D6 Sunday, September 9, 2012 www.jconline.com Journal Courier When one player ends song, another picks up tune Ira a Sh Jam Ever open, To joy and love. Bless this house, indeed. My grandmother did, each and every day of her life. Now it's time for me to pick up where she left off. Maybe, together, we can figure out how this song ends.
Taylor can be reached at atay Read her blogs at mind me of how I had failed. Failed to learn to play. Failed to fill the house with music. Failed to live with my grandmother's grace and faith. My grandmother animated the yellowed keys with her gnarled hands but my younger ones could find neither time nor tune.
Until now. By any measure, the year has been a challenge. I find myself ap proaching the end of 2012 as someone I barely recognize. This woman living inside my skin cooks dinner on a regular basis. She vacuums without fuss.
And she sees the old piano as a dusty treasure patiently waiting for a gentle refurbishing and, then, for willing hands to reignite the keys and fill our home with music. Gently, I opened the pages. My eyes danced over the familiar lyrics. The tips of my fingers began to tingle. Bless this house, 0 Lord we pray, Make it safe by night and day.
Bless these walls so firm and stout, Keeping want and trouble out. Bless the roof and chimneys tall, Let thy peace lie over all. Bless this door that it may prove, graphic back issues and faded papers littered the top. When I inhaled, I could smell mold and decay. More and more, the piano had come to re RESPITE STAYS AT ROSEWALK COMMONS What can a short stay do for you? Just ask Bette and Dorothy -respite guests whose friendship was renewed when they decided to make Rosewalk Commons their After my grandmother died, I gained possession of the one thing she loved almost as much as her family her piano.
Every morning and evening, my grandmother's elegant fingers played flourishing music from memory. "Bless this House" was her favorite. She played until the place where memory stuttered, pausing with fingers hovering hopefully as if she believed one day the tune would continue to its proper conclusion. The piano needed cleaning and tuning when we acquired it six years ago. A couple of keys were busted.
The boys soon pounded the life out of a few more. I had sentimental plans to pick up where my lessons left off back in elementary school. I wanted to fill our house with music like my grandmother. But progress was slow and distractions constant. I never did get the piano repaired or tuned.
As the years passed, I stopped pretending I was poised to reveal my inner Chopin. In truth, I had almost given up on the piano. I had begun to think that maybe we should pass it along to someone who would love and care for it properly. But something gave me pause. The other day, I lifted the creaky lid of the bench and thumbed through the sheet music within.
I found the golden oldies that my grandparents used to whistle. I found a book titled "Songs of Denison" with an inscription from 1936, when my grandmother was a college freshman. There were campfire favorites, hymns and the pieces I would painstakingly stumble through each summer when I was a wistful teen: "Some Enchanted Evening" "Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes" "Someday My Prince Will Come" And, at the bottom of the stack, I found the sheet music for "Bless this House." I believe my uncle tracked down a copy for the organist to play at my grandmother's funeral. I cradled the music in my hands and stared down at the old-fashioned font. Then my gaze lifted to the waiting piano.
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