BEAUTIFUL MUSIC

If there is anything that can touch my heart deeply and get my attention immediately, it is beautiful music. Today I watched - on YouTube - on my TV, Andrea Bocelli and Celine Dion singing THE PRAYER. It is so powerful that it brings tears to my eyes and my soul feels deeply touched.

Music has this effect on me, always has. Over the years I thrived on beautiful music at the St. Louis Symphony as well as the FOX. I was fortunate enough to hear THE IRISH TENORS at the Fox many years ago.

My love of music has been with me ever since I was a small child, eight years old playing the organ, when my feet could not even touch the pedals. I played for years at home, at church and weddings all over the St. Louis area.

But my true "love" is the piano. That would have been my instrument of choice as a child, but my father had his heart set on the organ. It was not until my second marriage when I taught myself to play the piano that was left behind by my second husband's wife after she remarried. I was thrilled. I spent hours and hours playing and memorizing pieces I loved. One was my mom's favorite from DOCTOR ZHIVAGO: Somewhere my Love. My favorites were Moonlight Sonata, Claire de Lune and Fur Elise. I had them memorized and could play them from memory anywhere I went where I could get my hands on a piano.

I have attempted to play on the piano here, but it is more difficult to read the music and my fingers no longer remember what they had once known without even having to think about it. I've always put my heart and soul into my music and my artwork, which is now on every wall in my room, and many designs I have given away to those who live here and work here.

All of these things, including quilling, Sumi ink, calligraphy, charcoal and pencil are expressions of my soul. I have made gifts. I did some paid work. I sold a few pieces, but  most have been gifts because I was never organized enough to be a salesman. I think it's hard to create the art and market it yourself.

Yet, the greatest gift was the one God gave me to be able to create beauty and receive all the joy and fulfillment that comes with that.