Reflections on the piano kids

Last night was our recital. Technically my second annual one, since last year I had one as well. This one felt more official, I had 9 students this year and I held it at our church instead of my house. Even though the venue was a bit more imposing, the kids did great. Not even one was rattled enough where they had to start over! I thought I was going to explode from being so proud of them. I was a little sad, too, since now they won’t be my piano kids anymore.

When I started teaching, it was really because I was being pressured into it. I had just become the pianist for our church, and two families in particular I had met were really on the hunt for a teacher. I had not taught before, and I definitely don’t think I’m qualified. I don’t have a degree in music, and after being taught mostly by lay teachers myself, I realized later in life that my music education had serious deficits. Thankfully I had other teachers as an adult and other experiences with music that helped me fill in some of the gaps. However, I still feel that years of playing with bad habits will always effect my performance. Let’s just say that I’m not a member of the school of thought, “Oh, you can teach! You play so well, just follow the books!”

When I found out that the previous teacher for one family had been a high school student, that’s when I decided that I would try it. I knew for the very beginners that I could teach them the rudiments of good technique, and I wanted to see what the older ones played like. Oh, did the older kids not like me at first. They had never heard of “theory”. It took me several months to get them used to the fact that I gave theory homework, every week. I should have called it “Miss Ellen’s School of Theory”. It was fun, though, watching them learn and picking out great music for them to play.

Now that I’m sending them on (and I recommended several professional teachers I’ve met at a piano teachers conference) I’m curious to know how they will do. I wonder what the other teachers will think. My main goal though (other than teaching theory) was to get them to feel the magic of making music, and there at least I know I’ve succeeded.

When we get moved, there’s a piano conservatory through the local college that offers lessons. I desperately need to find a teacher myself. I’m looking forward to playing for pleasure again, instead of the very functional playing that I do for my church. I hope that at some point in my life I can go back to school, I would love to study something boring like pedagogy. Then I can be a real piano teacher.

There are places I remember…

Lately I’ve been singing the Beatles again, surely you know how it goes?

“…all my life, though some have changed.

Some forever, not for better.

Some have gone, but some remain.

All these places had their moments

With lovers and friends I still can recall…”

Today I am feeling just a little bit sad. We received the first “parting gift” today. It was from our Sunday school class at church. It made me realize that somehow, we managed to form some sort of attachment here. It’s really a testimony to how welcoming the people are. I’ve talked about my detachment a little bit before, it takes quite a bit to penetrate that hardened “I’m only living here for a few years” mentality that I have developed over the past 10 years.

With our house now under contract, I am mourning a bit the loss of the place where my daughter had so many “firsts”. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to stay here. In fact this is low on my list of places I would ever like to return to. This town doesn’t even have a Target and don’t get me started on the lack of culture (unless you count the redneck cultural experience that is the Piggly Wiggly). But I will never be able to say to the dutchkid, “I first saw you walk for the first time right here.” Having spent my childhood in the same town, almost the same house, it has been hard to come to that realization.

I’ve had terribly itchy feet for the past 6 months and it’s definitely time to go. However, I have to begrudgingly admit that as much as I love it, the nomadic life does get to me sometimes.

Well, I guess someone loves me after all.

My house just sold!

Not for the price we wanted, and they tried to really lowball us at first, but they must really want it because they took our counter offer.  We will walk away with about $5000 more than we paid, but we put just over that in improvements (a privacy fence and sprinker system with its own well).  It irks my Dutch dh to no end that we are technically losing a little money, but for me, my Mexican half overrules on this one.  A bird in the hand…

We were prepared to be slumlords in case it didn’t sell, but I am heaving a huge sigh of relief.  I think it will be better to just have it settled.  You just never know with tenants and since we are hoping to head overseas after my dh’s year of school it will be better to not have to worry about a house.

This is turning out to be a good week, just when I really needed it.  It’s always good to be reminded that maybe your life doesn’t suck as much as you think it does.

A little bit of sunshine

We just got home today from our scouting trip. Normally before we move we take a small trip about a month or so ahead of time to check out the new area, figure out our housing, etc. Both dh and I are pretty big worriers and planners, so we can’t stand sitting in temporary lodging with our dogs (and now the dutchkid) trying to figure out where we’re going to live. We were pretty much planning on living on post this time, and we’ve been to this post before (although it was about 6 years ago) so it made things much simpler.

What we didn’t know was exactly what housing we were going to get. I wrote before about the housing of my dreams, but we had been told by people at the school that we wouldn’t qualify because my dh will be on student status again. However, the housing has been privatized, so we really didn’t know what to expect.

What an incredible surprise! While I’ve heard a few negative things about the privatization, so far we have been impressed. The lady we had been in contact with already had a house set aside for us (we move in 3 weeks), she even gave us the keys to go look to make sure it was ok. Was it ever. A stone’s throw from where my dh’s classes will be, it is one of the houses that I used to walk past sometimes and wish I lived in. It’s also newly renovated, so not only do I get to live in a historic home, it has a beautiful updated kitchen and bathrooms.

My dh hugged the housing lady. It’s so far removed from our past experiences dealing with Army housing we didn’t know what to do with ourselves. She is seriously getting something good from me. Chocolate. .. Roses… Champagne… I’ll think of something.

At a loss

I’ve been sitting here for awhile now trying to sort out my thoughts. But I give up. I was going to try to write something eloquent about how I feel but I don’t have it in me today.

I had my blood drawn this morning and I am not pregnant. My embryos did not survive.

Mostly I feel like I’m walking around in some sort of fog. Thinking about random nonsense like how I should make a list of all the things I can do now that I won’t be having a baby this year, or how I should get rid of all of the baby stuff and maternity clothes I’ve been hanging onto.

It feels final. I have not been on any sort of contraception for over 7 years, and the only time I have ever gotten pregnant was with in vitro. I am rapidly getting too old for that “miracle natural baby” crap. My mom made me laugh today, bless her, she said I would probably get pregnant again someday when the dutchkid is 14. Yeah. That would be my luck.

The hardest part is readjusting my idea of what my life was going to look like. I had foolishly allowed myself to envision the rest of this year being pregnant, and now that I’m not going to be I have to revise that. We had been talking about getting a larger vehicle that we now won’t need. I have to embrace the idea that my daughter will be an only child. Which makes me kick myself that I didn’t treasure even more fully every moment of her babyhood. I wish I would have known when I was pregnant that I would never get to experience that again.

Well, I wish a lot of things.

Just shoot me now.

I had to go to the commissary today. I had to. Anyone want to take a guess as to what today is? That’s right, everybody, it’s not just Tax day, it’s payday!

For my non-military readers, payday in the military happens twice a month (unless you elect to get paid only once a month), the 1st and the 15th. One of the first things you learn as a spouse is that unless you absolutely have to, you DO NOT go to the commissary on payday. Long lines, grumpy retirees, aisles so crowded you can barely fit through… I was missing the old system back when dh was first in the Army where they had arrows directing you on the floor of the commissary.

But I had to go today because we have guests coming tomorrow and I even had a good attitude. I got there early, I smiled at people and I was polite. I resisted the temptation to play bumper cars with my cart. The dutchkid wore her big girl panties for the first time out in public and used the potty in the commissary! I managed to get done in under an hour. I gave the dutchkid an apple juice box to keep her happy in the checkout line (I swear, it might as well be a minefield with the candy within reach) and unloaded the cart.

I knew it was too good to be true. I waited there for 20 minutes. The cashier had made some sort of unsolvable error with the customer in front of me. By the time they called the third manager over to help, my good attitude had melted away with all my frozen stuff. The dutchkid was having her own little meltdown. I ended up reloading my cart to get back into line.

We made it home, the end in sight, good attitude returning… right up until the dutchkid wet her pants while I was unloading the car.

The revolving door

TWO people came to look at my house today! The lower price must be working. It was clean, and dh spent most of the weekend painting a couple of the bedrooms. To my nose now, it definitely has that “new paint” smell, so I’m happy about that. Much better than the eau de dog it supposedly had before.

I have a crazy week ahead, some friends from out of town are coming in on Wednesday, my MIL wants to come for the weekend (joy) and on Sunday we’re having an open house. Next week will not be any slower because we are taking a little scouting trip to the place we’re moving to. I’m hoping the housing lady there we’ve been in touch with will tell us which house we’re getting… probably not, but I can at least drive through the potential neighborhood we might be in.

My piano students have been working, working, working on their pieces because the recital is in 2 weeks! I’m so excited. I’m so proud of them for all their hard work, and also so glad that after that point I will no longer teach and just focus on getting my stuff ready to move. The end is in sight!

All about ME

Doesn’t that make you want to want to sing that Toby Keith song? No?

I’ve been tagged by Julie, and I haven’t ever been tagged before so here goes:

What I was doing 10 years ago…

I was trying to find a wedding dress that would fit into my suitcase to elope to Korea, finishing up my senior year of college (excepting I had more than a year to go because I had changed my major to nursing and transferred) and generally stressing out. But my engagement ring rocked, still does.

Five snacks I enjoy…

• pretzels with nutella
• candy of any variety
• peanut butter and honey on an english muffin
• popcorn
• string cheese

Things I would do if I were a billionaire:

let me count the ways, aside from the obvious… paying off of mortgages and trust fund for my kid

• make my mom and Mr. Chaps find different jobs (take THAT Mr. M)
• pay off my younger brother’s school debt and pay the rest of his way for him and my baby sis.
• donate a huge amount of money to charities, particularly Wycliffe Bible Translators and the many people working to help our injured veterans
• Buy my dh the Doxa (it’s a watch) he’s been drooling over for the past year.

5 jobs that I have had

• field worker (cutting and washing lettuce and weeding, FUN!)
• dishwasher
• EKG tech
• NICU nurse
• church pianist

3 of my bad habits

I used to drink my body weight daily in Diet Coke (no, I’m not kidding) but I’ve quit cold turkey. So let’s see…

• I let my child watch TV so that I can get something done
• Once I get started on candy I will eat the whole bag
• I always forget to call people back

5 places I’ve lived (not in order)

Colorado, Michigan, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona

This took me forever to finish! And now I’m going to be bad and go to bed, and not tag anybody. Mostly because I can’t think of 5 people who might actually do it!

“You have…

…been excused from jury duty for your scheduled term of service and do not need to continue checking this message.”

That was quick.  I’m almost disappointed.  I love the tone of it: “Quit obsessively checking and clogging up our website!”  I’ve never actually done my civic duty, Arizona is the only state out of the 6 that’s ever called me up.  I think I’d be a good juror, too!  Maybe next time.

Smells like dog

We met with our realtor again tonight because we are going to lower the asking price on the house.   Just hoping to get a few more people in to look at it, since we’re only about 5 weeks out from when the movers arrive to pack us up.  She also gave us feedback from the people who have been through.  Two separate people said that my house smells like dog.  ARGH.

I’m a pretty good housekeeper.  I mean, you couldn’t eat off my floors or anything, and sometimes the toys get away from me, but overall I think my house is ok.   And that’s just when you might surprise me, if I know someone is coming to look at it?  I’m Dutch, people.   I seriously scrub my doorstep.

The realtor assured my dh and I repeatedly that she did not smell dog at all.  Her theory is that just by having dog “stuff” in the house (like the kennel) that some people would think that.  I, of course, had to call several neutral parties and grill them on if they thought my house smells like my dogs.  I think they sensed that I was on the warpath and answered correctly: “of course not!”

Tomorrow is officially cleaning day.  My two labs are getting a bath, all floors will be mopped, doorstep re-scrubbed.  Someone please buy my house before I completely go off the deep end!