Lovely Angel Sent From Heaven

In 1988, I auditioned for the show choir at the high school where I now teach. I’d been accompanying choirs at the junior high, and I wanted to sing. I was sick of playing the piano for others. (I got over that, by the way.)

I didn’t make the choir, but a month after auditions, the director called my house (so weird to have a teacher call you at home!) and asked if I’d be interested in accompanying the show choir.

Boo.

But I said yes. And I loved it.

Then, in 2002, I was hired to teach in the room across the hall from that same director. When he needed an extra set of hands, he called on me. At some point that year, he began calling me his “Lovely Angel Sent From Heaven.” Sometimes he would sing it in a clear baritone voice; sometimes he would just say it. Either way, it was always loud and with a flourish, and it always made me blush.

Tonight I was an extra set of hands for the choir that is now directed by his son.

As I walked down the hall to where the choir was waiting to warm up, I saw the original director, the man who asked me over twenty years ago to accompany the show choir. He turned around, saw me, hugged me, and said, “Lovely Angel Sent From Heaven! How are you?”

There wasn’t really time to catch up, but before I joined the choir he said, “seeing you made my night. Really, it did.”

And seeing him and hearing my old moniker made my night.

Really, it did.