This morning I was at a memorial service at my home church (I’ve been
in the choir there for 5 yrs). One of my fellow choir members has a
daughter in her late 20’s who was going through treatment for cancer but
died very suddenly and unexpectedly. Today was the memorial service.
Their family has Swedish / Lutheran roots, so most of the music was Bach
on the organ and cello. I felt very proud of my musician friends, who
seemed to play extra well today, rising to the occasion.
Along with the traditional church music there was also a Uilleann piper.
He must have been from the young husband’s side of the family. He played
with such strength and solemnity. I felt that all the musicians today gave us
such a gift.
Some of my most moving performances have been at memorial services. It is one thing that musicians can often do, when words fail, when there is nothing left to do or say.
First, thanks for the sympathy. I don’t know the family really well, so at
this point it’s mostly that I’m one of the people signing up to make
casseroles, and thinking about what else I can do to help them out in the
days ahead. Prayers mostly, and a listening ear when the time comes.
But back to the piper–
A lot of my appreciation of the uilleann piper was because of what I’ve
learned here. I was thinking “his rhythm is rock steady” “his ornaments
are so precise” “I wonder if it’s true that they’re surly”
Hijacking my own thread-- other C & F moments-- I had a dream last night
that Tolkien created a video game to go with his books, and there was a
big discussion here about whether the game was any good or not. I was
thinking “Come on, give the guy a break!”
Last week my son woke up and said “I have to tell you this weird dream I
had. The flute people were doing all the possible anagrams of the word
CORNFLAKES and one of them turned out to be some kind of password,
and another computer got control of our computer, and it blew up!!!”
They say when you are learning a foreign language and you start to dream
in that language, you are really making progress. I have no idea what it
means that I am dreaming about Chiff & Fipple…
That is spooky that a person is dreaming about C&F after less than a hundred posts, and less than a month on board.
If some of the more prolific long time members had similar experiences, they would be living in a totally abstract C&F universe by now. That would put a new spin on PostStructural.
I started researching flutes back in September and thought you guys were
so interesting that I went back to the beginning of the archives and read
all the way through. Parts could be distilled into a text on ITM. Parts of it
are like a novel… And then there’s great threads like this…
If laughter is the best medicine, this stuff will help you live to be 100!
A few Chiff & Fipple dreams are nuthin’, I’m waiting for the inevitable
nightmares about exploding headjoints, or coming to a session and
suddenly realizing that I’m naked
Tolkein’s works are used as a source and reference for a lot of online games. That’s why you have the option of different races: Human, Elf, Half-elf, dwarf, etc. In fact I’d go so far as to say there can’t be many role-playing games that don’t pay lip-service to Tolkein. How you approach dragons, for instance, is a case in point. You may wish to subdue it by beating it with the flat of your sword.
If you have an interest in looking into games of this sort, I can recommend anything in the “Baldur’s Gate” Series. Icewind Dale is a bit old now, but still enjoyable to play.
