Where I am, What I miss

I haven't posted much this week, mostly because I hate writing those "today I got up. Then I walked to the window. Then I ate a sandwich" play-by-play posts. We have been working so hard here and been so busy that I haven't had time for any of the Deep Thoughts that I take such pride in sharing on my blog.

In lieu of Deep Thoughts there has been plenty of Little Advances and Hard Work, which is why I am here. Masterclasses and coachings have kept us busy, and I have learned so much from watching my colleagues on stage. We sang a truly lovely concert in a botanic garden a few days ago. The setting was so beautiful it made up for all the challenges of singing outside.

Last night was the mainstage production of Carmen. We had guest artists singing principal roles who had also been the faculty this week, and all of the Young Artists sang in the chorus. Having just done the show a year ago with BOC, I really enjoyed spending more time with the score and the drama. The orchestra was rip-roaring, the principals were to die for, and the audience was thrilled.

There is something nice about getting out of the big cities. Last fall and winter I did a few gigs up in New Hampshire, and it was a completely different world. Everyone was so friendly, our venues fed us, and people said things like "you have the most beautiful voice I've ever heard!" You just don't find that audience warmth in the big cities.

Speaking of big cities I just walked away from my computer and left it unattended. Apparently in Colorado people don't steal things, which has been another bit of culture shock. When I wrote my earlier post entitled "all the doors are unlocked" I didn't realize how much of a theme that would be here.

Despite all its charms, I am ready to leave the middle of the country and head back to my beloved coast. In a few days I will fly out back to the land of fast walkers, rude drivers and blunt neighbors. Steamboat is charming and kind and picturesque, but I will take real over picturesque any day. I am glad there are people who cherish this place the same way that I cherish New England, whose 'real' doesn't include a gritty neighborhood and a can lady, or a Podunk hometown.

What I miss

The will for adventure

Once upon a time there was a woman who loved to stay home. She knew that she should love adventure and sometimes she truly did, but most of the time she wanted access to the familiar, to sleep in her own bed, and to know where all the light switches were.

I inherited this homebody streak from a family member who shall remain nameless, and I also inherited the willpower to beat it when I know I should make an effort. That is why this morning I set out for Colorado for another “opera camp” experience like my trip to Novafeltria (documentation of which was the purpose for starting this blog in the first place).

That was two years ago, and it feels it. These past two years have been really transformative and maturing – but I didn’t start this post to talk about how old I feel. I’m still young enough to have been happy that my flight was out of Hartford this morning so my Mommy could drive me to the airport before dawn.

My enormous pink suitcase was overweight when I finally got to the front of the line (a line which I believe I saw an entire family cut – really?). I already had to pay a fee just to check the bag – and I’m not one to get all “airlines these days”, but I do find that a little annoying. The extra weight was going to result in another fee. They asked if I wanted to take out 7 pounds worth of stuff to get it under the limit. I looked at my already overstuffed shoulder bag I was carrying on, and I looked at the lock on the suitcase, and I thought of the cash back I get on my credit card and responded “No.” (Is that another sign of my age? My willingness to throw money at problems?) The clerk looked shocked. I said “It’s six in the morning, and I just want to get on the plane” as I handed over my Capital One card.

I had the dreaded middle seat on the flight to Dallas. The man on the aisle was very large, and I spent most of my time balancing myself so that I wouldn’t be in his space (which, of course, was my space). A screaming child was behind me and I battled through the early morning exhaustion only to land in the Central Time Zone - and then again in Mountain Time Zone - and have to battle through those same hours all over again.

A few folks on the 10 am flight from Dallas to Denver had brought their Chinese food on the plane. Another moment of ‘really?’ And I thought I was rude for having had an onion bagel in the terminal. The flight was uneventful (a few more screaming babies), and I landed in Denver about an hour before our rides were to pick us up.

I got pretty lucky with my car-mates on the four hour drive up to Steamboat. If there’s anything worse than spending two weeks at a program with people who irritate you, it’s spending four hours trapped in a car. The company was good, and we even enjoyed my family tradition of singing "On the Road Again". Despite a little altitude uneasiness when we were up particularly high, by the time we got to Steamboat I felt fine (despite having been up since 2:30 Mountain Time and only having eaten a bagel).

Check-in, dinner, were all the usual blend of mildly awkward introductions and asking where the towels are kept, and then we got to the best part of the evening: rehearsal for an arias concert. As tough as it is to have to sing on such little rest, it is nice to get that first see-and-be-seen sing-off out of the way. We got a very kind speech about not being nervous, and I sat back and thought “I’m not nervous at all”. I don’t think I would have made it this long if I were still affected by other peoples’ opinions of my voice. In the end, I sang like I was dehydrated and had been up all night - which was pretty much true. But my high notes were nice.

To wrap up the day someone was generous enough to drive to the grocery, where I stocked up on hummus and fudgcicles, the two things that have sustained me most of the summer. We also passed a neon bunny that looks like it’s on drugs.

The picture didn’t’ really come out, but that might actually suit the mood.  Nearly 24 hours after my adventure anxiously began, I am at a picnic table under bright stars in the mountains, and it all seems perfectly normal.

When I went to bed last night and even when I woke up this morning I didn’t really want to go, what with all the uncertainty, meeting new people, unfamiliar beds and light-switch-placements. But I have trained myself to swallow my anxiety and just get on the plane. Inside me there is one person who loves adventure and one who loves consistency, and I’ve learned to let the two battle it out.

I hope to post once a day as I did in Italia due anni fa. I had the same hesitation about sharing my travel plans then as I do now, and I refer back to my warnings to potential thieves that I wrote in my very first post on this blog. I would also add that my upstairs neighbor sent me off with a promise not to let anyone touch my sh*t. So watch yourselves.

The stairs I will fall down in the night.
Note their close proximity to the bedroom door.

All you holy men and women, pray for us.

Last weekend I sang the ordination of two new priests. Having only sung one ordination prior (7 years ago), if you had asked me about the rite, the only thing I would have remembered was that it includes a litany of saints.

For a jaded old church nerd like me, it takes something special to move me (for instance, it's rare that the Agnus Dei lights my fire). Certain liturgical elements, thanks to their rarity, catch my attention (I'm a sucker for a good Sequence) and a litany is one of them. This weekend we sang Becker's popular setting of the litany. As we invoked saint after saint, while the newest members of the presbyterate lay prostrate, I became unexpectedly emotional.

The assembly repeated "pray for us" as we called upon saints familiar (Mary & Joseph), arcane (Chrysogonus & Hippolytus) and particular to our Jesuit community (Ignatius & Francis). On other occasions I have sung litanies that put Oscar Romero, Dorothy Day and Pedro Arrupe alongside Linus, Cletus and Clement. Where do we get the confidence to call upon our heroes to petition God on our behalf?

Any Catholic concerned with public perception keeps all this saints hoo-ha quiet if they can. Maybe we hedge a bit, acknowledging that we admire these people, but leaving out the more radical part of our claim to the saints: we believe there is something so generous and holy about them that they will back up our prayers.

As we asked for prayers on Saturday, what really took my breath away was the list we had in front of us, one that only skims the surface of our wealth of heavenly intercessors. And even when we mumble our response, or can't hear the cantor, or let our eyes and minds wander, the saints are still on our side, welcoming us into their communion. What greater advocates can we have than the saints named and unnamed, living in love with God forever?

[Two notes on the litany - I tried to find a recording of the Becker setting to which to link, but I was unable to find one that wasn't either out of tune, goopily sentimental, or one singer overdubbing his own responses to the invocations. Also, after the ordination I said something flippant about not knowing why a piece of music that is mildly cheesy was so moving. Luckily I was with the Jesuits, one of whom had a characteristic reply enumerating all of the evidence for this being the superior setting of the litany. Typical]

In lieu of a sound clip, I will include a photo of myself and one of my favorite saints.

What We Capture

In the room that we've always called the Great Room (due to it's unclear function in my parents' house rather than it's natural superiority to other rooms) there are some unobtrusive cabinets hiding a large collection of photo albums. Although no one in the family is a particularly gifted photographer, there has always been someone at every event with a camera (usually the disposable kind from the drug store), documenting graduations, picnics, parties, haircuts, soccer games...you name it.

Although many of the photos are of people, there are plenty that are of things. Some are profound - the Grand Canyon, sunset over evergreens, a rose window, an impeccable 1957 Chevy Bel Air. The ones that thrill me the most are mundane, and I am thrilled for this reason: each photo means that someone at some point, found beauty in simplicity.

Tomatoes from the garden, in varying stages of ripening, lined up on the windowsill. Crocuses popping up in the rock garden. A duck swimming in the pool cover. An owl in the window of the barn. A good-looking clock.

There are more than a few photos of car dashboards (I know I took many when I was finally sending the hoopty to the graveyard). Occasionally you will find a pair of pictures of a car odomotor, one showing it at all nines, and then another of it just after it turns over to some new, large, round number.

Two days ago the odomotor on the Jeep turned over to 120000, and I didn't notice until it was at 120011. I almost started to cry for my own preoccupation, for not being able to see that something simply neat was happening right in front of my eyes. There is a place for focus in a life, but there is a point at which focus turns into distraction, and we can't see what's right in front of our noses.

We have choices about what to capture, in our photos and in our hearts. I find it far too easy to capture the frustrations of a day, week, or month. If I'm not careful it can all turn into the frustrations of a life. I want my heart to hold snapshots of what is right in front of me, in all it's thrilling simplicity.

The Easter Picture

My brother and I, in the parking lot after 10 am mass.

In case you didn't believe we were there

With thanks to Dwight for the picture.

They say it's your birthday!

Guess who has a birthday today! Happy birthday to my favorite brother.

Tuesday night of the convention

Bill Clinton finds limitless ways to draw attention to himself (crying? Really?), Rahm Emanuel may have been a little drunk, and Mark Warner puts a lot of faith in the success of the Chevy Volt.

I know Hillary was the big story last night, but I was excited to hear Deval Patrick. Even though he was in the hot spot between Warner and Clinton, the only station that ran his speech was the Fox network station, because they ran it live during the 10 pm news. I think that Patrick is an extraordinary speaker, although I have to wonder if he quoted Barney Frank on a dare. The first time I heard him speak live, he happened to be speaking with another “skinny guy with a funny name from Chicago” (his words).

Not only did most of the networks (including PBS!) ditch Deval, CBS actually interviewed Mitt Romney during Patrick’s speech. Offensive!

I can’t help but remember the fun we had when the DNC was in Boston four years ago. We joked at the time that it was like Spring Break for Democrats. We were out late every night, scoping out famous wonks and trying to crash delegate parties and watching speeches at bars. Most of my friends have that peculiarly New England mentality that seems moderate around here but is phenomenally liberal to the rest of the country. Because I fancy myself open-minded I try to pretend I could at some point in a million years vote Republican, but for that one week I could get excited and say “screw it, I'm partisan!”

I think I’m having that week again.

a trip to Providence

Last night I drove down to Providence for an audition. Two nights ago I couldn’t sleep, with what I thought was nervousness over the audition. That was odd to me, since I very rarely am nervous before I’m going to sing for someone (why should I be nervous? I sing all the time. And I’m not terrible at it. So why stress?) Last night I couldn’t sleep either, so apparently it wasn’t the audition, but it does mean that I am anxious about something else and haven’t figured out what it is yet. Going back to work in a few weeks may be the instigator.

Anyway, this audition was contingent upon two things:

1. Finding a dress that would cover my knees, which are completely shredded from my recent bout of vertigo/clumsiness

2. Finding a way to roll up my passenger side window, which had been stuck since last Thursday.

I am getting spoiled since I have been driving the Jeep. When I was driving the old heap, I was never shocked when something went wrong. You didn’t know when you would snap a belt, or leak oil, or have a wheel fall off. For the sake of nostalgia, let’s look at the old rustbucket.

So I buy a “new” car (hey! 1999 is really new for me!)

I will admit, it’s nice to drive a car and know that it will start every time. But I’ll admit, when my window started clicking and wouldn’t roll up, I thought to myself “These blasted E-lectronic cars! They make everything electronic so they get you coming and going!!” All I’m saying is this wouldn’t have happened with my old crank windows.

Yesterday morning I took the car down to my mechanic, since I needed an oil change anyway. I have the best mechanic in the world (other than you, Dad!) here in Southie. If the world can be divided into people who do what they can get away with, and people who do what is right, my guy falls squarely into the second camp. It also doesn’t hurt that we think similarly: when I explained the situation to him, he mentioned that he could easily get the window up, and I could just not use it. I said “oh yeah that’s fine. You just need to close it. You don’t need to fix it.”

And now it’s closed. Life is good. And the audition went pretty well too.

Guess who i ran into today!

She goes back to Rwanda in 4 months. And Sister Augusta isn't the only former roommate I saw out and about (yes, you read that right) - I also ran into a girl who lived in the mods with us, who I hadn't seen since BC.

some overdue pictures

The fabled fruit roll-up!
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The view from the window of our apartment in Novafeltria. A foggy morning
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I took this picture in Cesenatico, alongside a canal that was designed by Leonardo Da Vinci.
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The ceiling of the Church of the Gesu. Wow.

Taken at the airport

Look who came with Mom to meet me!