An open letter to my choir family

Hey choir fam,

So I’ve needed to take a few days to process last weekend’s retreat, much more so than past years. As always, it was such a joy and privilege to get to share that time with all of you, make music, build our community, just hang out together.

But this year was different for me, in ways I had not expected. For all that I may have been seen to be – and sometimes loudly identified as being – in full choir dad mode, this year’s choir retreat ended up with me focussed mostly on myself. My inner introvert was in the driver’s seat and what bandwidth I had to spare I was using to reboot my own systems.

I share this in large part to explain why I didn’t get many notes done for the envelopes, not for lack of love and appreciation for all of you! Shout out in particular to Leah and Jenica for all the prep and energy they put into the activity, which I recognize and adore for its impact and importance. And in so saying, to make clear it was not a decision I made lightly, admitting to myself that I was not in a place to fully participate.

Some of it was specifically about choir and retreat this year.

One thing, which I’m actually taking as a positive sign, and explicitly as a sign of my great respect for our no-longer-so-new president and the job they are doing, is that I realized for the first time since my first year I wasn’t going to retreat feeling like I had a separate choir mantle to consciously and deliberately set down. I didn’t need to “stop being president” and “just get to be a chorister.” Which I now realize made it, rather ironically, harder for me to relax into being at retreat. I wasn’t downshifting to “just” being at retreat, just for me and just this one choir, so I somehow stayed “on” in a way I hadn’t in years past. Probably part of why I was putting out such choir dad vibes actually.

The other big reason was that this year was extra special to me, and thus far unique, because it was the first choir retreat I got to share with one of my kids. What a privilege and joy that has been as a parent. But then also throw in Erica’s return to choir and, again rather ironically, I realized rather late in the game that I completely, and completely unconsciously, switched into chaperone mode… so even more choir dad energy! It was Leo who triggered the freeing epiphany when he asked me the first night if Jacob being in choir and at retreat was why I had, weeks if not months ago, talked about planning to have a dry retreat. You can ask Leo… I was a bit gobsmacked at the realization. And, yes, I celebrated having that epiphany by having a drink — if you haven’t yet heard about the “Thursday Night” come talk to me or Leo!

Throw in some additional little things… wearing contacts because of the cold and as a result once again confronting the need for reading glasses – this time, ego check passed and I just leaned into having them… Michael and Tyson doing the actual dadding with monster battery packs and roadside support… Frank just being Frank… and this year’s retreat found me having to rediscover where I thought I fit in, my place in the choir, where and how I belonged.

Meanwhile, outside of choir, my life has been crazily busy and yet also strangely steady and yet also remarkably uncertain and unstable… so so much of my life is in transition. Some big decisions recently made, some big decisions still to come. So in contrast to everything I said above about feeling “on,” choir retreat this year was in fact a somewhat shocking window of calm and escape and peace, the first time in a while for me to actually switch off.

And so I think I really did. For two completely different sets of reasons.

Bottom line, it’s been a really weird week for me in what has already been an unusual several months.

All that to say, my beloved choir family, thank you for being such wonderful lovely humans to be with, or at least be near even while I was putting up distance and buffer and boundaries around me.

There are many of you whom I have still not properly met or had a chance to really chat with — including some of you who aren’t even new this year — something that I hope we can rectify in the coming weeks and months. Unlike at retreat, I hope to sit down with some of you at the choir and choir-adjacent social things that are still to come. And on tour — omg I can’t wait for tour!

Or if a one-on-one coffee is more your speed, I would love to find a time to make that happen.

At the same time, thank you for your understanding and patience if at times I have seemed not as open or approachable. In all sincerity, it’s not about you, it’s fully about me. But I can commit to this: if a particular moment doesn’t happen to be a good time for me, I would still rather you have approached so that we can set a time and have a plan to continue the conversation later.

In the meantime, one more thank you to all of you, for being you, and for all of the you that you put into our choir. What a space you have created and lead, Katy. This community changed my life, saved my life, fills my life with joy. I hope that it helps gives you some of whatever it is that you need too.

See you tonight at rehearsal!

– Winston