Rocket Scientist

Someone reminded me of something.  I write here a great deal about my dream: to write.  I can’t remember a time when I didn’t want to write.  But there are a lot of things I dreamed of and not all of them involve writing.

I’m not whining.  I’ve got a lot to be thankful for and I’m pretty happy.  But there are aspects about the way I grew up that sadden me.  I always loved singing.  I had a good ear and an excellent memory, but I lived with a parent who didn’t want to hear it and made no bones about not wanting to hear it.  “If you can’t sound like Karen Carpenter, I don’t want to hear you.”  Well, I didn’t.  I was, all unknowing, a soprano and though I pushed my range down nearly an octave below middle C, I was never going to sound like Karen Carpenter.

As you might guess, I grew up very self-conscious about my singing voice.  Taking choir wasn’t an option; I was “the smart child” (which was patently ridiculous - all of my siblings are brilliant), so high school was predetermined: 4 years of science, math, English, etc.  Nothing fun fun.

So, when I went to college and tested out of chemistry, I had available hours and nothing I had to take.  So, I took choir.  I had to try out with the head of the music department.  I was scared to death.  At the end of the tryout, the Department head told me two things I never forgot: “Don’t let anyone tell you you can’t sing,” and “Pick any choir group you want.”  I took them both as compliments.  Engineering physics doesn’t provide many free hours, so my window of opportunity closed soon.

After (actually during) college, I married someone who was as unappreciative of my singing voice as my mother had been.  So I stopped singing, largely, except when I was alone.

Until my daughter was born.  And then I sang with her and she loved to sing.  I was worried though that, as I was all but untrained, I might teach her the wrong way to sing.  So, finally, I took lessons.  My teacher was a retired opera teacher who told me, over the phone, that he wasn’t looking for a long term student.  Well, I was a mother with a small child.  I didn’t plan on being a long term student.

He told me right away that I was a dramatic soprano.  News to me, since I had always thought I was an alto.  “Well,” he said, “You hit the high C just now.”  I did?  I never did learn to sight read.

After two months, I thanked him for ensuring I had the basics in what I thought was the last lesson.  “You’re leaving?” he asked incredulously.

“Well, you didn’t want a long term student.”

“But that was before I heard you sing!”  And then he offered to teach me for free (which I refused).  He hated that I was “too old” to start a singing career and encouraged me to try out for the Houston Opera Choir after I’d been training with him less than three months.  Again, I considered all this complimentary. Although I did take more lessons from him, divorce, life, his illnesses, all conspired to bring them to an end.

It may sound like unmitigated bragging, but I have a point here.  I will never go pro singing, but I will also never let anyone take my singing from me again.  I can’t stress how important that is.

And, though I couldn’t undo the directions I had taken earlier in my life, my daughter has also shown considerable skill and expertise with regards to singing.  And I’m so proud of her, but also so pleased that she has the opportunity to do something with it, that it isn’t an avenue denied her.

You can hear/see her sing (ages 12-13) here, here and here.  Fabulous, isn’t she?

There are few gifts a mother can have that mean more than the ability to undo mistakes from her own childhood for her own children.