It’s not the warmer weather that I’m longing for, it’s a bit of sanity. February was Black History Month and is always brutal for me at church. I try to fawn off responsibilities to others, but, like a boomerang, they keep coming back to me. Lining up speakers, getting approvals, making sure equipment is set up, putting information into the church bulletin, etc.
Sunday, February 24 was a prime example. Go to the 8:30 a.m. service to make sure the guest preacher has shown up. Afterward, accompany him to a place for him to rest until the 10:45 service. Make sure the 9:30 adult education speakers are there and make sure they are set. Make at least some of the choir rehearsal, which starts at 9:30, but my cloning ability is frayed. Sing in the choir at 10:45 service, and also do the presentation of the ceremonial kente cloth, and read prayers of the people.
Thank goodness my wife has taken responsibility for the luncheon. But then there’s the clean-up afterward.
I would have been happy to have gone home then, as I was exhausted. Unfortunately, the husband of one of the choir members had died that week, and choir people support their own. So we sang at the 3 p.m. service.
Not that it was a BAD day, mind you. I thought everything went well. The guest preacher was good, the adult ed presenters were well-received, and the dinner was fantastic. I thought the music was fine; in fact, if I’m doing this correctly, you should be able to hear I’ve Been in the Storm So Long [LISTEN]; yes, there’s a one-second recording glitch at the end.
There were a lot of deaths in the families of people I know in the month of February. Our choir’s soprano soloist lost her father; him, I hadn’t met, but the rest of the people I knew. The former treasurer of the Friends of the Albany Public Library, Peg, passed away. So did the wife of the former president of the Friends; Len and Naomi Tucker had been married for over 70 years and were such a sweet couple. My friend Broome’s dad Michael died; he was always an interesting and entertaining guy. Our former secretary at work had her mother die in the early morning, then had to bring her father to the hospital for treatment of his heart that same day.
March means working on an initiative my church is supporting with Giffen Elementary School in Albany; my wife is even more heavily involved than I. There’s a church musical, and I have a part in that, on March 17, which means some rehearsals as well. And of course, there’s Holy Week, which church musicians and singers think of as hell week. (Someone suggested that was a sacrilegious sentiment – well, when you think about the betrayal, whipping, and crucifixion stuff prior to Easter…)
So I’m looking forward, more than usual, to April, when our office has a presentation to prepare by the end of the month; a piece of cake.