The other day my sister Priscilla and I were on the subway headed uptown. A musician got on our train car and started playing the clarinet. He was amazing! As he came our way, we gave him a tip and told him how much we enjoyed his beautiful music. The man stopped and stared at Priscilla.
“What instrument do you play?” he said.
“Oh, no, no,” Priscilla said, smiling. “I don’t play any instruments.”
The man and I spoke at the same time. “You don’t play the piano or sing?” he said. “She plays the piano!” I said.
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“Well, I used to play the piano,” Priscilla admitted. “But I wasn’t very good.”
“That’s not true,” I said. “She was really good!”
My sisters and I had taken piano lessons since the first or second grade from Sister Diane, a nun who could play the piano like nobody’s business. Out of all of us, though, only Priscilla was any good. In fact, Sister Diane was frequently frustrated with my piano skills (we had such similar names, such different talents!). Priscilla kept on playing all throughout high school. She was also a pretty good singer. How did this guy know?
“You should keep playing,” the man said.
“And, she’s a good singer!” I piped up.
The man stared intently at Priscilla, like I wasn’t even there, like I wasn’t the one who’d been supplying him with information about Priscilla’s musical talents.
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“Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t do something,” he told her, cryptically.
The man’s stop came and he got off the train. Priscilla and I were left smiling and a little stunned. A few months earlier, Priscilla had told me how she wanted to take up the piano again. This was no chance encounter, I thought.
“That was a message right from God,” I said to Priscilla. She laughed. She wasn’t entirely convinced, though she did say she’d consider looking into piano lessons.
What do you think–just a random encounter or something more?
