One Note

Sunday, February 22, 2015

Today I am grateful for one note. I just hope my husband finds his someday. It wasn’t today. Sadly. John tells a story about how he sang well as a boy soprano, but could no longer carry a tune when his voice changed. He’s spent the last seventy years searching.

After reading the paper, feeling guilted (by myself, not him) because he was already tackling the duty list, I decided to go out and clear the wintry mix off my car and shovel the slop. “Do you want me to put a sporting event on the TV for you,” I asked him, as he sat among parts of a fountain and pump that had stopped working. “Nah, I’m going to put some music on,” he answered.

When I came back in, the Irish music was blasting at a decibel that could rival a March 17th parade in Dublin. Fix-it music. It’s his go-to whenever a project has to be done. Irish is to him, what polka was to my dad. I’m okay with it because he gets a lot done if Irish music is playing. Our kids used to cringe whenever it came on because they knew it would be a “project” day.

He doesn’t see me. He doesn’t know I’m in the house. And he’s singing along like he’s in the Clancy Brother’s band and he’s channeling good ole’ Tommy Makem hisself. “Whack Fol the Diddle. . .Oh. . .There’s whiskey in the drum!” He’s really getting into it.

Today he’s all Irish, still off key, unusually loud, beyond enthusiastic and he’s even sort of jigging around the living room. . .still searching for his note. I will be grateful when he finds it. BING! Heartprint!