music here and there...

It’s been ages since I last wrote about anything on my wee blog. I was going to do a ‘this’s been happening and that’s been happening’ kind of spiel, but too much’s been happening for that! So, I’ll just go back to basics and tell you one of the things that made me feel good today.

I’ve been a bit down in the dumps over these past few days and a bit weepy. Ocht, it’s just not like me and I’ve been trying so hard to shake it off! There’s a reason for me feeling a bit upset, but it’s not something I feel comfortable about sharing, so I'll just keep that part of the story to myself. I’ve not been a total misery guts and, as ever, I’ve been finding plenty of things in my days to make me feel good: spending time with Gemma while she was home over the weekend; learning interesting stuff at Uni yesterday and getting the go-ahead to start my placement work with clients (woohoo!); demolishing a bottle of wine on Monday night and enjoying lots of boozy chit-chat with Alex (I’d been looking forward to a good ‘get-it-out-your-system-sing-song’ but choir practice was cancelled and I was left with no option but to hit the bottle instead...!); enjoying a nice lunch with a good friend; watching Gordon perform on stage with a fantastic vocal group made up of pupils from our local schools; and finding out that I’m not the only middle aged wifey who suffers from a freezing cold nose......

OK, so that last one sounds a bit weird – let me just quickly explain! My nose gets really cold, and I mean really cold. Poor Alex’s had to put up with me going on about it, and getting him to feel how cold my nose is, day in, day out, “Feel it! It’s absolutely freezing, isn’t it?!” Even when the rest of my body is nice and toasty, my nose can be sooo cold. And it gets sore too; it’s so cold sometimes it’s actually quite painful. Stop laughing – it’s not funny! Gemma thought it was funny too, but she humoured me by typing ‘freezing cold nose’ into Google and, low and behold, came across one of these forum thingies with a thread full of posts from women all over the world bemoaning the fact that their nose was always freezing. Even better, they’re all in their 40’s or 50’s and they’re all either menopausal or, like me, have had a hysterectomy in recent years! There’s a whole community out there of wifeys with freezing cold noses! It’s a syndrome waiting to be discovered! I didn’t go so far as joining the forum; these women were taking it all a bit too serious for my liking (“it almost broke up my marriage, my husband just doesn’t understand how debilitating it is...”) but I did take some comfort from the fact that I wasn’t imagining the fact that my nose was sometimes unnaturally cold!

Anyway, as I was saying, I’ve been feeling a bit rubbishy over the past few days but it’s definitely not all been bad and today was no different. After spending the morning catching up on work work, Alex and I headed off to the funeral of someone who’s been a close friend of Alex’s family for many years. Jessie was 92 when she died and had only become more dependent on others during the past couple of years. It was a ‘nice’ funeral, and we came away with a real sense of Jessie having had a lovely, and fitting, send off. Much of that was down to the minister who conducted the service. She was quite theatrical and had a beautiful, operatic singing voice - which thankfully drowned out the drones of those of us who aren’t at all religious and only know the most popular hymns in the book! She clearly knew Jessie well and had visited her many times in the nursing home – but she didn’t just go for a blether; she used to take her guitar in during her visits so that she could sing and play for all the residents. How lovely! I’ll bet the old ladies and gents got so much out of that; I’ve witnessed, on so many occasions, the uplifting effects of taking live music into the hospice and I don’t imagine it to be all that different in a Nursing Home!

It was so fitting that my friend Paul sent me a message tonight to tell me that he'd had another successful visit to Strathcarron earlier on today. I usually try to be at the hospice when folk come in to perform for - or play along with - the patients, but I was otherwise engaged at Jessie’s funeral when Paul visited today. However, I just love the fact that all the while that I was sitting listening to the minister telling us about the difference she’d made to elderly people’s lives by singing and playing guitar for them in their Nursing Home, one of my lovely Myriad of Music volunteers was actually making a difference to the lives of people who have life-limiting illness by singing and playing guitar for them in the hospice! 

And that was just the ticket to make me feel really good today!

Learning all the time

One of the things I’m enjoying most about my placement is the opportunity to meet some really lovely people. The evening that Leah came in to the ward to sing, I was aware of one visitor in particular who was clearly appreciating Leah’s lovely voice – and clearly enjoying singing along! I wasn’t properly introduced to Frank till the next day. I was heading out of the ward, after helping one of the patients set up a playlist of her favourite songs, and bumped into Frank in the doorway. After complimenting Leah he told me that he had a lifetime’s experience of entertaining people with his music. It turns out that Frank has his own Big Band and, after I briefly explained that I was trying to introduce more in the way of music to the hospice he, without hesitation, offered to come in to play for the patients.

And play he did! Along with two of his band members, Frank gave up his own free time to entertain the day care patients, their visitors and some of the staff yesterday afternoon. A few of the patients from the ward managed to come along too, and I’m pretty sure that that alone made Frank’s day. His form of entertainment was very different from that of the school pupils – and neither will have been to everyone’s taste – but it was clear that many in the appreciative audience really enjoyed the visit from The Frank Curran Trio!

I’m learning all the time during my placement and one of the things I learned yesterday was to be a wee bit more careful about the volume when musicians are in the hospice performing! Frank had brought along a full kit of amps, microphones, drums, keyboard and bass guitar so the music was pretty loud. That was totally my fault though and certainly no reflection on Frank and his friends. Anyway, it turns out that there was a rather important committee meeting going on in an adjoining room and I gather it was, em, interesting for them to have Matt Munro and Nat King Cole classics belting out in the background! Ocht well, hopefully no harm done and hopefully I’ll be allowed back to Day Care with more performers soon. Possibly some that are just as talented as Frank’s trio, but maybe just a little bit quieter….!

The lovely Frank Curran

Clearing the decks

Oh dear; my blog seems to have gone for a Burton these days! I’ve just not been finding the time recently to sit down and write. Having said that, I have been sitting down plenty – and in front of the computer – but much of that time’s been taken up with completing the final assignment for my counselling certificate course, preparing for an interview at Strathclyde Uni next Monday (eek!), preparing the presentation I’ve to give on the last day of my course next Tuesday, getting the ball rolling with fundraising for my placement at Strathcarron and keeping on top of work work. (With, of course, the odd peek at Facebook in between!) The housework’s also gone for a Burton – but I’m not so bothered about that!

I don’t officially start my placement until the beginning of March, but I’m making a start by doing a wee fundraiser so that I can purchase some of the bits and bobs that I need to help bring my project to life. I decided to keep the fundraiser simple while giving it a ‘music’ theme, so I made up a music quiz sheet (if you fancy a shot, check out my Just Giving page!) and I’ve been using Facebook, Twitter, my email contact list, my voice – ocht, basically any method I can think of to punt the idea to as many people as possible! (I’m even using my wee blog...) I’m coming to realise some of the real benefits of social networking; I know it has many drawbacks, but for raising awareness and spreading the word, I think it’s great. I’m attending the ‘World of Difference Winner’s Launch Day’ down in London at the end of this month and I couldn’t help smiling when I read that one of the talks will be on ‘effective blogging’! We’re encouraged to use blogging as a means of raising awareness of our projects and to give a bit of publicity to our chosen charities. I like to think I’m just a wee bit ahead...

So, what am I actually going to be doing at Strathcarron? Well, I’ll be spending a lot of time talking and - more importantly - listening to patients and staff to discover how best music can be utilised to benefit both the inpatients and day care patients. Then I’ll be trying to facilitate some of those suggestions. It could be something as simple as setting up regular visits from local musicians and singers, organising a fundraising concert, installing a system for music to be piped to the bathrooms or treatment rooms, or researching the different forms of professional music therapy available and sourcing long-term funding. I’ll not manage to do all of that in my four month part time placement – but I’ll be doing my best to put every minute available to me and every penny I raise to the best possible use!

Something that I will be able to do straight away is provide MP3 players and accessories, thanks to the generosity of the people who’ve already bought a quiz sheet or made a donation! The idea is that I’ll spend some time with the patient chatting about music that’s meaningful to them so that I can make up personal playlists of their ‘special songs’ to download onto an MP3 player. The patient will have their own collection of special music and songs to listen to on their ‘own’ MP3 player at anytime and anywhere in the hospice – be it in bed, in the bath (with the appropriate equipment – more funds will be required!) or walking in the lovely grounds. If the patient has given prior permission, I’ll make up a wee CD of the playlist as a special keepsake for the family.

I was delighted when the hospice staff (who I presented all my placement ideas to) were most taken with the personal playlist suggestion and that that was the thing they were most keen to see put in place. I can’t wait to get started and the first of March can’t come quick enough. In the meantime, there's a bit of deck-clearing to do with the small matter of an interview, course presentation and manky house to sort out....

Being shortlisted!

I spent a fair amount of time recently putting together an application for a charity placement so I was absolutely delighted yesterday when I received confirmation that I’d been shortlisted for one of the available places. According to their website, over 11,000 folk applied to the Vodafone Foundation World of Difference scheme last year (which I first mentioned in this post), so I’m chuffed to have made it to the final 750!

Basically, the foundation funds 500 UK placements in the hope that the recipients will ‘make a difference’ to their chosen charity. As much as I get a whole load of satisfaction out of volunteering, I couldn’t afford to devote 15 hours a week for a four month period doing it. So, the idea is that the foundation pays the charity to ‘employ’ people for a short spell who would love to have a go at doing more for their chosen charity; it’s not a huge amount of money you’re paid, but it would be enough to allow me to justify sacrificing some of my ‘work, work’ time to doing more for Strathcarron Hospice.

The application process involved: coming up with a proposal of how I could ‘make a difference’ to Strathcarron; presenting it to the Hospice for their approval; then presenting it to the foundation judges in the form of an online submission. There was also an option to submit a supplementary video and, as I figured it was important to use every possible option available to make the application stand out from the other however-many-thousand that the judges would be sifting through, I wrote, recited and recorded me reading a wee poem about my plan to help the hospice. (I know it sounds naff, but I guess it kind of worked!)

So, some time during the next few weeks: my referees will be contacted; the hospice will be contacted (to check that they’re fully behind me working for them); and I’ll be contacted for a telephone interview (Help ma boab!). Then I’ll be told, anytime up to the middle of January, if I have a place. Once I know whether I’ve made it or not to the winning 500, I’ll be able to say more about what I’d actually be doing at the hospice, but I don't feel right about doing that till the placements have been awarded.

Suffice to say that the jist of my proposal would involve bringing ‘A Myriad of Music’ to the hospice, so it just seemed fitting that music has featured a lot in what’s been making me happy over the past few days. One of the things I miss most about the kids being away from home is the ‘sound’ of them being around the house. So, singing along with Gemma, as she was pottering about at the piano on Saturday afternoon when she was home for a flying visit, was just braw. I started secretly recording her with my phone – I’m obviously biased, but I just love to hear Gemma play and sing – and the wee video below is us giving it big licks with one of the songs that we love to sing together (I’m giving it my best shot with the low harmony that I’ve been taught at choir in the background! Hope I'm not infringing on Annie and Jane's copyright!). Me and Gemma would never make it on X Factor (thank goodness!), but the pleasure we get out of having a sing-song together beats all the fortune that that that kind of fame could bring!

So, that was the first thing. Then, I had choir last night. We’re full in the throes of rehearsing for our concert at Stirling’s Albert Hall on the 10th of December (have I mentioned that before?!) and last night the band that’ll be accompanying us came along to practise. I absolutely loved it. Aw man, I could’ve stood there singing all night. And, one of my favourites of the night was the one that Gemma and I had been playing around with on the wee video; Coldplay’s ‘Fix You’. It was the first song I learned with the choir, and it’s one of our family favourites. Just seemed so apt that it was so awesome last night.

Lastly, Alex and I are heading through to the Playhouse in Edinburgh tonight to see ‘We Will Rock You’. In a similar vein to the real Queen having two birthdays, me and Alex have two anniversaries; the 28th of June (to celebrate the day we got married) and the 29th of November (to celebrate the night we started going out – 31 years ago today!). So, what better way to round off my ‘Myriad of Music’ weekend than going to a musical that celebrates the music of a band that I love with the man that I love!

I'm feeling quite brave posting this wee video, I think I'm a bit carried away with the excitement of the past few days! No doubt I'll regret it tomorrow and pull it off the blog, but, in the meantime, here's me and Gemma making some noise (with no pictures to go with it)!