Those Pipes

Lately, I have been pining for something I don't have: a piano.

From the time I was 6 till I was 17, I took piano lessons.  I played what most folks play, I suspect, who studied as long as I: Bach inventions, plenty of Debussy (I especially remember "Golliwog's Cake Walk" for some reason), lots of old and some new classical music, old standards and popular ones, and plenty of carols at this time of the year.

The last thing I learned was Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue," and I memorized all 31 (as I remember the number) pages.  I played it with great feeling, over and over and over again.  (I pity my father for suffering through its repetition, though he was probably tinkering in the basement, out of earshot.)

My teacher also introduced me to her small Kimball organ, on which I learned the rudiments of key action, foot pedals, and stops.  I learned just enough to earn permission to play the pipe organ at church.  Some days after school, I'd go to St. Luke's, climb up to choir loft facing the cross my father designed and made, and play whatever fell open in the hymnal.  The swelling thrum was truly music to my ears and feet and hands and nose and . . . .

Yesterday afternoon, I walked in the new snow up to the campus and, as I neared All Saints', heard the organ.  I walked in quietly and stood in a side aisle, out of sight, I suppose because I didn't want to interrupt the player.  He stopped anyway, within fifteen seconds, and as I slid just past a column and watched, he walked casually out toward the offices.

I was disappointed.  I had wanted to feel that thrum again, just as I want to play the piano again.

The silence of my camera was deafening.