Friday happenings

The last few days have been fairly uneventful. That's one reason why you haven't seen more frequent posts -- I haven't had anything particularly interesting to write about.

Shelley had her sixth fiddle lesson this morning. Her playing is becoming more recognizable, she has a number of songs going well, and she is beginning to figure out the fine art of intonation. String instruments are particularly troublesome in this respect because as you might know, you can place your fingers pretty much anywhere on the strings and make a sound. Even if you have the right fingering, it can sound quite off.

I don't have prefect pitch, but I do have a rather precise relative pitch; i.e., given a starting pitch, I can tell you whether or not another pitch is on or off, even if it's just a tiny little bit. (And yes, that means that out-of-tune and off-pitch notes really aggravate me; it's worse than intentional dissonance.) Was I born with this, or did it come from my early string instrument experience, or is it a combination of both? It's just fascinating for me to ponder this as I think back to my earlier years.

Much of my late morning and afternoon was spent in sermon preparation. I'm giving it the title Adoption and Rebirth, based on John 1:9-13.

I received unexpected sad news this evening. The wife of the family living across the street from the church passed away unexpectedly, perhaps from heart attack. They were the family that came to our Christmas service a month ago. I had just spoken to the husband yesterday afternoon as I was heading back home from the church. Everything was fine then, but in just a little over a day the world has changed for the worse for him. I left a message for the pastor of the church that he usually attends to see how we might coordinate any efforts to assist.

Those of us that are still young and healthy don't think much about our lives ending, but if there is one thing that is guaranteed, it is that there is no guarantee as to our future on this earth. It could be a sudden health problem, a freak accident, or some other unexpected event that could quickly end any of our lives. Would I be living any differently if I knew that my life would end today? Would you? If the answer is yes, then perhaps we should be making those changes today, while we still can.