Give Me Your Harpmobile, Julia Child...

Matthew and I re-watched Julie & Julia last night. Ooof! Y'all think I could fit my harp in that amazing car?! The summer before my senior year of Chemical Engineering I studied abroad in Paris for a month... It was so magical (as you might imagine). Julia & her husband's apartment in that movie was a place I walked by so regularly while living there. I remember FLIPPING OUT when I saw it in theaters. I quickly grabbed my phone & pulled up a picture of it on my flickr stream to prove it to my friends (who were probably rolling their eyes and actively shushing me... I don't remember, I was too giddy to notice). Anyway... Now my husband and I both have Paris-itis. Like, can we please board a plane and go live in France immediately?! I wonder if Camac is hiring???? Although not my style, I get quite a kick out of their harpes bleues.

Harpwear

I intermittently find myself daydreaming about what amazing dresses I'll wear SOMEDAY when I have gigs as a harpist! A closet full of elegant, flowy gowns for formal occasions... Neon+glittery nail varnish?... Decorative headpieces?... Retro gowns with giant poofy chiffon skirts?... My beat up, old, way too big for me Smashing Pumpkins t-shirt with jeans and Dr. Martens?... It all sounds perfect.

Sara Tyler Harp.. Technician? / Getting to Know You!

Ever since my short trip to Richmond last year to fix my harp's buzzing I haven't been able to stop thinking how awesome it would be to be a harp technician. I felt so tempted to twist and push and pull everything to isolate the problem, but I also felt like I might mess something up so I resisted. Then I found out someone gets to do this, like, as their job?! Hang out with harps all day and take things apart and make harpists' days by repairing their beloved instruments? What could be better?! Apparently that means moving to Chicago and working for Lyon & Healy or something. I wish it were easy for me to do that... I don't want to rule it out, but I don't know if I can go for it anytime in the very near future.



I think something changed in me after seeing Amy get my harp in the back of the giant SUV I rented when we were all done... She's tinier than I am but she just wheeled it out and shoved it up in the SUV all by herself. No fussing or worrying about whether the right parts were supported after putting it in (like I had after loading it at home). I felt less scared of my harp. I think when I first got my harp, it barely felt like it was really mine. I'd been swooning over pictures of it online for months, but it seemed a little impossible that I'd be able to buy one. At first, I was a little scared to move it from room to room, and I was very shy about the pedals. Like, oOoOoOohh, it's this giant, heavy, wooden, stringy, complicated mechanical thing! Beware!



It seems less fragile to me now. I guess that just comes with time. This is still a new instrument to me. A broken string doesn't make me panic anymore. I have no problem wheeling the harp around without assistance. I'm probably still pretty gentle on the strings when I play... but I'm still such a beginner. It's becoming more like a friend than a stranger, if instruments can be friends. It audibly resonates sometimes when we're sitting around talking. I've come to think of it like an animate part of our house. Maybe I'm just crazy and instrument obsessed.