Waiting

About eleven years ago a woman I grew up with had a stroke.  When it happened, the prognosis was not good, but against the odds, she woke up and went home.  She had another baby.  She went back to work.  She saw her oldest graduate from high school.  She did all the things a mom of four does every day for eleven years.  All the big stuff, all the little, every day stuff.

Then, last week, she went in for a routine brain surgery to address an issue related to the stroke.  As my mom says, "We really shouldn't say any brain surgery is routine...".  The surgery went fine, but a waterfall of things happened afterwards, leaving her dependent on a ventilator.  

Her family is taking turns waiting at her side, while those of us who can't be there wait and pray far away.  I pray for a miracle.  I pray for comfort.  I pray she isn't suffering. I pray if she has to suffer it is so she will wake up. I pray for her kids and for all the "what ifs"  I pray for her parents, who wait so patiently, and for her siblings and extended family.

I've made an effort to make time to sit and pray, to think, to communicate with folks who are there and with folks who are far away, like me, and praying.  I spent time over the weekend going through the CD of family photos my mom gave me, looking for pictures of all of us as kids and smiling at all the happy memories.  There were lots of pictures, and lots of memories of things we didn't take pictures of.  Today, I spent some time playing from the hymnal our church used in high school for church and for choir--(My piano teacher would cringe...those flats and sharps are tricky to unpracticed hands). As I played, I  heard many voices in my memory. I could hear my friend take the high soprano, while I did my best to hit second and her sister sang alto. I could hear her laugh, and hear her tell me I could hit the higher soprano note, too. (And me laugh, "no").....I know that even if she leaves us now I will hear her voice again when we all reach heaven.

So for now we wait and pray and remember and hope.

Don't look a gift piano in the mouth?

A few weeks ago Mr. Ranch's law partner asked him if we would be interested in a free piano.  The partner is moving and the new house won't have room for the piano.  I keep asking for a piano but taking one without hearing it concerned me (a lot).  I hemmed and hawed, and then said, "ok".  After all, if I accept it as free, then someone else will in the future, right?

The piano apparently has quite a history--it has a stamp on it that says it was built in 1903. It also has a "I was tuned" sticker from 1976  in the small South Dakota town where my parents now live--weird! It is an upright grand and looks very pretty.  You can watch the innards if you play without sheet music and it has a harpsichord petal with makes it sound a lot like a really old harpsichord.

 Also in an interesting turn of events, The Girl has decided to teach herself to play the piano.  Every afternoon this week she has dutifully sat in front of the piano with the beginners book and practiced.  I think she has practiced piano more than drums this week.  Mr. Partner's daughters left all their books in the bench, so combined with all my books, The Girl has quite a selection to practice.  Alice  is helping by keeping the top from raising.

 Inside the piano--a 10 year guarantee that expired over 100 years ago if it was really built in 1903.  Crazy.

Some pretty interior details...









Now that we have it moved in, next on the agenda is to have it tuned--I should get to work on that this week!