Music really is my heart language. It nourishes and shapes my soul.
I’ve always been a singer. And starting about age 5 I was playing the guitar. I added the fiddle starting at age 9, and picked up mandolin and dulcimer along the way.
I really began singing, in choir and other performances, in middle school. My life in high school was filled with making music – choir, swing choir, musical theatre.
University found me busy with engineering study and academics, and I only sang a special song at church once in that time, then finally got back into choir my very last semester.
My husband is / was a pastor, and participating in church worship and on worship teams was very natural for me. Singing always seemed to put me back at rights with the world. I was very active with music in all our churches, but one (where my depression overtook me to the point that I could not even get to the music).
I haven’t ‘performed’ in years. Only one of my family members seems to appreciate my singing around the house very much. I think they’re used to it, or (for at least one of them) it doesn’t even register because music isn’t their thing.
I’m missing the process and beauty of creating music –
voices blending, instruments layering,
crescendos, decrescendos,
majors, minors, tonics,
micro moments of intensity,
and macro minutes of satisfaction.
Not the response from those listening (though I’m always blessed when my music touches someone else), but the connection between musicians, between singers, and the way the music fills my physical body, but also my spirit.
Music really gives me life, making music fills me in ways I can’t describe, and I’m missing precious parts of that right now.
