Asia, Unplugged

It’s raining. I have an unfortunate and fettering cold. I haven’t bicycled in 4 days.  Blug.  

So, to divert myself I went back and read the battered yellow journal I carried with me on my bicycle adventure around Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam last year. Sometimes, installed in this world of stationary apartment, with cat and academia job and a wardrobe, with the ability to drink the tap water and read the road signs, my time in Southeast Asia feels very far away indeed.  But it IS my handwriting.

I feel like sharing with you some bits from in there. Just to relive them. This was my personal journal, not the glossy carefully-preened blog I kept, and so I wrote with no objective. I often just made lists of what I was eating. Or risible quotes of hilarity between traveling partner Lady Elise and myself. Or just stream of conscious end of day downloading.  (in no particular order)

On Breakfasts, uninspiring

Feb 2. Thailand.

Started with too sweet yogurt and “Muesli” which was all dumb corn flakes and 3 oats. But riding quieter roads, dipping around potholes. Lunch was unidentifiable fish and rice. The morning had some cloudy-ish patches and that was nice.

On snacks

Feb 1. Thailand.

I have so many snacks! They make me eager, pleased, and resourceful. [then there was an exhaustive list of everything I had gleefully purchased in the Thai market]

On environmental awareness

Feb 1. Thailand.

New things! I pooped into a squat toilet this morning. Which went straight into the sea. I remember reading about raw sewage into the water, but half dismissed it somehow, too far away, too horrid to be possible, too astonishing? But when I hear it splash down there, it’s true.

On wardrobes

Jan 31. Thailand.

I’m wearing color blotch shirt with floral pants: appalling combination. But I really do not care. The young people don’t, but older ladies wear all sorts of arguing prints.

About clearing our guest house rooms of mosquitoes

Jan 30. Thailand.

After mosquitoes. Could be a game on the Wei. Jumping, reaching into air, then diving to all-fours, slapping across the tile floor. You hear a solid slam! on the wall and then a victorious HA!... “what are those people doing?” [someone might think upon hearing us]

On rainy days for the poorly equipped

Mar. 21. Vietnam.

We have camped here in the clean-floored lobby of the “Something Long” Hotel. The weather is so miserable that you can only revel in the misery and irritation it brings you (the cold froth in the sandals, the damp hair, arms clutched ineffectively about your person) especially when we are lacking boots and proper coats. This town has little more than lots of Everything Else Shops (“everything else you don’t want”) and the beguiling lights flashing on the bridge and that eerie skeletal cathedral.

On luxury earned for the weary

Mar. 15. Vietnam.

Ok so maybe it’s not named the Imperial Hotel, but this hotel sure feels luxurious and I am thoroughly enjoying it. This day: had no idea how it would work itself because in the beginning there was diarrhea and rain. But Bahn Mi [sandwich] was so delicious for my wearied self. I love the process of eating them. Mine was so good because it was so hot and there was so much egg. … Falling asleep with pen in hand here, because of the wine and HOT BATH and smoothy yummy scent oil. Mmm.

On ingredient lists, inclusive

Mar. 12. Vietnam.

Ingredients on the Vietnamese packaged fruit chips I got (delicious!): “Some kinds of fruits and vegetable oil.”

On hotel beds, the unexpected

Mar. 8. Vietnam.

Just pulled a hopefully clean pair of panties from the fitted sheet in this bed! Ha!

On food choices

Mar 4. Vietnam.

Been pregnant with farts all windy evening since I ate that puffy white Chinese style bun with pork and two whole boiled quails eggs in it. Was eyeing up Elise’s Pho with all the greens jabbed into it…ends up being quite healthy.

This is funny because bathroom = shower stall

Feb 26. Cambodia.

Sandra, after a Cambodian shower: “Sorry Elise, I made such a mess! I got water all over the bathroom floor.”

A probably typical Cambodia day

Feb 15. Cambodia.

Road was very jostly and jangly. Dusty, honky, pummeled with traffic. Was afraid of full boredom in this place once we got here but painted nails, did yoga, went for a janky massage. That was hilarious though. Only 10,000 riel, not at all like the Bangkok massage. Mostly a bunch of kneading. Like they were little girls playing Town and they decided to be Massage. But nice.  …  Had a green mochi-like thing that had an odd, slight, flavorless-ness so was probably “melon.”  And then some Chocolate Orange Filled cookies simply because they were marked with a price and that pleased me.

On hotel room habits

Feb 6. Cambodia.

[Note on our post-ride routine: Elise would wash out her riding outfit every day and hang it out to dry; Sandra would empty her panniers and set out her belongings]

Sandra: “Where would we be without your clothing to decorate the rooms?”

Elise: “Yeah, well, YOU make the place look like a market. Sometime I’ll just put price tags on all your stuff.”

Laughing at our expat selves

Feb. 13. Cambodia.

After our rope-heaving hike we stopped at lovely little restaurant with strings of lights and colored stars. We had $3 cocktails and my first fresh spring rolls (the sweet sour garlic-chunk sauce so good I drank it) and some chicken. A little loopy, quite content, decidedly beat. I sat there, holding my fistful of foreign money, picking my teeth. And Elise nearly forgot her bra she’d hung on a chair. [ok, so it was very very hot there and any item to be removed from the body was a relief] Imagine the servers running after her, “Madame! Madame! You forgot something!” I laughed so hard I was nearly in tears. ….I was basting in this on the beach, looking at the islands: that I like being in Cambodia and I love traveling.

The Descent of Woman, Or: Oh Holey Butt

(This is unfortunate. Here is an entry that should have been finished and posted last month: that bicycle ride from Wayne County back to Ithaca. But better late than never.)

May 25 2015.

Destination Bicycling is much more of an involved way to get back home. 

Involved in a way that is sensual, meaning senses participating more than just holding a steering wheel while under a seat belt. Instead sensations become perceptible thanks to the meditation of spinning along endlessly in the air.

To feel the air temperature change, dipping into a stream valley, like passing through a curtain and feeling the cold fabric of it brush against your body. The smells of a Laundromat, the honey suckle, the cows. 

To really know the wind. To have emotion for the wind, impeding my progress so thickly. In our houses and offices we can be removed. Look out the window and see the wind in the trees and know a storm is coming….completely different than grinding into it.

I wanted to bicycle back to Ithaca under my own power, to have awesome novel thoughts all the hours in the saddle, see my edge. To earn views and earn chocolate cake.

The ride started out powerfully, churning along at 14 mph (fast for me, #allsteel), from Canandaigua to Geneva. I lived in Geneva last summer, and returning there it felt recognizable but not familiar. It did not feel like I had embodied it as a home place. But I relished espresso and a second breakfast and rejoiced I was continuing on to my new home of Ithaca.

Midday, full sun, the adhesive air of pre-thunderstorm humidity. And the southern wind. I pointed directly into it, watching the leaves exposing their undersides in the flapping as I rode. The grain fields bending in huge synchronized dance numbers, the Memorial Day American flags waving vigorously. My pace slowed to grappling along at barely 9 miles an hour.

I was out of water.

I’ve stopped at places before, noticing someone outside and pleading for a water bottle refill. People have gone out of their way to get me ice. (With a bit of common sense, and excluding the hyper violence on the news, I choose to believe in a mostly nonthreatening world. Most of the time I get by excellently.)

There was a woman out gardening in front of her trailer home, and I pulled into her driveway hopefully. I called out my plea and she saw me and looked slightly perplexed, then started gesturing. Before I could stand my wits at attention, a throng of 17,000 terrible, gray, enormous, pregnant dogs rampaged from the side yard at me. The ugly kind of gray, bred for grumpiness, snarling and roaring and charging. I was on their rural plot of territory. I must die. The woman came to my aid--bless her; she was barking at them to get away and swinging her shovel, "they're breeders!" she explained to me. My bike became a shield and I spun with it, dancing in horror and fending off the dogs. But my butt—the only part of me offering a real purchase, padded in bike shorts and jutting out juicily--was too easy a target and I was chomped.  

Bitten in the butt by a dog.

That's a first. Well at least I've had my rabies shots. 

(after beating them with her shovel she finally dismissed them and did fetch me some plastic bottles of water, although a little wordlessly and, I assume, begrudgingly) 

I think next time I'm thirsty I'll avoid rural trailer homes.

Later: after the adrenaline receded. 

I pulled up at my aunt and uncle's place, surprising them in their afternoon projects. They fed and watered me, and we sat at the kitchen table as I consumed melon, and CHEESE, and bread, and peanut butter. I LOVE THESE PEOPLE I kept thinking inside, and want to tell them things! And share anecdotes. But all I could properly do was eat food.

Riding 70 miles in heat and unforgiving wind was a study in discomfort and also presence. I’ve done way more than 70 miles before, but usually in a group of others, where everyone is bonding together and encouraging each other on. The best way to go about it alone was to notice this house, to see that tree, to laugh at that road name. Not so helpful is to think, “so that was 2 miles…I just need to do that 10 times more.” 

The point where I’d reached the zenith between the lakes, where the ride into the southern wind was over, where I was just gravitating down towards the road running along Cayuga Lake…with the yellow road signs with the truck pointing down a triangle… the DESCENT. Flowing and flowing and not pedaling….I started to have normal thoughts again, cooling off enough that I could have thoughts. And then seeing the Ithaca 2 Miles sign….the arrival would have been more epic had I not been so tired.

But I can store it up and reflect on it later, drawing a little epic pride perhaps for when I need it.

To do something other than pedal, like to shower and eat sausage, was a change of pace after such single-minded focus. How fortunate that I could push my self this way on this day under my own volition….because for many people having to push is not a choice.

The earned lake views.

The earned, if very unattractive, chocolate cake. Note: best NOT to carry and serve in a.... bag.

Road.

Uncle's bike and niece's bike.

Pearls & Rain Pants (and Ithaca Fest!)

This weekend has been Ithaca Festival, perhaps one of the most notable weekends all year in this little city.  Blocks of downtown have been blocked off, a number of different music stages set up. Blues, folk, eastern belly dance, hip-hop….these fill the streets. Food trucks sell Cambodian pancakes, deep south grilled chicken, Mac N Cheese.

My Mansard roof is just one block from all this; from my window I can hear even the words to the music clearly, and see the food tents. I am positively gleeful to be living inside such a fantastic festival. Instead of waiting in line for a compromised blue plastic porta-potty, I can trot back to my very own bathroom. I brought friends up too, for ice water in this mugginess. I took breaks to make popcorn, to snuggle with Cat, to bake gingerbread, to nap.  And then down my stairs and out into the music again!

Saturday of the festival was thick with heat and humidity and I danced in the park, bare feet in the grass, until the rains came and I retreated up to my apartment.

I was in the parade Thursday, riding with the AIDS Ride For Life bicycle fundraiser ride. We wore matching blue tee-shirts and pedaled along following the bagpipers (which was a lot of fun). The other bicyclers and I looped circles around the banner, like a small smiling swarm of bees, avoiding getting run over by the following fire-truck. My chest got all swollen with happiness to see the faces of this city lining the sidewalks cheering on the parade. Glowing, eager faces. A high population of vegan faces, faces with many higher educational degrees, faces of professors, faces of professor children wearing paint.  

Unlike the wee town of Ontario parades I’ve accompanied my father’s cars in, this parade had no tractors but instead Planned Parenthood all marching in pink tee-shirts, and Save Seneca Lake! anti-oil group waving banners, and the local solar company.  Ithaca sure is a unique place.  And I’m happy to be living here.

I’ve spent the entire weekend padding about the festival, eating Lemongrass Meat On A Stick, running into just about everyone I know, and happily soaking up the music.  Sunday I finished out the festival with a high of newly-discovered band love. The gun poets. Can’t-hold-still hip-hop with poetry lyrics. Not jaded. Instead about life and appreciating and community and all to a fiercely grooving beat. I don’t know how anyone could be nearby and not be moving. For me it was involuntary, and I danced that glorious celebratory dance of existence. Dancing alone and not caring, but dancing with everyone too. Where the band knows they’re getting to people, and they have their souls on their instruments, and it’s this feedback loop of crowd upping band upping crowd. Little children wearing huge ear-muffs, highschoolers, the bottle-picking vagrant population, parents, students, everyone. Everyone moving and grooving together. All a heightened state of humanity.

Sunday morning I escaped the food tents and the crowds to be organist at a church for whom I’ve never played before. The United Methodist Church in Lansing, which wasn’t exactly convenient in time or location.  (#carfree) Their service began at the, erm, sprightly hour of 9am and choir rehearsal was before that as well. Nine miles away and up a hill….mercifully I discovered a bus that ran at 7am going partly in the right direction.

It was raining that morning. And cold. All the July sunny mugginess of Saturday had phase-changed into November.  Gray froth hung wetly over the land, and steam churned about the falls. The roads were dark with puddles. What could make bicycling in 7:30am cold rain worse? But wind. So I bicycled into a stiff north wind.

I’ve bicycled in miserable conditions before. I suppose that’s a thing to be grateful for having been such an incorrigible bicycler and traveler: that even if it’s a bit miserable now, it still won’t top the previous winners of misery.  So the pearls and the rain pants powered forth. I realized I was decidedly inward focused, because instead of watching much of the world go by, I was considering a drop of water sliding back and forth across the brim of my helmet. Right there in front of my face. Sliding to and fro with my left-right rocking action of driving into the wind. To and fro. It was like a hypnotist’s watch. Somehow this was incredibly irritating. My feet were cold, my hands were stiff and wet, I was pushing hard. But that droplet.  Grrrr.  I flicked it off.  Soon another formed.  I flicked that one off too.

And then. The smile once I turned downhill and out of the wind. The church in sight. Cruising…15 mph, 20 mph. YES. Oh, how earned that feeling was.

A country church. I arrived and cracked my cold hands from their handlebar grip and amazingly they warmed to play the pipe organ. A straightforward little instrument it was, two manuals, nothing fancy, but my feet connected effortlessly with the pedal board.  And within half an hour of warming up we were one.

Pastor asked if I could play “a little somethin-somethin-somethin” while people sat down before the prelude. What I call “filler” music, or “emergency backup” music. I hadn’t brought any, but was able to forage through the sliding piles of books around the organ and find something appropriate. “Noodle music”, as Mr. First Presbyterian Choir Director would call it.  I noodled away and watched the church fill.  And fill.

Every pew filled. The children brimmed all over the front steps for children’s time and I don’t think I’ve ever seen a congregation with so many brightly flowered dresses or bow-ties or suit-jackets in such a long time. I do enjoy the Methodists. And with my experience playing for Methodists before, I know they especially resonate with the happy and “boom-chunk” music.  I had fun. I had so much fun in church this morning.  I charged the hymns right along and people sang lustily.

“We’re so glad you’re not doing only soil!” said one of the choir members, when they learned of my actual day-job.

I played Emperor’s Fanfare for the postlude, all big chords and trills and DAH DAH DAH deep pedal notes. This piece takes no small amount of concentration and it is a blast, in all senses of the word. I landed the final chord, and surfaced back into the world, and heard something I’ve never heard in church before. The people weren’t only clapping, they were cheering. Cheering and hooting. I was blown away. I loved all those Methodists even more.

Mrs. Alto was standing at my elbow all smiles: “You PUMP IT, girl!”