I'll Give You My Tired

I just got back from a rehearsal for a 9/11 memorial service, and I wonder if I'm torturing myself on purpose.  I'm not much for rah-rah patriotism right now, and several of the songs we sing are high rah-rah-tolerance songs.  I got moved to the front row for no reason today (along with all the other Alto II singers), so I definitely can't start crying in frustration when we sing those songs. 

It might be tough; I'm feeling smashed pretty flat right now.  Still no teaching job (not really a surprise), but that doesn't make the debt I shouldn't have had to take on in the first place go away.  I wonder if 36 months of economic hardship deferment is going to be enough. 

I'm really hating government bureaucracy right now, and it's hard not to equate the bureaucracy with the government itself.  It's painful to sing "Give me your tired" (and a little funny because I'd love to give them my tired, all of it, all 6+ years of it, etc.), as it's abbreviated for our rehearsals.  The song is based on the poem on the Statue of Liberty ("The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, I think), and it's so open and inviting and gloriously full of hope and optimism, and I'm just . . . not. I think it helps that the song is sort of painfully dull and boring, although we seem to be doing best with dynamics on this one.  It needs all the help it can get.

We're also singing a Verdi piece (in clunky English) and the "1812 Overture" in Slovanic.  (Unexpected after we weren't allowed to sing in Italian.)  I love singing in Slovanic; we've sung several pieces recently for the college a cappella choir.  I love the way the altos just get to blast in Russian pieces; it's refreshing!  The rest of the volunteers for the choir are mostly just nice church choir members or friends of choir members who only sing church music translated into English, so this is a chore for them.  I think they're starting to get into it a little.  I wonder if there'll really be cannons . . .