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When I was in High School I was able to take music class and learn a REAL instrument (by that I mean something other than the recorder or grade school ukulele).

The first instrument I picked-up was the Baritone (like a Euphonium, but a smaller version). I loved it. Playing the baritone opened-up an entire universe to me that I had never imagined could exist. I felt my existence more powerfully when I played than any other time, except for when I was writing.

High School was extremely difficult for me, as I know it is for a lot of people. I ended-up depressed and suffered from many anxiety attacks and emotional/mental breakdowns. Playing and writing is where I found solace and safety.

In grade 10 we played a piece entitled “Campbell River Sketches”. There was something about the melody that just transported me to a better place. During this piece, I had the great privilege of playing a beautifully soaring solo. I can still remember it, note for note, to this day, as being one of the most fulfilling moments of my life.

And so, I decided that I wanted to be a professional musician.

When I expressed this to my teacher he told me that if I was serious I needed to switch from the baritone to the trombone. I did so and for the next year I practiced hour upon hour to become as good on the trombone as I had been on the baritone. My parents bought me a silent mute so I could play for hours on end without bothering them. I was so excited that I was on my way towards living a life doing the thing I loved so much.

I arranged an audition at the University ‘of my choice’ (there will be more about this University stuff later) and all my spare time went into perfecting my 3 chosen pieces.

When it was time to audition, I beamed with confidence and pleasantry and played my musical selections excellently. However, I was completely unprepared for having to sit through theory tests, sight-reading, performing every scale imaginable and having to be able to listen to notes, intervals and chords and identify them.

When I didn’t get in to the music program, I was devastated. I had hoped that my glowing personality and the soaring tone of my trombone would have been enough for them to overlook the absolute failure I was at some of the theory.

I was accepted to the Arts program, but would never attend University (as I said, another story for another time-this post is about the music).

Here I am, almost 20 years later, and I still desperately wish that when I woke-up in the morning, after enjoying my cup of tea and toast, I would be grabbing my horn and heading to rehearsal.

I still wish that my evenings were filled with performing music with a professional orchestra/band/ensemble and emptying spit valves.

I feel sad for this loss every single day of my life.

I have found other ways to try and “make-up” for it: joining a community band, playing guitar at home, singing all the time, etc. But, it’s not the same.

Every day I ask myself how to reconcile living with the thought that things just didn’t turn-out the way I had wanted, hoped and expected them to.
How can I be ok with my desk job when my real dream is to be playing in an orchestra?

I think ‘if only this had been different…’

‘If only that had gone differently…’

‘If only someone had told me at the time…’

I don’t believe that everything happens for some great cosmic reason, or there is some great being out there pulling strings and moving things around like a giant chess board. I believe things happen because decisions are made and each decision carries consequences. My decisions have brought me here-to this place.

And, while I can find happiness in the life I have now (my gorgeous child being one bright spot), these things do not and cannot erase the fact that I still want(ed) my life to work-out one way, and it turned-out another.

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I have only recently come to understand that I am a lot more immature and naïve than I had believed myself to be.

I always thought I was very mature because, even as a child, I spent a lot of my time with older children, teenagers and adults. I know, now, that I was just very good at pretending.
I have a keen talent to be able to transform into the type of person that reflects the situation or demographic of which I am surrounded.

While this has served me well in life, it has also caused me trouble. When I moved to the city, I thought I was mature and “street-smart” enough to handle it.

The fact that I was not became glaringly obvious when I found myself walking home from my part-time job at a thrift store, holding hands with a much older man whom I barely knew because I didn’t know how to get rid of him and I was afraid to stop it.

I was afraid to stop it.

This person had started coming-into the store and I was as small-town friendly with him as I was with everyone else I met in the big city. He started to visit more frequently and just hang-around me. Added to my naivety was the fact that, at the time, I believed I was on a mission from god to reach-out to every poor person in the city and give myself wholly to them as a vessel.

This man showed-up one day just as we were closing and asked if I wanted to go out after work. When I declined he asked if I wanted to go to his place. When I declined that offer, he asked if he could come over to my place. I declined again. He kept pressing me, and I was starting to feel rude, flustered and nervous, so when he asked if he could walk me home I said ‘uh…I guess…’

The next thing I knew, he was holding my hand.

I froze.

I was panicking inside. I didn’t have a clue what to do.

I didn’t want to be rude to him, because in my mind I was meant to be there to help people as a vessel of god and as a christian, I shouldn’t be rude.

So, I let him hold my hand and walk me home.

Thankfully, I didn’t live by myself. I lived in a ‘ministry house’ with 3 other adults (all of us had moved to the area to volunteer in the community.

Also, thankfully, there was an after-school program happening there at the time, so when he asked, again, if he could come in I had an honest answer ready to give: ‘No, sorry, there is a program happening right now.’

When we got to the door I, politely, shook my hand free of his and when he asked if he could have my phone # I said “uh, can you wait here a minute?’

I went inside and explained to one of my male friends, who was leading the after school group, what was happening. He came back to the door with me and talked to the man, explaining that he was my boyfriend (he wasn’t) and asking him to, please, leave me alone (in a polite, godly way).

But, the man kept coming to my workplace and talking to me. He came back the next day and said ‘why didn’t you tell me you had a boyfriend? You let me hold your hand.’

I told my boss what had happened and my boss instructed me to go to the back area of the store that was for employees only and inform him whenever the man entered the store.
I did as instructed and my boss, who was a massive man from Trinidad, would go and tower over the man and tell him to leave and never approach me again.

I felt so embarrassed.

I was so young.

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