This is Daddio here, posting again after a long break! Katy’s been…encouraging…me to write another blog for some time now, and I’ve put it off for as long as I could. Not for any good reason, because I really do like writing in general, but this is really Katy’s “baby” here (the blog, I mean!) and I have generally shied away from getting too directly involved. For better or worse. Still, it’s fun to post now and again!
We’ve always said, more out of optimism than certainty, that we think Charlotte is destined to be musical. It started with her singing the first few bars of the introduction to Beethoven’s 5th Symphony when she was very young (she’s grown up primarily on Dorati’s Living Presence recording and a cute little version built into a handheld jukebox toy). Now she can do about 12 bars, including the appropriate fermatas 😉 Since she was around two, she’s been singing scales in tune with us, and she will easily match random pitches we sing to her….when she’s in the mood 🙂 Pretty cool stuff, and maybe not even advanced, but we first-time parents are not too hard to impress!
Anyhow, yesterday we were stopping in the co-op grocery store for some quick dinner to take home. We were trying to decide between spanikopita and dolmas while this girl next to us was having a strange conversation with a man friend about dropping her more traditional music career and everything else to go hard-core with the accordion (yes, only in Iowa City, or maybe a Portlandia episode…).
A few minutes later and a few aisles over, Charlotte is singing really loud about something or other when that same girl comes over and says how great Charlotte’s voice is and how well it projects. Nice to have some validation of Charlotte’s musical skills from an unbiased third party! 😀 I proudly said “thank you!” and mentioned the Beethoven thing. She thought it was neat and started to sing the “dun dun dun DUUUHHH” intro. Charlotte ducked behind me and wouldn’t say a word, of course. The nice girl went on to tell me about a wonderful children’s chorus they have here in town, something to look into for Charlotte in the future. Maybe we’ll still be in town when the time comes?
At the checkout counter it finally clicked to Charlotte, and once again she started belting out Beethoven, but the girl was nowhere in sight. The checkout guy was pretty impressed, however, and, emboldened, Charlotte proceeded to lift up her shirt and show him the big red brontosaurus tattoo above her bellybutton! We all laughed aloud, and Charlotte got a dinosaur sticker out of her show. Still makes me smile thinking about it! She showed her belly tattoo to a little girl at the library today, but she wasn’t quite so impressed…
The Open Door 