17. Dining Alfresco

Here in Maine we are in the midst of an unusually uncomfortable hot spell. After breaking out in a sweat from a simple walk down the block I try to remember the interminable winter with its endless snowstorms as well as this year's June and July with days and days of rain. And when I voice a complaint about the heat people often say Aren't you from Texas? You should be used to this! But the truth is one usually deals with the heat in Texas by turning on the air-conditioning; in most cases that is not possible here. And after a week of 90-degree plus temperatures and equal humidity everything is hot. Even the pets stretch out under the ceiling fans and move as little as possible.

Finally, though, we can eat outdoors on the balcony without wearing a sweater! Despite the sultry house I look forward to preparing a cool meal and dining alfresco after the sun drops below the maple trees. Here's the perfect menu after practicing all day in a hot church or doing paperwork in my sweltering 2nd floor office, and you never have to turn on the stove or oven:

Mediterranean Tuna Salad

Chilled Canataloupe

Hearty Bread with Real Butter

Sauvignon Blanc

I'll include the recipe for the salad, adapted from the August issue of Eating Well.

1 can beans (make it easy and use whatever you have on the shelf)

2 cans water-packed tuna, drained and flaked (5 to 6 ounces each)

1 red bell pepper, finely diced

1/2 cup finely chopped onion (red or Vidalia is nice)

1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley, divided

4 teaspoons capers

1 1/2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh rosemary

1/2 cup lemon juice, divided

4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided

Freshly ground pepper

1/4 teaspoon salt

8 cups mixed salad greens

Combine beans, tuna, bell pepper, onion, parsley, capers, rosemary, 1/4 cup lemon juice, and 2 tablespoons oil. Season with pepper. Combine the remaining lemon juice, oil and salt in a large salad bowl and add the greens, tossing to coat. Divide the greens among 4 plates and top with the tuna salad.

I generally have all these ingredients on hand and am lucky to have these herbs in my garden. Make sure the cantaloupe is perfectly ripe and the wine a little dry, then ENJOY! A scoop of sorbet or a piece of chocolate tops it all off nicely.

Bon appetit!

16. Soldier Boy


What passing bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs-
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.

What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
The pallor of girls’ brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing down of blinds.

(Anthem for Doomed Youth by Wilfred Owen, 1917)


On a recent Southwest Airlines flight from Nashville to Baltimore I was one of the last to board the full flight. I took the first middle seat I saw, which happened to be next to a handsome young soldier, one of a couple dozen on the plane. Normally I immediately bury my head in a book in order to skip the chit-chat with the person next to me, but when the flight attendant announced Let’s show our men and women in uniform how much we appreciate them he and I made eye contact. I felt compelled to ask the proverbial Where are you going? and when he answered Afghanistan the conversation began.

Chris, based in Ft. Campbell, Kentucky, is 23 and an Army officer from a military family. He was headed to a helicopter base near the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan where he will be a maintenance supervisor. A recent college graduate, he chose the military both for job security and because it is in his blood.

I asked how his parents were handling his deployment (pretty well, since his father is career military) and what his living conditions would be (a tent, some access to phone and internet services, a softball field). I wondered about the preparation he’d had for the trip, such as language and culture studies. His answer was not reassuring. Perhaps I detected some apprehension in his face, but no real fear.

Truthfully, I’m not clear anymore why we are in Afghanistan. To me it’s just another part of an unjustified, endless war that we cannot win. All of it is very, very far away and removed from my own life. But meeting Chris suddenly made it real to me, with a personal, human dimension. I was taken aback at his young, tender age, and the ages of all those with him. My daughter is 24. How, oh how, can we send our young people into these ambiguous situations? If they are lucky enough to come back alive, there is a good chance they will be seriously injured, either physically or emotionally.


Since this encounter I’ve become aware that Afghanistan is in the news everyday and that troubles there are escalating. In the newspaper I’ve begun reading the weekly summary of our soldiers killed there and in Iraq and I am sadly reminded of the fragile and transient nature of life. I fear that we are in a situation that will only escalate, with tragic results, as we fight an ill-defined enemy seemingly able to outwit our best intelligence.

At my church Chris and his company have been added to the Prayers of the People every Sunday morning. May they return home alive, healthy and whole.

Almighty God, we commend to your gracious care and keeping all the men and women of our armed forces at home and abroad. Defend them day by day with your heavenly grace; strengthen them in their trials and temptations; give them courage to face the perils which beset them; and grant them a sense of your abiding presence wherever they may be; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (The Book of Common Prayer)

15. The Contraptionist


In June I spent nearly 2 weeks touring Ecuador as the accompanist for the First Parish Choir of Brunswick, ME. My friend and organ teacher Ray Cornils is the Director of Music there and in 2006 I toured Ireland and Wales with the same group.

Although I consider myself an above-average accompanist, going on these trips is really not about one’s ability to play a lot of notes or one’s sensitivity to balance and nuance. After 4 international choir tours I’ve come to realize that it is all about flexibility. With great anxiety I recall climbing the spiral staircase to one of the five organs at the Salzburg Cathedral and having not even a few seconds to test the instrument before the downbeat from the conductor. All the while I was receiving whispered instructions in German, which I do not speak, about when and what to play. On the trip to Ireland and Wales I was privileged to play a number of fine instruments, both pianos and organs. Although in most of these cases I had adequate rehearsal time, I never knew until I walked into the church what the instrument would be like. In some instances the organ was separated from the choir by the entire length of the church and I had to watch Ray via a video monitor. It all became somewhat of an inside joke between me and the choir, who peppered me with questions such as What’s it going to be today, Julia? Will we even be in the same building as you? How are those eyes in the back of your head?

As the trip to Ecuador became closer I asked Ray about the instruments I’d play. He wryly informed me that they’d be electronic keyboards as Ecuador had few good pipe organs and pianos, and those were usually out-of-tune and in bad repair. I innocently thought Fine. A piece of cake! The keyboards will be in tune and I’ll be able to see the conductor. Although I would never consider playing a concert in the US on an electric keyboard, I realized that I could not be such a perfectionist on this trip.

First stop: a beautiful village church in Cumbaya, a suburb of Quito. We were scheduled to sing for mass, then perform a concert. I marched right up to the side of the altar to discover the less-than-full-size keyboard with no music rack or pedal. Yikes. Not only that, but there was no chance to rehearse in the church because of back-to-back masses and the priest wanted the choir in the back of the church for the service. Ray made a quick decision to sing the mass a cappella, then bring the choir forward for the concert. I sat on a chair at least a foot too low, jerry-rigged my music against a mike stand and constantly reached for notes that were not on the keyboard. I was utterly frustrated! But as the concert went on I looked into the faces of the hundreds in attendance and saw that they loved the music. A deep connection between us gringos and the Ecuadoreans was forming and it did not matter that I was playing a crummy keyboard. They laughed, they cheered, they sang along. We all left that concert on a high note.

With variations, this experience continued at four other venues. At the Iglesia Compañia de Jesus in Quito I endured one of the worst rehearsals of my career, playing with the music in my lap until a wobbly stand arrived and trying to make music out of a contraption. At least it was full-size and there was a pedal (which wanted to walk away from me), but I just could not get an acceptable sound from it. This beautiful church is dripping in gold leaf and the US Ambassador to Ecuador was in attendance. Where was the Steinway grand?

In the city of Cuenca I was faced once again with a short keyboard, but this one had a bona-fide music rack and the pedal was taped to the floor! This instrument sat on a simple table, but that was not enough for the person in charge. She found a white tablecloth trimmed with roses and onto the table it went. Propped up on two thick pillows, I sat in an elegant chair. As this concert ended I found out that the next night I would be playing the same keyboard. Yes! I thought. I’ll know what I’m dealing with. Did I really think it would be so simple? This time the pedal stuck and could not be used, and even after carefully checking the settings the first chord I played sounded like an organ for a 60’s rock band.

At our last concert in Papallacta the keyboard was the best of the bunch: full-sized and with a working pedal. Ray generously gave me the single rickety music stand and gallantly conducted with his score on the floor. This location, though, had an electricity problem, and a few minutes after the program was scheduled to begin several men were still trying to plug me in to a set of bare wires! For the most part it worked, although in the middle of one piece which has a particularly nice piano part the power went out. Ray scowled in my direction and I just gently shrugged: What can I do?

Throughout the trip the choir often wondered how I could get through the concerts on these contraptions. And I even asked myself if perhaps I was compromising my musical integrity. With no exceptions, however, the concerts were packed with an audience eager to hear this American choir. They discovered such joy and meaning in our music- who was I to withhold that because of my distaste for electric keyboards? And selfishly, I, too, would have missed out on many rich, rewarding experiences.

On the bus one night after a program I announced that I was not the accompanist, but the contraptionist. And a kind, male voice replied I think that would be the Immaculate Contraptionist.

On a favorite jacket I wear a button that says Peace Through Music. Before the trip to Ecuador I believed that, intellectually, but now I believe it in my heart. Despite chasms of language, culture, economics and geography, the choir and the people who heard us made a powerful, human connection, thanks to the universal language of music.

14. Piano Recital

Ah, Lily! Your hand position!

That scary, intimidating, yet exciting event called the Spring Piano Recital is now history. And what a rewarding and fun time it was. This year I have had 11 piano students- 8 children and 3 adults. Most of them have had a productive year, but I do admit to wanting to pull my hair out at the end of more than a few teaching days. Grace, you didn’t practice this week EITHER? Emerson, you forgot your books AGAIN? Alden, your fingers STILL look like spaghetti!

All is forgiven, though, when the recital performances are like those I heard on a recent Sunday afternoon. Most of the children have been studying for about 2 years and they are now making music. In addition to the usual Suzuki beginner pieces we were treated to the sounds of Bach, Mozart, Hummel, Kabalevsky and Bartok, and without exception these miniatures contained dynamics, correct articulation, phrasing, and feeling. In short, musicality.

In these days of technical verbosity, why does a child or adult choose to take up an instrument? Thankfully the human desire for creativity and expression cannot be fully met by electronic devices. The piano seems to enjoy a universal attraction and I feel lucky that it is my instrument and the one that I teach.

For about 2 years now I have had an especially challenging high school student that I’ll call Jim. When he first came to play for me I wasn’t sure if I could work with him. He would neither talk to me nor look me in the eye and his playing, at an intermediate level, was troublesome. His hand position was atrocious, his legs were in constant motion and he couldn’t count to save his life. Why, oh why does this kid want to play piano? I must have been up for a challenge since I decided to take him on, and for a long while it was a struggle. In addition to there being little personal connection between us, he had no idea what practicing meant. After a few months I gave him the usual song and dance: this is a waste of my time and your mother’s money.

But slowly something started to change. He learned one of Bach’s minuets and began to play with feeling. He asked to learn more Bach and chose the Musette in D made famous by Bobby McFarren and Yo-Yo Ma. About this time he even began talking to me and laughing at my cryptic jokes. I started to like this boy!

After about a year of study his grandmother came in to tell me how much piano meant to Jim. She took me aside and whispered He has Asperger’s syndrome, you know. Well, I didn’t know much about that and I immediately did some research. Bingo, it all made sense. That Jim could push aside this developmental disorder and communicate through playing the piano is a striking example of the power of music to transcend our human limitations.

I often think back to my own piano study and recitals growing up. For 12 years I studied with Mrs. Harris, a fixture among the local piano teachers. A graduate of the University of Texas, she had a large class of students and was also the organist at my church, First Baptist. She was a wonderful teacher and always had a twinkle in her eye as she conveyed her enthusiasm for the music. Many of her students, including myself, consistently won top prizes in competitions sponsored by the Lubbock Music Teachers Association. And were we ever busy! There was always another hymn festival or sonatina contest or theory exam on the horizon. She had so many students that she had to divide them in half and have 2 separate recitals.

In my teenage years Mrs. Harris and I did have a few run-ins. She was not too pleased when I announced that I wanted to play a medley from The Sound of Music for the recital. And there was a whole string of lessons when I arrived quite late, thanks to spending some time after school in my boyfriend’s car, and was subject to her glower. But through the years she gave me so much more than my parents ever paid for and was thrilled and proud that one of her students went to Baylor as a piano major.

For as long as I can remember music has been my soul food. It is the one thing that has never let me down- in my darkest days it has been a steady and comforting companion and in good times it has allowed me to express boundless joy. How fortunate I am that what sustains me also provides my physical support; sharing my love of music with students, choir members and the congregation in the pews gives my life great meaning.

My students have taught me much about the joy of expression, the need for patience, the possibility of human connectivity through music and the importance of generativity. And so this year I ended the recital with my own performance of Mendelssohn’s Gondola Song in A Major- a gift to them in thanksgiving for their presence in my life.

13. Running Interference


How does one face the indignity of old age gracefully?

I recently spent a week in the Dallas area visiting my parents and aunt in their new retirement facility. It is a lovely place with beautiful grounds, spacious living accommodations, decent food and many activities from which to choose. As the trip approached I began to feel a sense of dread- I was anxious about seeing my mother and dad there and not in the family home in Lubbock. But that particular fear did not materialize: their apartment is full of familiar things and feels like them. And most of all they are where they need to be.

But the sense of dread was not misplaced. First of all, I was unprepared for the realities of staying in a retirement place for a week. But more importantly I was dismayed by my dad’s deterioration. Even though my sister had warned me that he could barely walk, I felt that something very significant was slipping through my hands.

There are so many different types of people at the Remington and most would probably prefer to be somewhere else. Walkers, electric wheelchairs and oxygen tanks are common. Cliques form in the dining hall whereas others are left to eat alone. When entering the lobby you are forced to walk the gauntlet, through the folks sitting around chatting. It is always the same group and as you walk past you hear the not-so-whispered comments: Who’s that? Who’s she visiting? Emily was nearly assaulted by an old codger wanting to take her out to dinner.

Most amusing, yet also sad, was a couple trying to have some sort of romantic relationship. She was insanely jealous of anytime her man friend spoke to another woman and I could hear them yelling at each other as they watched wrestling matches in front of the big screen television down the hall.

For several years my dad has had congestive heart failure and spinal stenosis and has been in a slow decrescendo. In fact in 2005 the doctor gave him a year to live. But I am not surprised that he has hung on- that side of my family tree just doesn’t know how to die. They wring out every last drop of life and, unfortunately, usually wear out the caregivers in the process. As downcast as I am at seeing Dad’s demise, it is equally sad to see what’s happening to my mother.

Coming to terms with Dad’s illness has been a slow process for Mother and there have been times when I believe she has single-handedly kept him alive. They have an extraordinary marriage, but she is now a caretaker more than a wife. The strain of taking care of Dad, as well as her own aging, has led her to lean more and more on my sister and me as she struggles with decisions. Gone is the confident, optimistic woman I grew up with. And Amy and I are weary, too, after the endless persuasions, encouragements and even arguments necessary to get them out of their home in Lubbock.

It is hard for me to imagine what it feels like to be unable to take care of one’s own most basic needs or to lose control of bodily functions. I looked into the faces of the Remington residents, knowing full well that many are at this stage of life. Some are able to cover this up and perhaps even deny it, but what does it feel like on the inside, when it’s just you acknowledging it to yourself? How are some able to maintain their dignity while others slip into despair? And how many only put on a happy face, pretending to accept the situation, while actually living in a personal hell, wanting this life to end?

As I watched my mother give herself completely over to caring for my dad, sometimes sympathetically and sometimes resentfully, I could not help but wonder if I was seeing myself in the not-so-distant future. My husband is 21 years older than me, and although we have had a fairly normal married life together I see some things starting to change. Hearing loss, forgetfulness, occasional cognitive confusion- these seem inevitable signs of aging which are becoming more noticeable and problematic. Bill has often said, only half-jokingly, that he doesn’t need long-term care insurance because he has his younger wife to take care of him.

As a wife I know that I will, in fact, take care of Bill in any way necessary as he grows older. But selfishly, I don’t want to turn into my mother. I have years left of energy and interest in my career as a musician: many organ works to learn and perform and many choral works to conduct. There are thousands of miles I want to cover and so many friends to spend time with… I pray that fate will not ask me to spend these peak years mainly as a caregiver.

I have an indelible memory of my trip: of being in Target with my mother as she begged the pharmacist to fill a prescription which the doctor had forgotten to authorize, all the while holding a bag of adult diapers. Every bit of grief, worry and pain that she’s endured the past few years were etched on her face… and in my heart as well. I returned to Maine feeling bruised and battered, as if I’d been running interference between my parents and the blows of life.

12. Music for the Weekend

A few years ago CD’s for certain occasions or times of the day were quite popular. Titles such as Mozart For Your Morning or A Baroque Breakfast were ubiquitous at gift shops and bookstores. The local classical music station here in Maine even has special programming for Sunday brunches, weeknight dinners and the evening commute. I suppose these ideas have been good marketing tools and have at times encouraged the neophyte to purchase a recording.

My fingers seem to have been running a marathon lately, playing a lot of music which would never turn up on these commercial lists. I am the accompanist for the Acadia Choral Society, a community choir of around 60 voices, and our spring concerts were May 2 and 3. On these programs I played piano, organ and harpsichord- a challenge, to be sure. We did Handel’s youthful Dixit Dominus, four songs by Stephen Paulus, and three anthems by John Ireland in which I got to “pull out all the stops” on the organ. The concerts are in my church, so I am accustomed to the piano and organ as well as the acoustics.

The harpsichord is another story. It is not my favorite sound and I am often reminded of the esteemed conductor Sir Thomas Beecham’s comment that it sounds not unlike two skeletons copulating. I haven’t played one since graduate school, so I was a bit worried about it. Yes, the keyboards are laid out the same as a piano, but the touch is stiff and finicky, to say the least. There is no damper pedal and the sound evaporates immediately. And then there are the many early music “experts” who are very particular about style and ornamentation. Would any be in the audience? Luckily I’ve played enough Baroque music on a tracker organ to have a good idea of what to do.

The Handel was accompanied by eleven strings plus harpsichord and many times I’m sure I wasn’t even heard. But there were a couple of movements for solo voice and continuo where my part was exposed and prominent. All in all it was fun and I think I did fairly well (I haven’t heard the recording yet). That is, until I reached the last four pages of the piece in the second performance. I began to notice an odd clanking sound and something looked amiss when I glanced at the inside of the instrument. Some keys would not rebound after playing them, so I shifted to the upper manual. Then those keys began to malfunction and within seconds all the notes remained down and I could not play the instrument! What to do? If I were to just sit there with my hands in my lap it would surely draw attention to the problem. Fortunately the entire orchestra was playing forte at this point and my part would not be missed. I decided to fake it by keeping my fingers moving without actually touching the keys, and nobody was the wiser.

I still don’t understand what happened; something must have gone out of adjustment. When the harpsichord technician came to move it back to the library the day after the concert, he was not alarmed. However, if I end up playing this instrument again I am going to know more about its mechanics!

The Ireland pieces were fun to play and the local critic even commented on the spine-tingling organ accompaniment in one. But his Te Deum quickly became known as the
Tedium among the choir because at twenty pages it is just too long. Stephen Paulus, a Pulitzer- prize winning composer, has a beautiful way of setting text, but I was disappointed that the choir was unable to sing the appointed ones a cappella. They would have been much more effective without the piano quietly plunking out the notes.

The program was long and demanding and the chorale sounded a little tired by the end of the second concert. Still, the comraderie among the singers was strong and there is always some post-concert euphoria surrounding a successful performance. I chose to bypass the party afterwards, opting to have dinner with friends.

The following is a Celtic invocation, used as the text in one of the Paulus songs. It is a beautiful prayer of reverence and thanksgiving which gave me pause every time we rehearsed it. I’ve decided to recite it every morning for awhile in hopes that it will inspire me to each day look beyond the problems, hassles and struggles of life; to find the beauty, hope and peace that exist in my world.


May I speak each day according to Thy justice,
Each day may I show thy chastening, O God;
May I speak each day according to Thy wisdom,
Each day and night may I be at peace with Thee.

Each day may I count the causes of Thy mercy,
May I each day give heed to Thy laws;
Each day may I compose to Thee a song,
May I harp each day Thy praise, O God.

May I each day give love to Thee, Jesu,
Each night may I do the same;
Each day and night, dark and light,
May I laud Thy goodness to me, O God.

11. Friday Night Lights

I freely admit it: I am obsessed with the television show Friday Night Lights. Please don’t invite me to do something on that evening, the answer will be no; I will be at home faithfully watching at 9 pm.

When I announce my enthusiasm for this show the response is invariably something along these lines: WHAT??? You like a football show??? (I do like football, but that is a different story). FNL is not about football. It is about people whose lives have football as a common denominator. Football is just the back drop, serving as a binding to hold the story together. Yes, I’m sure it can be classified as a “soap opera.” But it is a damn good one, with believable characters that are always fully human.

In almost every episode there is for me an “ah-ha” moment, where I think they got that right: Coach’s grabbing Smash at his college try-out and saying to his face God has placed you HERE to do what you’re best at. Julie’s looking expectantly in the mirror after her first sexual experience to see if she notices a difference. Tyra’s Yes, ma’am. Matt’s grandmother relying on a member of her Sunday school class to take her to a doctor’s appointment. Sexy, smart Tami’s talk with her daughter about sex, a mixture of sadness and relief.

And then there’s Buddy. Dear, dear Buddy. I know him; he is familiar to me. A middle-age man carrying too much weight, his youthful good lucks still apparent. Always wanting to do what’s best for his family, his friends, his business, but sometimes getting waylaid by his passions. A car dealer and head of the team boosters, he would cut off his right hand to save someone or something he loves.

When the movie version of Friday Night Lights came out I said to two teenage boys in my youth choir, That was my life in high school. And indeed that is true. The original story took place in Odessa, Texas, a place even grimmer and drier than Lubbock. Life in both places was governed by sports schedules and church. My family had season tickets on the 50 yard line to the Texas Tech football games and even occasionally traveled out of town to watch the Red Raiders play. And equally important was high school football. I wouldn’t have missed a Friday night under the lights for anything. My brother played as did my high school sweetheart.

Since I had a boyfriend on the team Friday nights were really all about after the game. And there was quite a build-up to that, beginning with a pep rally at school in an auditorium filled with screaming, hormone-laced teenagers, led by the cheerleaders (in my day the popular, and yes, loose, girls), all for the benefit of the incredibly handsome young men dressed up in coat and tie, sitting on the stage.

The football game itself produced a comraderie among the fans that I’ve rarely experienced since. Homecoming meant that the girls were weighed down by huge mum corsages laden with floor length ribbons, cowbells and miniature footballs. A feeling of being on top of the world was in the air when we won, tears and despondency when we lost. A loyal group of fans would cheer the team as they returned to the bus, no matter what the outcome of the game.

I would separate from my girlfriends at this point and wait for my boyfriend Tommy to come by my house. A win would often mean a trip out for a burger and a loss would usually keep us at my house. We did not go to the wild parties depicted in the show; we wanted to be alone. With eyes and ears out for my mother, passion was the name of this game, whether it was in Tommy’s car or on the couch in the living room. The game results dictated that passion, too: enthusiastic and celebratory if we won; quiet and ardent if we lost.

Perhaps watching Friday Night lights is just my middle-aged sentimentalism. Yet perhaps it is more, for it brings up that nagging question of leaving Texas, leaving a husband, leaving family. Leaving a familiar, comfortable, yes good way of life for something new in this state of Maine.