On Sunday mornings long ago I would walk into the clapboard church early, a few hours before service, to find the old woman sitting on the piano bench, warming up the Mason & Hamlin.
Her fingers were twisted with arthritis. Her hair was freshly blued. She was a walking advertisement for the Estée Lauder bath powder product line.
I was the church’s pitiful guitarist. They let me play acoustic beside the venerable pianist during the clapping songs. We played uptempo tunes like:
“I got a home in Gloryland that outshines the sun,
“I got a home in Gloryland that outshines the sun,
“Way beyond the blue…”
I wasn’t a great guitarist, I contributed very little in the way of talent. But the old woman once told me: “It don’t matter how little you have, as long as you give it away.”
So I gave it away. Although I’m not sure many wanted it. I would arrive at the church carrying my heavy guitar case, before the people showed up, slip in the
back pew, and listen to her finger through a Debussy piece by memory. “Clair de Lune.” Eyes closed. Channeling old Claude.
She was my friend, and she proved it a few times.
One time someone in the congregation got peeved because I showed up to play guitar wearing blue jeans and a button down that wasn’t starched like marine-grade plywood. It was the old pianist who defended me against the fundamentalist fashion police.
And there was the time I invited four of my landscaping coworkers to Wednesday night's meeting to see me play. Four of my Mexican friends showed up wearing neon work shirts and grass-stained boots and sat right up front.
The preacher intercepted my friends and guided them to the back pews so their collective appearance wouldn’t be distracting for others.
It was the old woman who gave that young minister a verbal dressing…