Kiss My Keys Goodbye

I've always love the sound of the piano keys playing a melody.  I took lessons as a child, and learned to play well enough to plunk out the tunes I wanted to hear.  I never reached the skill level it takes to accompany a choir, or even to feel comfortable playing in front of an audience, but it was enough to soothe my soul.

Having the talent and the skill to accompany a group in song has always been a skill I admired, and really wanted to give my children the opportunity to grow that talent.  But, as I've said before, we moved around every 3-6 months for the first decade or so of our marriage.  And moving a piano was not in the cards.  So I bought a little keyboard and tried to make do.  It just wasn't the same.  I quietly longed for the day we would settle down enough to buy a piano.

Christmas was quickly approaching, and my husband was oddly silent about gifts.  Usually he badgers me to  tell him what I'd like, teasing that if I don't tell him I won't get anything at all.  Not this year, I knew he had something up his sleeve, but no idea what it was.  A few days before Christmas he sent me out for the night.  I had strict instructions to do whatever I wanted, go shopping, relax with a book, grab a bite to eat, whatever-as long as I did NOT come home until he called.  I was in the aisle at Target browsing the books when he called and let me know I could come home anytime, but I was to go through the front door, not the garage door when I got there.

I arrived home and entered the front door as instructed, and saw 5 happy little faces clean and ready for bed, all in their jammies, and beaming with excitement.  They could hardly contain their glee as they laughed and pointed at the large object in the corner concealed with every blanket and pillow in our house-or so it seemed.  My husband refused to tell me what was in it, only that it was my Christmas gift & I could open it then, or wait for Christmas Day.  Those 5 little faces demanded otherwise, I knew there was no way I could wait a few days and deny them this moment.  So I opted for the immediate gratification and "opened" the gift right then.  This is what I saw:

A beautifully restored, antique baby grand piano.  I cried.  I laughed.  I loved it.  My husband is not  a musical guy, and he is not the most patient man either.  I knew this task must have been a hard one for him to accomplish.  It was a gift of love.  Only given because he knew I wanted one, and would never demand, just dream.

Although I had never dreamed of a piano like this, in my imaginings I had only thought of a simple, usable upright.  Steady, musically sound, and servicable.  

This was a thing of beauty.  As an antique it had beautifully carved legs, and details on the music stand I adored.  I loved it.  It was more than a piano, every time I played, or heard one of my children play it was like hearing my husband tell me how much he loved me.

Now we're moving again, and I've had to sell my piano.  It just doesn't fit in the new place in life we're carving for ourselves.  And now my living room looks like this...

I cried when I was cleaning out the music from the bench.  I cried when I watched the movers break it down and load it up to drive to a new home.  I hope she loves it as much as I did.  You see, a husband was buying a gift for his wife.  Who had always wanted a piano just like this one...a gift of love, yet again.


This post was inspired by the letter "K"  and Miss Jenny's AlphabeThursday Class, read more posts here: