My parents got rid of the piano. I can't say that without letting tears glaze my eyes. I suppose it is just a piece of furniture. No. It's more than that. I would walk into the living room and feel my heart jump at the thought of pulling out the bench and lifting the pale wooden cover. My heart always did that, whether I played or not. I expressed myself on that piano long before i could plunk at the keys of my laptop. My fingers would spread over that ivory, they just fall into place. I barely used music. I just used what was in my head. Lately it was Musetta's Waltz, or Nessun Dorma.
I played it one last time before they took it away. Maybe I should have played it more before that. I sat in front of those keys and I was four years old again, playing what was in my head. I imagined, as I played, my parents surrounding me with tears in their eyes. My father places his hand on my shoulder and tries to understand what it means that they're giving it away. He changes his mind, apologizes, and I continue to play. They gave it away and no one understands what it meant for them to do that.
I have a guitar now, but I didn't have a guitar when I was four. I didn't figure out the Japanese theme from my Raffi tape on the guitar. Or the theme to Edward Scissorhands when i was seven. I can't sit at the guitar and touch my youth. "We'll buy you a keyboard," I've had repeated to me. A keyboard isn't the same. Any Other Piano Isn't The Same.
How long can one go on, lamenting over am instrument?

"Life without God is a long lonely road.
He's the reason to go on..."

We had this huge Christmas concert at NWF yesterday. It was combined with the Christian Fellowship Church--a group that we've befriended over the years and have been doing stuff with. It's a lot of fun for me because it's a black gospel church. They are surprisingly similar to us though. I think they have multiple pastors or elders, and they are pretty informal. It was a long concert, but it was great. My Uncle Paul, Aunt Donna, Chris Martin, and Frank Oakley sang a few songs. The quote up there is from the one that's been in my head.

Harry Martin taught a great message. He compared how the world recieves Jesus at Christmas time to the way a young toddler recieves a Christmas gift--he spends more time on the wrapping than the actual present. That's the way the world is at this time, with Christmas. "Too involved in the wrapping--" i.e., the shopping and the lights, or maybe even the giving itself, "to recognize the gift." I thought that was a great analogy.

It was good to be reminded that through Jesus being born into this world, and therefore taking on our "human condition," that He did his work ifor us. "Glory came down from Heaven," they sang. Sometimes that gets covered up in all the fake snow around here. "God is with us now," Harry explained. And He is. Oh, and before Harry said any of this he sung this hymn called "One Day" or something like that, which was really touching. He just sang it there, acapella, his voice vibrating off the YMCA walls. I wish I could remember exactly which song it was...