. . . And Then it Happened

Months after I started playing the piano again, I was driving home after a choir practice,

Thinking about random things,

Something I do quite frequently.

Somehow, what I was thinking of led me to twist words together,

Words with melodies.

Before long, I had an entire refrain in my head . . .

In four-part harmony.

(Did I mention this was after a choir practice?  Yeah.  I don't know if it was possible for me to think in anything other than four-part harmony at that point.)

When I got home,

I got out an old composition book,

Opened it to a blank page,

Wrote out the refrain . . .

And the rest of the song.

Before long, I'd worked out an accompaniment, too,

Although it was difficult to play on my dad's old keyboard -

Apparently one of the first ever created -

With tiny keys not even big enough for my fingers

And a piano sound almost identical to the electric organ sound.

Still, I had an accompaniment,

And it all happened that one Tuesday night.

The next day,

Seriously, the very next day,

One of the teachers at school asked my class if anyone wanted to do anything at the weekly assembly the next Tuesday

And I knew.

I knew it was something I needed to do,

To play my song less than a week after it was written,

And the timing was absolutely perfect.

I went to see her later that day,

Volunteered to help,

Though I warned her that it was a song I'd only just started working on.

She said that was fine,

That I could play it for her on Friday.

Friday ended up being a snow day.

I played it for her Monday,

The day before I was supposed to perform,

On an old piano in one of the classrooms,

An old, out-of-tune piano.

It wasn't incredible.

Still, she liked it,

Said I had a beautiful voice

And that I could play it at the assembly the next day.

I left class early to go down and get set up.

I had been practicing the accompaniment on the piano in study hall,

Working hard because I was nervous,

Afraid I would screw something up,

Especially the ending.

I was still nervous, sitting there,

Waiting.

Then it was my turn.

I went up

And played

And sang.

It wasn't perfect,

But it wasn't bad, either.

One of the people in my school told me later that she'd liked it,

Asked if I wrote it myself.

I said yes, I had.

It was the first time I'd ever performed one of my songs,

The first time in a long time I'd played the piano in public,

But it went pretty well,

And it was just incredible how it all came together.

For some reason,

I don't know why,

I kept writing after that.

It wasn't just one song every now and then,

It was a song almost every day,

Though I still didn't think they were that good,

My best friends read them for me and encouraged me.

I was truly blessed.

After that, I started asking God what He wanted me to do,

What the reason was that He'd brought this back into my life,

How far He wanted me to take this.

I haven't gotten a complete answer yet,

Although I've gone past a few road signs,

One of which was very, very big,

But I want to be sure that I listen,

That I seek,

So I take this where He wants me to,

Not where my still-overactive imagination wants me to.

Well, more about that tomorrow.


The words visible in the pictures are from the song "My Prayer (Your Arms)", written and performed by Mary Schieferstein, ©2010 Mary Schieferstein.


This post is the fourth in a multi-part series.  The other posts can be read via the links below.
     Part 1 - #150
     Part 2 - When I Was Little . . .
     Part 3 - Favorite Artists and Favorite Instruments
     Part 4 - . . . And Then it Happened
     Part 5 - The Way I Was Made
     Part 6 - Faithful from Beginning to End