We attended church at the Tours, France branch today, half an hour away from our latest house. Apparently there were several families out of town, and there were less than 50 people in sacrament meeting. When we had arrived and settled into a row of chairs in the chapel, Jeff started reminiscing about how he was asked to be the pianist in this branch 16 years ago while he was on his mission, even though he could only play one hand at a time on the piano. Under his breath, half-jokingly, he chanted "please don't ask me to play the piano, please don't ask me to play the piano!" I chuckled and said he was probably quite safe today. Immediately after that exchange, the priesthood leader in charge (Branch president? Counselor? He was the only one there, so it was uncertain) came over and asked our clump of chairs if there was anyone who could play the piano. Jeff pointed to me and grinned.
"Elle peux jouer," he said.
I began shaking and quaking the minute the frère gave me a grateful/relieved look. Suddenly I was walking up front to the small platform and sitting on a squeaky piano bench, frantically reading the music to see if I knew the hymn. The French translations of the hymns usually take me longer to decipher than just going straight to the music notes. Tender mercy/massive miracle: the opening song was Choose the Right ("Bien choisir"), my #1 BEST-known hymn ever since I was 12 years old. The frère said a few opening words, announced the opening song and prayer, and less than 10 minutes after I walked in the door, I was playing the piano up front while the entire congregation sang. Until church today, I hadn't even touched a piano since we left home three weeks ago! I didn't even get to play the hymn through once before the singing began--there wasn't time. I played a two line introduction, and we were off!
The 40 or so members in attendance impressed me with the volume and gusto with which they sang the hymns. As a shaky nervous pianist, I felt grateful that I wasn't making the loudest noise in the room. I was trembling to my very CORE, but I forced myself to play the familiar notes at a decent upbeat tempo and volume. I fumbled some notes, but I used all of my primary training and left those mistakes in the dust, forging forward.
A few minutes after the opening song, we began the sacrament hymn: I stand all Amazed (Merveilleux l'amour). I had never actually played that hymn all the way through, but thankfully up until a few weeks ago, I had been practicing a song with six flats, so the four flats in this one were not too overwhelming. Plus most of the base part is one note at a time. So I stayed afloat, only mucking up the chorus and an accidental here and there. Every time we hit the chorus, my nerves spiked and I got tunnel vision, but then I heard my mom's advice echoing down that long tunnel "just stick with the melody and add one low note per measure." My frazzled mind grabbed ahold of that life preserver and I managed to keep the right hand going, bonging out a low left hand note every couple of measures and tying it all together with the pedal. I survived, and even improved a little during the last verse!
During the sacrament, I used the quiet time to hide behind the piano and plead-pray for PEACE and courage. It helped and by the time the water was passed to me, my hand wasn't visibly shaking. After the sacrament ended, I glanced at the hymn numbers posted on the wall behind me and looked up the final closing hymn, hoping my luck would hold and I'd be able to play it. Relief melted me into a quivering puddle. It was "Welcome, Welcome Sabbath Morning" ("Jour du Sabbat, Jour du Père!"). I was going to be alright! It is shocking how many times the key of C has more or less saved my life.
When the deacons (all two of them) were dismissed to sit with the congregation, I hesitated too long so I ended up sitting on the piano bench for the entire meeting. It was not super comfy, and I know I could've gone back to sit with my family any time, but I detest the act of WALKING up front--it's almost worse than performing/talking/making noise all by myself up front at church--so I stayed on my little hard squeaky bench all through the testimony meeting, doing my best to follow along the streams of consciousness and different accents of the various members who bore their testimonies. I was probably just shy of 30% comprehension...maybe a little more than last week's 25%, but not much. The awesome part is, I FEEL the French comprehension building and growing. If we could stay here for a few more months, I think I'd really get the hang of it! Oh the torture of my back-and-forth stunted linguistic growth!
The piano was facing the room, so as I sat behind it, I could look out over the congregation in front of me. I watched Amber befriend a little French girl who was sitting behind her. They started playing during the last 15 minutes of sacrament meeting, and it was super cute. Every time a speaker with a particularly difficult accent/speech style began to speak, I gave a solid effort to understand them, and then took a break to air-practice the closing hymn. When it was time to sing the closing hymn, I was as ready as I was going to be without actually playing the song through beforehand!
While I was in the middle of playing Welcome, Welcome Sabbath Morning//"Jour du Sabbat, Jour du Pere!" (which worked as a closing hymn sung at noon only because the French translation means Sabbath day, Day, of God--or something close to it), I had a jab of insecurity when I forgot if there were three or four verses in the song, and again when I glanced at the words and saw that there were four verses, I couldn't remember which verse we were on. So I had to risk flicking my eyes away from the music notes again and check the words that were being sung (in French). Thankfully I recognized the written words that I was hearing sung before I lost my momentum in the music, and then I found my place in the music without too big of a hiccup. Thus I avoided the awkwardness of stopping the song a verse early or launching into another verse when there wasn't one.
Again during the closing song I loved that energetic singing--40 voices sounded like 100. I felt a tad sad that I couldn't spend more time listening to and pondering the French translation of the familiar hymn--I was too focused on The Notes. Four upbeat verses later, the hymn ended and I breathed a sigh of relief. After the closing prayer, the room was silent and nobody moved. The branch leader looked over at me, smiled, wiggled his fingers in a piano-ish way, and nodded at me. I took that to mean "play the piano again!" Thankfully I had browsed the hymn book previously during the meeting and found another friendly hymn to play as postlude: For the Beauty of the Earth ("Pour la terre et sa beaute").
I remembered that in France, after the closing prayer at the end of sacrament meeting, the congregation sits quietly and listens to the postlude music for X amount of time before heading off to classes. I thought that was just a coincidence in the other two branches we have visited in France, but today I realized that it is for real here, and it was up to me to provide that music!
The silent room with everybody waiting for me to play and the uncertainty of how long and how much I was expected to play jangled my nerves again and my hands shook hard while I tried to play that simple hymn. I killed a few measures and decided to play it through again since it was so short. The second time through was much better. "Should I play it a third time?" I asked myself. The entire congregation was sitting there waiting for me to finish before they stood up or even started talking, so I cut it off at 2 verses with a questioning look over at the frere in charge, and at last I was out of the spotlight... mostly.
I got tremulously to my feet and the chorister thanked me for playing. I told her "Merci pour choisir les cantiques que je peux_____(I air-played the piano at this point because I was unsure if the French word for play piano was different from the Spanish word--I asked Jeff later and it is different, haha). I meant to say "thank you for choosing hymns that I can actually play," but I'm not sure how close I was or if my self-deprecating humor translated at all. I had to repeat myself because the chorister either didn't hear or didn't understand me. I don't know if she ever got what I meant, haha. Oh well, points for effort. As scary as this experience was, I'm still glad I got to go through it because it was a neat opportunity to serve, something I didn't expect to be able to do while traveling.
Jeff and I took our kids upstairs to primary, where they doubled the number of primary children in attendance up to six today. The primary presidency was all out of town, so a sweet soeur (sister) took over and we practiced singing I Am a Child of God (Je suis enfant de dieu) for the whole time, switching back and forth between French and English. That song is the only French our kids know--we taught it to them months ago. The soeur chorister wanted me to stay so I ended up playing the piano for primary too. Amber and her little friend scooted closer and closer to me by the piano and started plinking around on the high notes. Eventually they got braver and started really playing loudly while I played. They were too cute for me to care too much.
After church, Amber and her new French friend ran around playing. They were such cute buddies, holding hands, playing chase, and sharing the little girl's petite baby dolls. It was fun to watch pure childlike friendship--language barriers mean nothing to love and acceptance. Neither Amber nor the little girl understood a word that the other was saying, but they played and played. It was adorable. I think they both admired each other's hair--Amber's wild blonde curls and the little girl's wiry black hair with lots of braids and a flower headband. I wish I could remember the name of the little girl--it was darling and French and suited her perfectly, but I can't remember it at all.
Jeff and I stood in the foyer talking with a few kind members before leaving the church. They were so kind and helpful, I felt a surge of hope and possibility for my budding French abilities. One lady said that I was speaking French very well--that's my first language compliment from a native French-speaker! It is definitely possible that she was merely being kind, but I'll TAKE IT because I do feel a few wisps of improvement and a major barrier between me and French is confidence. (and accent and a tendency to toss false Spanish cognates into the mix...)
Jeff and the kids changed their clothes in the church bathroom and we drove to a local park recommended by a church member to eat our picnic lunch. The kids played on the playground and got all hot and sweaty. We went for a walk along a pleasant little pond surrounded by nice shady trees. Then we loaded up and went to Jeff's favorite park in Tours, the botanical garden (Jardin botanique de Tours). It has pretty flora and fauna and several random animals roaming around small enclosures: 2 large tortoises, a wallaby, 2 very creepy dinosaur-esque emus, 2 peacocks with babies, a donkey, a massive pig that was probably bigger than the donkey, lots of chickens and ducks, and a small flock of pink flamingos. The kids frolicked on yet another playground and got really hot and sweaty, begging for water out of the tiny 8 ounce water bottle that fits into my purse. We strolled through the park and then went back to the car and drove the 40 minutes home.
Amber and her amie (friend)
For singing time the kids wrote French and English words to I am a Child of God on the chalkboard. It was challenging for the kids because the stub of chalk was tiny.
Park number one (the name started with an R but I'm not sure how to spell or say it)
Park number 2: le jardin botanique de Tours
Dinosaurs are not extinct, people. Check out those nobbly feet and crazy eyes! Emus are modern day dinos!
Rose loved the flamingos
Hot tired limp kids on the drive home.
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