Back to Middle C

One of the most significant life lessons I have learned was learned in piano lessons.  A couple weeks ago Mike asked if I would teach him how to play the piano.  Because he does play guitar and drums, not at the same time, I know that he has an ear for music and that rhythm is nearly second nature for him.  This is a good foundation for a beginning piano student.  First of all it is good because he can hear when things are going bad, and he knows that playing notes without any sense of meter is just playing notes.  But when you sit down to a piano the first time and you see 88 keys it is overwhelming.  How can a person possibly know when to use which key?  Middle C.  We start with middle C and everything above it and below it begins to make sense, slowly make sense.  If you’ve ever sat down to play and started on the wrong note, you understand how being one key off can quickly humble you.  So you take your hands off the keys and you refocus and go back to the middle to find your foundation.  Eventually you know it, you feel it and your hands just flow to and from, in and around middle C.  It’s like a gravitational pull to keep you centered and ready to play the next piece.

In life we need a center; a person, place or thing that helps to keep us focused.  Every morning Mike goes out for a run.  It doesn’t matter if it is raining, sleeting, snowing or hailing, he runs every day.  Oh that the postal service could be this reliable. (that was a random thought) He runs without music so that he can hear the thoughts that need to be sorted in his mind each morning before he goes to work.  It is this time that brings him back to his center, the part of his soul that makes him who he is.  I am thankful for this because I love who he is and I wouldn’t want to interfere with this process.  My center is different.  When I am feeling lost or overwhelmed, I pray with the piano.  I sit at the piano, close my eyes, and just play.  My emotions create the melody and the intensity varies as I work through whatever it is that has inched me away from my center.  My center is a quiet place; a place where I meet the God of my understanding.  I need that place, I crave that place and sometimes when I sit down to play the tears come.  The distance from the center closes and soon I find myself back at my middle C, and it’s then that I am refueled for the next season.

I hope that as you read this that you too have identified what it is that centers you, that keeps you grounded when life’s hectic pace is bearing down on you.  I hope you have that center. If you feel you’ve lost your way, know that there is a center, a quiet center in the middle of you.  In that center may you find a peace that brings you back so that you too will be ready to face another day.

To those who stopped by to read this entry, may you know that I write because I want to offer hope to the hopeless and to encourage others to go and do likewise.

Thanks for stopping by,

Amy Lynn Michael

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Love is Not Blind

Recently I had to be away from home on business for two full weeks.  This meant being away from my husband.  With each day that I was gone I became more aware of how much I enjoy having Mike in my everyday life and I just plain missed his presence.  I do love technology and although I haven’t yet mastered Skype, we talked on the phone as often as we could and sent text messages.  Mike writes a love note for me most every day and while I was away that didn’t stop.  In fact he still wrote them with pen on paper.  He then photographed and e-mailed them to me so that I would be able to read them at the end of my work day just like I do when I’m at home.  That was an amazing thing but still I missed his smile, his eyes and his touch.  These are things that cannot be substituted. Love is blind they say.  “They” also say that my affections for my husband and this incredible desire to share every day with him will pass with time.  It seems that...
Read more

That Old Road

Image
There is just something that keeps calling me back. Maybe it's a fear that the good memories will fade with time unless I trace over and again the path to all I have become. Driving familiar roads making note of the things that remain; only older, warn and broken down. Grieving, in a small way, the things that are no longer there; houses, grocery stores, barns. Time seems the robber of memories. But what we do remember must be met with the reality that someone remembers those things differently, if at all. We remember events, people and places according to the the effect that they had on our lives. Perhaps we remember them as obstacles in our path while someone remembers them as the challenge they needed to push them to achieve more. However we remember those things, they are etched in our minds somewhere. Whether we choose to remember or not, they can creep to the front of our mind. Most would not know about a little town in Iowa called Clarion. But when I hear mention of th...
Read more

Dear Abby

After listening to break-room talk today, I decided to come home and compose a letter to Dear Abby that may have come from any one of the conversations that I witnessed.  This is in no way to be a reflection on my marriage.  I have trained my husband much better than this.  Enjoy the read and have a best day! Amy Dear Abby, Today is the day I have chosen to finally sit down to write you a letter.   I have been married to Jack Ass, (his real name) far too long.   When we met he was a perfect gentleman.   He always opened the car door for me and waited on me to be settled before closing it.   I in turn would reach across the seat to unlock his door and open it for him as a sign of returning my love.   When we would sit down at the dinner table we would hold hands and gaze lovingly at each other, sometimes forgetting why we were there.   It was bliss, I tell you, pure bliss.   We have been married for one year now and suddenly that ...
Read more