Leading With Laughter

I've been substitute chorister in church for the past couple weeks.  Each week I've had to force down giggles.  It's just not the appropriate time to break into laughter.

The first time I won't say much about. (Only that which others were there to witness, without names.)  I'll only say that out-of-the-blue one of the men who's singing voice I've never heard before was singing above the rest of the congregation, in a somewhat off-key operatic voice.  Really, what was funny was just that it was so unexpected.  Who knew he had those pipes?  I actually handled it quite well.  I kept a very straight face and pretended nothing was out of the ordinary, but the woman in front of him threw her head back then almost doubled over with laughter when she couldn't handle it any longer.  What is it about seeing another person react that makes it so much harder to contain ones-self?  I caught myself before I got past a small smile, which wasn't easy, then kept my eyes focused on the other side of the room.  I'm happy to say I don't think anyone knew I was fighting my own giggles.

Conductor of the Tabernacle Choir - Mack Wilberg
(I can pretend right?)

Sunday, my own daughter had me trying not to giggle.  My family was sitting on the second row of the chapel.  I was up in front and had just started to lead the opening hymn.  My daughter whispered loudly, "What page are we on?"  Seriously?  I was wondering if she'd been hit in the head or something.  Did she actually think I was going to yell it down to her?  Did she want me to stop the organist and congregation while I said, "Jessica, the hymn number is 30," wait for her to get to the correct page then start up again?  She definitely wanted to know more than the nothing I was giving her because she kept it up.  I was honestly trying not to laugh at her ignorance of the position I was in.  I started moving my head in the direction of the wall behind me where the page numbers are posted.  Did you know it's difficult to bob your head in the direction of behind you while trying to lead to a hymn that changes from 4/4 timing to 3/4 timing every 2 measures?  I found that out the hard way.  Anyway, after my head bobbing, Jessica then whispers loudly, "You're in the way!"  Was I to shuffle to the right or left for her?  Nope.  Time to learn a lesson in preparation.  Next time surely, she'd have to look at the page number before the chorister is standing in her way, or listen to it announced at the pulpit, or read it in the bulletin.  What a turkey.  Surely, she'd learn from this.  Right?  Wrong!  I'm the one that learned.  I learned that she didn't learn anything.  I stood up to lead the next song, the sacrament song and she whispered up to me, "You're in the way again!"  I learned a few other things about her too.  I should probably not say them publicly.  I'll let you figure them out on your own. Lol.

It did bring back a memory that I may or may not have mentioned before.  When my boys were just little I ended up at church, leading the music without my husband.  I let my 3 year old son join me on the stand to sit, thinking he could sit nicely while I led the music.  It was an old building.  The sacrament table was a few feet to the left of where I stood on the stand rather than below it which is more typical for an LDS church building.  As I was conducting I noticed my little guy standing next to me.  That was fine until he scooted to the left, just out of reach.  He then scooted some more and reached up and snagged a piece of bread the young men were breaking.  Leading with my right hand I tried to grab him with my left.  Too far away.  He snagged another piece of bread.  The young men just smiled.  The people in the congregation who were actually looking up from their hymnals just snickered.  No one to the rescue.  Trevin snacked on bread while I finished leading the music, looking like a tomato with eyes.  I was holding back some giggles that day too.

What have your kids done to embarrass you at church or during an inopportune moment?