Rosie and I went to a kids' adaptation of a wonderful symphony, complete with storyteller and visuals. It was a double orchestra, both youth and the regular, and it was a terrific introduction to "how to do a symphony/concert/musical event." When to clap, when it was ok to talk, how the first violin and the conductor are honored by walking on by themselves, the encore. I hadn't really thought about the formal pattern of the event until I saw it through the kids' eyes.
There were booths in the lobby of the hall afterwards so the kids could see and touch the instruments and ask the young musicians questions. It was all wonderful, until... the symphony's sponsor gave away a rather nice recorder to every single child there.
Every single child. Yes. Three hundred and more little kids with recorders, simultaneously tootling and shrieking, in a huge, echoing space. After about twenty minutes, I literally had shudders running up and down my back that I was doing my best to suppress. I thought I was going to cry. I was doing all I could to not burst into tears. And we stayed half an hour after that! because Rosie could not bear to leave all the fun. I know what my personal hell involves now.
Inexplicably, the incredible din bothered Rosie not at all. Or to be honest, if it did, I was too traumatized to tell. If I had remembered to put in the earplugs I keep in my purse it might have helped, but no. I couldn't remember that I had them. When we went home I looked in the mirror and saw that I was pale and waxy, with bruises under my eyes so dark I looked like I had been punched twice. Yeeg. I put in earplugs then, because my ears were - not exactly hurting, but they couldn't stand any more sound. Then I pulled pillows over my head and crashed for two hours.
When I came out of the bedroom, Rosie said, "Mom! I want to learn to play the recorder!"
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