Back in the saddle again
It’s been ten years since I had a website. Up until 2010, I was a busy and successful voice teacher, conductor, and professional singer. I had a website and business cards and even brochures. Halfway through 2010, at the height of my career, a medical disaster forced me to close my business, shut down the website, step down from my conducting positions, and retire from performing, all at the tender age of 37. (I still have some brochures, though).
Now, ten years later, I am returning to professional life with a renewed sense of purpose, newly refined goals, and a brand-new website!
I’m back in the saddle again!
I feel very connected to this phrase, having grown up on a small horse farm in rural central Massachusetts. The phrase is a metaphor now, but it used to be an almost daily reality. The first pony I ever rode was named Bluebelle. She was grey and white, super short, and completely adorable to everyone but me and my bruised five-year-old ego. To me she was a horse, and she was formidable. Before my mother started teaching and the riding ring became The Riding Ring, it was simply a large vegetable garden with a track around the outside of it for us to ride on. Nearly every day, Bluebelle and I would trot up the long side of the ring (yes, it was a hill - more about that some other time). Just before reaching the top, she would drop her head like a stone, I would slide down her neck, and inevitably end up with a mouthful of dirt and unripe tomatoes.
My mother: “Are you hurt?”
Me: “Noooo.”
My mother: “Good. Get back on.”
Me: “Okaaaaayy.”
Back in the saddle I went.
When I outgrew Bluebelle, I started riding Hopscotch (a palomino who was so named because he could jump over his stall door from a standstill), who was kinder but craftier. Whenever I wasn’t paying attention (like when I was lazy or distracted or turned around in the saddle and awkwardly flirting with a cute boy) Hopscotch would drop his shoulder and foom! – down to the ground I’d go. I could almost hear him laughing.
“Are you hurt?”
“Noooo.”
“Good. Get back on.”
“Okaaaaayy.”
Back in the saddle I went.
I was a pretty hearty child and getting back in the saddle after I had been unceremoniously dumped in the dirt became a habit – one that has stood me in good stead in many of the situations I have encountered throughout my life.
If you’ve read my bio, you know that I suffered a brain infection, a neurological attack, and was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2010. Talk about dumped in the dirt. The last ten years have been a constant slog of health issues, onerous treatments, and financial collapse. And yet…
I have been so fortunate, too! I have been held in the loving embrace of family, friends, and an amazing musical community! Their compassion, assistance, and care have brought me to a place where, despite the fact that I did land in the dirt, and I did get hurt, I am now ready to get back on and ride.
This is certainly an odd time to go back into business. But there’s reason behind the madness: when the Covid-19 pandemic started to ramp up, everyone around me was descending into grief, mourning the loss of their lives as they knew them – work, school and family life disrupted -- whereas I felt oddly…the same. It really shocked me – how okay I felt.
“Are you hurt?”
“Noooo.”
“Good. Get back on.”
“Okaaaaayy.”
I had an epiphany: it occurred to me that I had already done all of my mourning ten years ago when I got sick and lost everything, and that I’ve essentially been living in quarantine with my own personal epidemic for a decade. I suddenly realized that I had unique gifts to offer people during this crazy and uncertain time: I could help people to discover, claim, and develop their voices – offering instruction infused with humor, joy, and a fresh perspective – while providing a positive distraction from the burdens of daily life during a pandemic. Recognizing that I could do all of this with just my computer, my mind, and a fifteen-foot commute has been a blessing.
With online platforms popping up everywhere and becoming part of daily life, and geographical borders ceasing to exist online, I felt inspired to offer voice classes that would empower and uplift people everywhere, so that they, too, could get back in the saddle. It has not been easy; my health is and probably always will be precarious – I will never be able to look at an unripe tomato without tasting some dirt in my mouth – but the first vocal technique course this Fall has been a great success, so here I go…
I’m back in the saddle again!