We Thank Thee, O God

Back in February, I was accompanied my friend Wendy and her sisters for a concert. It was a great concert. If you ever want to hear the recording of it, let me know. Wendy’s brother-in-law recorded it, and it’s pretty good quality.

You may not have known about this, because my life was so consumed by student teaching at that point that I rarely blogged about anything else. Although, I looked it up, and I *did* blog about my future sitcom life the night of the concert.

Anyway, after the concert, Wendy’s sister, Laura, bumped into a man who had been at the concert. He told her he was organizing a banquet for President Monson, and asked her if she and her sisters would sing. They said yes, because of COURSE you say yes to the opportunity to perform for the man you believe to be the living prophet on Earth. They asked me to accompany them.

At first, I was hesitant. It was the same night as You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown’s opening. There was also the annual TAG awards banquet the same night, but I’ve always missed that because they ALWAYS schedule that during youth theatre shows. ALWAYS. Could I bail on the kids for the opportunity to play a couple songs on the piano?

Turns out I could.

We rehearsed a couple times, and then showed up tonight to perform. I didn’t know all of the details. I just knew President Monson would be there. When I walked in, Wendy’s sister-in-law, Laurel, was calling me to see if I wanted salmon or chicken. I didn’t even realize we were going to be eating. Turns out it was a dinner honoring people for their contributions through print. They inducted President Monson and a handful of dead guys into the “printing hall of fame.”

We went through our songs, and then sat down. The dinner was supposed to start at 7, and we were supposed to be there at 6. They placed us at a table in the corner of the large hall, with a sign alerting everyone that we were musicians. We lived up to the stereotype of being unruly and crude, because we dug into our salads WAY before 7. We were literally the only people in the entire room eating. I blame the pregnant girls. They started it, and everyone else followed. Wendy’s brother, Dave, and I were the last ones to give in and eat.

After we finished our salad, and Laura apologized to the servers for eating so early (hehe!), President Monson arrived. He’s not as tall as I thought he’d be, and he looks older in person than he does on Conference in HD. They brought out our dinner, which looked like this:

I sure do love good salmon, and this was GOOOOOOOOOOOD.

As we ate, lots of old men (and a couple younger ones) talked about the history of printing. Then we were brought dessert, which looked like this:

It was no salmon, but I didn’t mind it. I didn’t eat all of it, though.

After the food, we performed. It was fantastic. The girls were AMAZING. Wendy and Laura sang “Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again” from The Phantom of the Opera, Julia and Laurel sang “Goodnight, My Someone” from The Music Man, and then all four sang “Pie Jesu” from Andrew Lloyd-Webber’s Requiem. President Monson likes showtunes, and he seemed pleased with the selections.

After hearing lots of people talk for what seemed like an eternity, President Monson spoke, which from our white trash table in the corner, looked like this:

He said a lot of cool things relating to printing, and then he talked about musicals. (Gosh, I love that man.) He talked about how he goes to all the musicals that come through town and he writes down what he believes to be the “key line” in each show on his Playbill. He shared a few examples. He also talked about how gorgeous Laurel’s high note at the end of “Pie Jesu” was and had her stand up. He then clapped for her, which made the rest of the room applaud. It was very classy and yet fun. He also mentioned A Christmas Carol and told us that the original manuscripts for that book are in the Church’s vault. Cool, eh?!

After he spoke, there was a beautiful number by a women’s acapella group from BYU (except I HATE the stereotypical breathy/80s pop “Mormon sound” – someday, I shall lead an LDS music revolution) and a closing prayer. Then we were asked to stay seated until President Monson had left. The second he was out of the room, we were up. I went out to the lobby, and saw him talking to some people. I TOTALLY could have gotten close enough to talk to him, but instead, I went to get the ladies to come and talk to him. By the time I was back, there were more people, and even though we followed him out to his car, we never got to talk to him. I was bummed.

On the way home, I stopped and got myself a vanilla Frosty, because dangit! I deserved it. I wasn’t able to finish it, but it was good until I was so full that I wanted to puke.

As a memento of tonight, I stole the card from my seat that let the servers know that I wanted the salmon. Is it wrong to steal when the Prophet is in the room? Crap. Maybe THAT’S why he didn’t come and talk to us. I ruined it for everyone. Oh, well. We’ll meet again, President Monson. Oh, yes. We’ll meet again…