What an evening!

I think I mentioned a while back that the choir I joined was performing today. The event was the finale of a nature festival - a combined churches thanksgiving service up on top of a hill in a nature reserve outside of town. As soon as they found out that I play the flute they asked me to do some flute solos - quite undeterred by the fact that I hadn't played in public for four years!

I was really nervous beforehand, but it went fine. I played "Younger than Springtime" from 'South Pacific', "Hello Young Lovers" from 'The King and I' and "Morning Has Broken" while people were settling into their seats, and then "Colours of the Wind" from 'Pocahontas' as the beginning and end of the service. It was a really beautiful service and I'm really proud to have contributed to it. I made a couple of mistakes because there were flies attacking me the whole time - I had one lady from the choir on each side of me, holding the music stand so it wouldn't blow away with one hand and flapping flies off my face their other hand, but the flies still distracted me enough to cause a problem a couple of times, and I flubbed a couple of notes when there was a fly on my lips! But overall it went really well and everyone was really appreciative of me having turned up and played as well as singing. I was shaking afterwards, but so glad that I did it.

On the way home, driving between towns in the dark, I said a little prayer of gratitude for the opportunity to play my flute again, and then something rather strange happened. First I saw some sort of small marsupial run across the road - I think it was a chuditch. I've never seen a chuditch in the wild before, only in the zoo! Then, while I was still thrilling over that sighting, I went past an owl sitting in the middle of the road, watching some sort of scurrying thing that was just out of my sight. Probably a mouse.

I feel almost like those sightings were a reward, for having the courage to stand up and play at the service and for believing in myself. I simply love seeing animals in the wild and it's a huge thrill whenever I do, even when it's something a bit creepy (like the BIG snake I saw crossing the road on the way to the performance lol). So many in one evening makes me feel like it was laid on just for me :-)

I'm performing twice around Christmas - once at Carols by Candlelight and once at a Christmas Eve church service. I can't wait!