My grandparents from Texas are visiting for Christmas. I get apprehensive and nervous about people visiting us. I can't quite describe it, but ever since I was little, I sometimes feel sick to my stomach when extra people are in our house. A little selfish bit of me misses having just my own family in our house. I'm an introvert, I guess.
A surprising thing happened this afternoon. I'm playing my violin at all the Christmas Eve services at my family's church. There were two services this evening, and there are three tomorrow. At one point in the service, the lights all go out and I play the first phrase of O Holy Night all by myself. I was nervous about this and was worried I didn't know how to make it "musical" enough, so when I got home from work, I practiced it a few times, trying different fingerings and shifts and bowing and phrasing ideas and things. Then I played it for my Mom downstairs. My Grandaddy was there too. Now, my Grandaddy can sometimes come across as being a somewhat critical person... or at least, I'd say he's difficult to please. Also, he's not a Christian. Well, after I played the phrase, my Mom talked to me about how it sounded, and then Grandaddy said he wanted to tell me his thoughts on it. I prepared myself for a criticism, even though he's not a musician or anything. But then he proceeded to try to explain that even though he didn't know much about violin or how I made it sound a certain way, that it was beautiful and that it was the most moving thing he had ever heard played on a violin. And... he was sort of crying. I was so surprised.
No comments:
Post a Comment