Brahms

So this week has been great and horrible in just about equal measure.  I found out I didn’t get the job at the college.  Or rather won’t be getting the job at the college.  A good family friend passed away this morning.  He and his wife don’t have any kids, but have been married for 67 years.  Sixty-seven years.  My parents are just approaching half of that.  As they don’t have any kids, and I’m no longer home, my parents have been spending some of the holidays with them over the past few years.  Like Thanksgiving and Easter.  Dave has been sick for a while now, in and out of the hospital.  My mom told me this week that he was in his last days.  She and my dad have been spending time at the hospital with Bev, and today about noon, he finally passed away.  Tomorrow my parents are going with Beverly to help with funeral arrangements.  My mom pointed out that it was a little like reliving how my grandfather died for my father.  Dave was a funny, out-going guy who always had a joke and a smile for anyone who stopped by.  I know my parents really enjoyed their company, and vice versa.  Today was also my dad’s birthday.  So for him, this is a bit surreal.  His own father passed away the day after Father’s Day.  So joy and sorrow wrapped up together for him all over again.

The only reason I haven’t blown my head off yet is the college orchestra is performing Brahms Requiem this week.  We have a visiting conductor who is fantastic, and the music is some of my favorite in the world.  Truly.  The German Requiem was something totally new when it came out.  Requiems are the Catholic masses for the dead, using specific words and texts all in Latin. Brahms was not Catholic, and therefore did not want to write using those texts in a dead language.  So instead he choose Biblical texts (in German) that not only mourned the death, but celebrated the resurrected life in heaven.  It was ground-breaking at the time, and has remained one of the most amazing pieces of music to this day.  You can hear the influence that Brahms continues to have in the movie scores of Howard Shore and John Williams.  There are parts of the Requiem that feel as if we’re playing something directly from the Lord of the Rings movie score.  Its absolutely fantastic.  Tonight was a private concert/working dress.  We did the whole thing just like a performance, except not in dress clothes, and we did stop a few times.  Its not as formal as the performance, but gives everyone a chance to run the whole program.  Anyways, there’s been rehearsals every day this week, some much longer than others, but still.  Its given me something to do every day which is good.  I’m not looking forward to next week, when I have less and less motivation to get out of bed.

I also half-heartedly asked out one of the guys from orchestra.  He’s been really sweet lately and we’ve gotten to know each other a little bit.  I mentioned I was watching "The King’s Speech" and he said he’s never seen it, but wants to.  I have it from Netflix.  So I invited him over, but he said he’s too busy and tired right now.  The problem is I don’t know if he said no because of timing or because of me.  I don’t know if it was just a blanket no never or just a not right now.  I’m not brave enough to really venture into it.  I’d rather be shot down and can pretend it was just timing, rather than be told he thinks I smell or something.  It really could be just timing.  He had a lot of concerts last weekend, and then he got sick.  Then this week is Brahms and college finals are coming up, so there are exams and papers and whatnot.  And he’s a fourth year, so he’s got a lot going on.  I completely understand, but…  I don’t know.  I do like him, and I think I could like him more.  I’m just such a loser when it comes to this stuff.  For all I know, he’s got a girlfriend and I just made things incredibly awkward.  I haven’t been able to figure it out cause he’s been sick and rehearsals have gone long and everyone is tired.  So I don’t know if its just that or its me.  I really hate the dating scene.  Really and truly. One of the deacons at church, Kevin, likes to tease me and threaten to set me up on a date.  I keep telling him to go right ahead.  Truth be told, I wouldn’t mind it at all!  Let someone else be in charge of finding the guy and just tell me when and where.

I feel like I did this whole career/life path thing backwards.  It would be enormously easier to find an orchestra, move to that town and then find a church.  Instead I did it opposite.  I found a church and now I’m trying to find more gigs.  I’ve been watching a lot of "In Plain Sight" recently and so I’ve wondered what would I do if I witnessed a murder or something.  What if I had to give up everything that was me.  No more oboe, no more music, no more church positions.  What would I do?  Unfortunately, in my state of mind I’d probably refuse to go into WitSec.  The last episode I watched was about a writer who couldn’t handle not being a writer, so she left the program.

Yah, that would be me.