Internal Organs

So, I got called to accompany congregational hymns. It's the scariest job ever, and I'm not very good at it. Today, for instance, I had to play an extra verse or two while the Priests finished preparing for the Sacrament, and I totally flubbed them. It was heinous. It wasn't a finger slip, or a small mistake, but a huge "Can I just die now?" moment. In front of 250 single men who will now never date me. I mean, they didn't date me before, so no biggie, but it's still frustrating to give them an excuse.

But they all liked my tie! Which turns out, was Georgio Armani. Which I was explaining when I tripped over the step that shouldn't be there, and they laughed at me.

God put me, the bundle of nerves and anxiety, in front of a congregation of peers to perform a skill at which I am, well, unskilled. I believe there's a plan. I believe that God puts tasks in my life for larger purposes. I hope, and sometimes believe, that I must do this so that I can be called upon to do it when someone needs me. But sometimes I am convinced God simply wants me to experience constant humiliation. I'm not sure how that figures into His "Master Plan," but He never lets anything go to waste.

So I play the organ. Rather badly. Because that's the only way I'm ever going to learn, and I think someday He's going to need me to be able to play the organ. Or maybe just in case. I'm the backup plan. I'm glad to do it, and it's exciting to learn a new skill, but in the meantime, the constant humiliation of public incompetence is wearing.

In our church, we don't get fired for incompetence. We don't get fired for anything less than "hey, your time's up" or breaking laws. And this is a good thing, but I still have a constant fear that everybody knows I'm horrible, and someday they'll fire me for it. I'm terrified that God will not accept my work, or the best I can manage right now. I don't know why I'm so scared, but I am. I'm so scared that my roommate could see my hands shaking as I played. And everyone is very kind, and they lie to me kindly about playing well. I look out at the congregation and see friends, and yet my hands shake, and afterwards I feel so much trauma I can barely think.

I think I will get better. But I think I need lots of people to be very patient, and I don't trust them to be so.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Joy in the Ugly Process

Image
 Today I sat on a panel of colleagues at a "Meet the Professor" activity hosted by the English student committee. It was awesome! Such bright and interested English majors. Meanwhile, I was sitting there, a middle-aged woman, on a panel of people who had "arrived." They had reached their destination. Each of them took a moment and explained how they had succeeded, how they had found acceptance. Even those who had detoured through other paths before they got what they wanted described those detours as some kind of success: some successfully raised families, some had other jobs, etc. Some were convinced that it was because of a particular habit or capability. For several minutes, I just sat there feeling horrible, right in the middle of this impressive panel. I should have stayed silent. Blerg. I can't stay silent. I'm not that wise. So I added my two cents: I explained that I would tell them something the others would not: that sometimes you don't arrive,...
Read more

High and Low Horses

 I have not blogged in a LONG TIME and I'm so rusty.  Politics these days, amirite? My little brother pissed me off a few weeks ago in the throes of a political kerfuffle (not reasoned enough to be an argument by either definition). He accused me of posing - I don't remember exactly what he called it, but it was something like "virtue signaling." And very, very rapidly, I was trapped. I could not even attempt to do the right thing without knowing that I was doing exactly what he had just sneered at. I suppose I could go back and carefully analyze the rhetoric of the conversation and delicately unravel exactly what was happening. I am capable of that kind of analysis, but this is a blog, not a school paper, and I'm more interested in the abstractions at play. I'm always more interested in the abstractions. Let's imagine that you have a stick figure in a two-dimensional world. I'd draw it and upload it for you, but somebody stole my reMarkable. Stick fig...
Read more

The Guilt-Edged Life

Folk philosophers and self-help "experts" (seriously: what kind of person claims to be an expert in living somebody else's life!? I mean, BESIDES me) have hypothesized about the negative emotions that we struggle with when we become painfully aware of our own flawed natures. In my own experience, I can identify three, and this year, I'm going to deal with each of them differently than I have before. 1) Shame. Shame is that mortification and humiliation I feel when I see my flaws through somebody else's eyes: a symptom of valuing their opinion above its worth. I want to learn how to put negative feedback - verbal and nonverbal - into context, subordinate to what I know is true about me, the world, and God. And I want to distinguish between my actions and my identity. I can be mistaken, but I am NOT a mistake. I am Batman, but that doesn't mean I accept all the pop-philosophy of the Christopher Nolan films. 2) Guilt. Guilt is the puritanical conviction that I ha...
Read more