Not All Who Wander Are Lost...Really.

I attended a service of praise and thanksgiving this morning at Queen Margaret's School, where Andrew is organist, and the Chaplain left me thinking. Thanks, Chaplain. This was the morning in which the girls and their families sit together to worship at the school for the last time before summer term comes to an end and the girls go off into the world to their various new universities. As the Chaplain addressed the graduates he called upon them to simply follow two rules of advice: to be kind, and to be humble. To go into the world, humbly, he said, is to (as the latin 'humus' suggests) be closer to the earth...to go humbly into the world, then, is to have both feet firmly planted on the ground; to live humbly, then, is to be grounded. He acknowledged the value of being recognized for the accomplishments and talents we've been given, but went further to say that it is, also necessary to remember to be grateful to the hands that nurtured those talents and made those accomplishments possible in our lives.

I don't think I was particularly engaged in worship this morning. My head has been clouded, I have been guilty of consistent worrying, my body and heart are admittedly weary. But no matter my resistence to enter into an attitude of worship I found myself caught up in prayer, whether I liked it or not. God was speaking to me, and I was going to listen. If I'm perfectly honest I have not felt grounded lately. My music degree has been over since January, and my creative writing masters coursework finished this week, and while I have quite a few beautiful gigs lined up, I've been taking quite a lot of mundane work just to keep financially stable in preparation for a catastrophic amount of student loans coming due very soon when my full-time student status comes to a hiatus. Lots of people have asked what comes next. First and foremost is our December wedding. It's a beautiful thing sharing engaged life with my best friend, and it seems to be the straightest, clearest path in front of me. I want to begin a PhD desperately, but the trouble is I'm not sure which direction I want to take myself in. I can't seem to choose between early childhood, renaissance performance, baroque performance, English...and I don't think I've been a good listener lately. I've been too ungrateful - borderline resentful - of my varied passions.

When I was 4 years old and graduated pre-school I was awarded "Class Caregiver" and "longest hair" (which I'd cut crazily short the day before the ceremony, but they still let me keep it). When I was 14 and graduated middle school I was awarded "Jill of All Trades." When I was eighteen and graduated high school I was awarded "Most likely to become rich and famous" and "Most Musical." Lately I've been predominantly feeling overwhelmed by my interests in just about everything. I love working with children - I love the nurturing and care that is involved, I love writing, I love acting, I love language, I love making music - medieval, baroque, contemporary, solo, choral - I love teaching, and above all else I love performing. But this morning was a reminder that, perhaps, the reason I am not grounded is that I have been worrying and worrying, allowing myself to fear what will or won't come next in my life as an artist, as a musician, as a writer, as a teacher. I sleep poorly at night wondering what I'm going to be, what I'm going to be able to do to contribute to our life, to make something of myself upon which I can help build our family. And, as this morning reminded me, I have not been thanking the God that gave me these passions. I've not been allowing myself to see that my various gifts/passions were/are first and foremost gifts, given for me to use, from my Father. How arrogant, actually. Instead I've been seriously resenting the fact that I'm stretched across multiple disciplines. If I've been learning anything, though, it's that music is at the core of my being. All of my other passions are like evergreen roots that spread out from a musical core. But rather than worry, for now, it's time to start trusting that everything is going to be ok. I have a dissertation to start and complete in two months on children's literature, I have a 'Venetian Carnival' concert to prepare of Grandi, Monteverdi, Strozzi, Vivaldi, a joint 170th birthday party performance of Mozart and Purcell to prepare for one of the founding fathers of the early music movement, I have a French Baroque and English Baroque concert for da gamba, voice, and two harpsichords to prepare for September, I've started an artist management business that's going surprisingly well, and I've taken an additional three part-time jobs this month, and I seem to have a wedding to plan : ) Writing it all down is like a splash of cold water on my face. I've been worrying so much about letting my musical life take a backseat to everything else, but, as ever, it seems to be the solidarity around which everything else is happening.

Dear Heavenly Father,
Thank You for the gifts You have given me. Thank You for the hands you gave me to care with, for the voice you gave me to sing with, for the ambitious mind you gave me to dream with. Help me to see that they are given, that they are purposeful, that they are mine to use in Your name, in Your will.

...Not all who wander are lost....Tolkien is so right.
-Nia