Playing a funeral

Sometimes the quiet and introspective days can metamorphosize into lots of fun. I guess the sunny, warm weather was a sign—yesterday was sandwiched between Friday's chill, brisk winds and today's cold, freezing rain.

My friend Kevin's grandmother died earlier this month and I was pleased to be asked to play the piano for her memorial service yesterday. I dug out a dark charcoal suit with a subtle windowpane pattern to wear, accessorizing it with a lovely little black foulard Armani tie. Kevin picked me up at 12:45 and drove me up to Maryland to the assisted living center where she had lived the past several years and where they were holding the service. The center had set up rows of dining room chairs in what I guess they call the sitting room, with overflow into the game room. I didn't count, but I'd guess that about forty residents and staff attended, plus members of the family.

My part was easy—just a quick little prelude and then opening and closing hymns (two of my three least favorite hymns in the world). For the prelude, I did a Bach partita and then the Samuel Barber "Adagio," perfectly timing the ending of the Barber—all in the best Westminster Abbey tradition, of course—to straight up 2:00, when we were set to begin. But, just as I got to the last page of the Barber, I got word that the service was being delayed pending the arrival of another grandson. Eh. So, I played some Chopin préludes in a suitably somber and sepulchral way. Finally, at 2:10, I saw a typical, disheveled-looking, prep school boy wander in the front door, so I switched to Bach's Prelude No.1 while the boy's mother got him straightened up and the knot of his tie pulled up to within half a foot of his neck. And then we started. My quick little prelude ended up being a twenty-some minute mini-concert, but, hey, it's the first time I've had access to an in-tune piano in months.

The minister for the service was the pastor of one of the big, local MCC parishes (for the uninformed, Metropolitan Community Church a/k/a the "gay" denomination). He looked very familiar to me and I couldn't place him, until I remembered where I'd seen him. Last summer, he and his partner were "Adam and Steve" on their church's float in the gay pride parade.

Anyway, what I found really nice is the fact that he had been pastoring Kevin's grandmother—who was 99, by the way—for the past several years and they had become good friends. There is always hope for American society when good, Christian, nonagenarian matriarchs enjoy the ministry of the openly gay clergy.