True confessions

November 1 marked All Saints Day, which many celebrated this past Sunday. Lutherans are in the End Times season of the church year, so many will celebrate "Saints triumphant Sunday" in the next couple weeks if they have yet to have that saints in heaven theme... And still many will not feel like celebrating. There's a whole group of people whose loved one died right in the middle of that season. Or who are about to die. Part of the challenge is that it's a day where you're supposed to be joyful. It's a day that is supposed to bring relief and comfort and peace. And objectively, it does. There is a peace that comes with knowing your dad's future (or now present) is secure. But there's a tricky thing about grief... As soon as you are "supposed to" or "should" feel a certain way at a certain time, you're pretty much guaranteed to feel the opposite. There actually are no "shoulds" in grief. You'll be happy...

to properly prepare you for everything that might happen. Sometimes a jazz percussion beat will start playing on the piano out of nowhere... In the middle of "Lord Jesus Christ, You Have Prepared" Good luck keeping track of all 4 flats after that.

There's a common expression: "the final nail in the coffin." It means the end of something, right? To use another idiom, the final nail in the coffin is also "the last straw." Well a coworker aptly said that seeing the name on the grave marker is the true "final nail in the coffin." There are a lot of final nails in the coffin for grief. Watching your father take his last breath, seeing his body carted out of the house, seeing him lying in the coffin, seeing the coffin carried out of the hearse and to his final resting place are all "nails in the coffin." But nothing is quite the unexpected sucker punch to the gut that getting this photo emailed to you is. I'd change the idiom if I could, from "nail in the coffin" to "name on the gravestone." Seeing your father's name carved in stone- his gravestone - brings about a finality like nothing else. His body is no longer hidden away in the ground. His death...

... that you didn't pull the second page of the hymn out of the hymn box. And didn't realize it until you were halfway through your introduction... You can fix this. Just keep playing. With strength and flexibility y ou previously didn't know you had ,  reach your left hand across your body to grab the hymnal that you foolishly put just out of reach of the piano (to reduce clutter on the piano) and open it to the right page as fast as you can. Throw in a little ritard and you'll be good to go. Nobody needs to know. * Don't try this at home ** Refer to Rule 10 and 10c. #discountdoublecheck

There's a fun fact about this rule. No matter how many times you break it, you'll never learn. You'll get comfortable and forget to check which parts of the liturgy are actually in the bulletin. If you're lucky, your pastor will ask to do a quick run-through, and will point out all the missing lines you would have just played. But you won't always be #blessed like that. So just Double Check.

When you show up to church and there's a trumpet set up next to the piano, just roll with it. Even if you had no idea there would be an instrumentalist.

It doesn't matter if you brought a different book for each piece you are playing throughout the service. It's going to happen. The pastor is going to say something in his sermon that very directly ties into a song for which you didn't bring music. A song you know you have in that one book. You might drive back to your house between services to get it. You might write the entire service off as a missed opportunity. You might just pull out the hymnal and improvise on a wing and a prayer during the offertory. There is no cure for wanting that one book.... (Unless you live across the street and can send a gopher to get it for you.)