A daughter reflects on those horrible piano lessons her mother forced her to take.
My six-year-old granddaughter sits at my mother's piano and looks up at me with wide, inquisitive eyes. "I want to learn how to play the piano," she begs. I join her at the bench. It feels strange to me after so long without playing. As her fingers discover various notes, mixed emotions swirl inside me.
I had always hated piano lessons. But now joy seeps into my heart. Pleasurable thoughts replace my negative feelings. Where did those come from? Hadn't I always hated those piano lessons?
My mother had made me practice. "You'll be thankful someday," she would say. I preferred playing softball with the neighborhood kids.
When my piano teacher, Mrs. K, would open her front door, her huge frame towered over me. Gray hair twisted into a matronly bun in the back of her head. Dark veins popped out on her thick calves sticking out below her voluminous skirt. Clunky, comfortable shoes covered her massive feet. Against my will, I followed her into the music room like iron pulled by a magnet.
Wooden floors creaked in the silence as she lumbered from room to room. Hands on a grandfather clock ticked rhythmically as time crawled for the half-hour lesson. Each week I entered another world, a world of the musician where nothing else existed other than scales, Schubert, and reprimands to practice more often.
Pulling up a straight-backed chair, Mrs. K would sit next to me. Her nylons gathered around her large ankles in a heap, like the folds of an elephant's legs. Tapping a pencil against the piano, she instructed, "Sit up straight, curve your fingers." My hands raced up and down the ivory while I bent over, concentrating on correct finger work. Inevitably I crossed my thumb under at the wrong place and she made me start at the bottom all over again.
Completing one level of work only moved me to a new, more difficult level. More challenging pieces always loomed in the distance, taunting me. It was like climbing a never-ending ladder, and I could never reach the top.
My mother sat in her rocking chair and listened to me practice. "You'll be thankful someday," she said.
I hated the annual recitals the most. Every spring each student performed a piece by heart in front of a roomful of people. My nervous hands perspired, causing my fingers to slip off the keys. Forgetting the notes haunted me.
But now I remember. There had been joy as a child taking those lessons. It had given me pleasure to play those delightful beginning songs: The Teddy Bear Dance, The Parade of the Elephants and The Little Brown Rabbit. There was also the joy of accomplishment as I moved up from one level to the next as the years went by.
There was laughter, also. With my drab brown hair pulled back into a ponytail and wearing a new blue dress and shiny patent leather shoes, I remember a recital where I poised my hands over the keyboard to begin "Momma's Little Baby Loves Shortenin' Bread.' Then somebody's father snored so loudly that everybody heard him. I looked at the man's head bobbing up and down, winked at the audience, and then pounded out the first few measures. He woke with a start and a snort, and everybody laughed.
I realize now what my mother wanted for me, why she sacrificed financially so I could take those lessons. She wanted me to reach my fullest potential. Music is a gift from God. My fingers search out a long-ago forgotten tune. Its melody lingers in the air. My mother had given me a beautiful gift. It just took me a lifetime to appreciate it. Mother was right after all. Thanks, Mom."
A wicked Cajun Fairy named Robes Pierre entered the impenetrable Magical doll land of Sha Bebe. Queen Faustina, the ruler of the doll land, thought she had destroyed him, but he's back! Will the doll land survive his evil ways?
