Meant to Be

It was not an auspicious beginning to my workshop. No dongles worked with my computer to show the short Powerpoint I had created and there was not enough room on my thumbdrive to load it onto another computer. I had planned various pieces to be played on Orff instruments, but people failed to bring enough—for 50 people, there were only about five. I had various movement and line dance activities planned and one of the participants was in a wheelchair. What to do?

 

No choice but to begin. My work is rarely dependent upon Powerpoint, so I could let that go. One of the hosts ran to her school to get more instruments and the lovely man in the wheelchair figured out, as I suspected he would, how to accommodate himself to the activities. Once I stood in that sacred circle holding hands, I returned to my heavenly home and off we went. 

 

The President of this Orff Chapter in Washington DC is a black man and my friend Tom Pierre. We have been together in Orff courses I’ve taught in Ghana, New Orleans, Spain, San Francisco, Carmel Valley and shared various Conferences in the U.S. where he taught and I, so happily, was his student. Thanks to him, there were various black music teachers on the Chapter Board and some 15 in the workshop, unusual (sadly) for the American Orff culture. 

He and a colleague Cierra who presented a short opening experience read various statements about the African view of education as beginning in the body, heart and Soul. She offered a quote to the effect that “we cannot continue to be consumers/ beneficiaries of African-American music without understandings its history and origins.” Exactly the point of my Jazz, Joy & Justice  book and exactly the way I taught the body percussion Juba in the workshop. We were wholly aligned in our vision to bring cultural awareness and social justice issues into Orff training where they have rarely been, them from the inside and me as an ally from the outside. This was not business as usual and I was thrilled. 

 

And then there were all the series of small and big serendipitous events that suggested invisible hands guiding and applauding us all. The black man at the host school who welcomed us was named Avon, the name of my first and most important Orff mentor, also a black man. I had never met anyone with the same name and he said that he also had never heard of anyone else with that name. 

 

I always name my three 8^th grade students who taught me the Steppin’ patterns I still share. Back when they taught me some 15 years ago, I invited them to teach at a workshop and paid them accordingly. Opening Facebook that morning, I found that it was the birthday of one of them, Tanisha Wills! I wished her Happy Birthday and thanked her again, letting her know that her gift to me still echoed on. (While feeling a little sheepish that I hadn’t learned some 50 more patterns! The four she and Jasmine Gittens and Autumn Green taught me are just so dynamic and learnable  though!)

 

I decided to end the workshop in this election year by reciting by memory Langston Hughes’ extraordinary poem Let America Be America Again.  All sat with closed eyes to let the images and histories and truths uttered ignite their imagination, intrigue their mind, stir their heart. At the end, with crossed arms and hands joined, we sang America the Beautiful and the day was done.

 

But not quite. The greatest serendipitous event was soon to come. Tom had chosen an intriguing restaurant to gather with the board for lunch. It’s called Busboys and Poets and is both a restaurant and a bookstore. While eating lunch, I found out that the name came from a busboy many years back at this site who dropped some of his poems in front of poet named Vachel Lindsay. Suitably impressed, Lindsay helped him launch his career as a poet. 

 

That busboy? LANGSTON HUGHES!!! (Keep in mind that Tom had no idea I was going to recite that poem. It appeared a random choice, but I think other forces were at work). On the walls were photos and drawing of the Peacemakers and on the bookshelves were all the books the far Right is trying to ban. But most stunning was walking into another room and there was a mural in which the top portion had the opening stanza to the poem I had just shared! "Let America be America again. Let it be the dream it used to be…" I got the people from my table to walk into the room and all stood slightly stunned. One commented, “I guess this day was meant to be.”

 

Indeed it was.