SING ME NOT [Sat, 8-16-25]

BEYOND WINTER: The Embarrassing Memories of An Old Man—SING ME NOT [Sat, 8-16-25]

 

Tomorrow is Sunday, the sabbath, the day of rest, the day I devote to recalling all the stupid church stuff I did over 70 years as a preacher.

I’m sure there is no one besides me who has even the slightest memory of the Sunday evening worship service at Mineral City, IN [1] when I sang “Pass Me Not” as a solo, but when I remember it, I cringe. Literally. Why is that? Why should it still be embarrassing after 71 years, when no one else remembers it, when anyone who could remember it is probably dead?

I was preaching at the Methodist churches in 3 tiny Indiana villages, Solsberry [2], Koleen, and Mineral. They were scattered geographically, so I could get to only two of them on a Sunday morning. That meant an evening service at the third church. So that none of the three would always have the early morning or evening service, the services were staggered. I went to Mineral at 9:30 on the 1^st and 3^rd Sundays of the month, and 11:00 on the 2^nd Sunday, and 7:30 pm on the 4^th Sunday. Solsberry and Koleen had similarly irregular schedules.

The evening service at Mineral was rather poorly attended, so in one of those fits of stupidity that I would like to blame on youth, but which is misplaced blame since I kept doing such stupid things my whole career, I told the Mineralites that I would sing a solo if they ever got 50 people to worship at their Sunday evening service. Why I thought that would be an incentive for people to come to church I don’t know, but I didn’t have enough money to promise them something like ice cream. I wasn’t worried, though; 50 people for evening service was a remote goal.

You can guess the next chapter. I counted carefully to be sure. It was actually 51, not even including babies.

I wasn’t a bad singer, but I was not a confident one. I had a decent voice, but a very limited range. I had gained confidence in my singing ability, though, because of Jim Barrett. Jim was a year behind me at Oakland City High School, and my roommate my junior year at IU. He was a music major. When he did not have other responsibilities, he went to church with me and played piano. When he accompanied me, he simply transposed as he played, keeping my voice in range. I didn’t know that; I thought I was getting better.

On that particular Sunday evening, the Mineral folks had borrowed people from all over Greene County to come up with 51 at worship. For some reason, Jim had not gone with me. Instead, the gracious and sweet 90-year-old lady with no music education but plenty of arthritis was playing piano.

I had not prepared anything, of course, for I did not think they could ever get 50 people to church. Only a year before, however, I had sung in a quartet. “Pass Me Not.” A great hymn, and I sounded pretty good when Bob Robling and Dave Lamb and Bob Wallace, real singers, were covering up my wavering bass. So, I asked the pianist if she knew “Pass Me Not.” She thought that maybe she did.  

I suspect that song was never again selected in that church.

It was a disaster. She knew nothing about transposing to fit my range. I switched, almost word by word, from one octave to another, from key to key, even clef to clef, trying to find some common musical ground between voice and piano.

Well, I started this meditation to try to figure out why that incident is still cringe-worthy. It’s no worse than many other embarrassing moments to which I have subjected myself and those who had to witness them. I really have no answer to that, so I’ll just have to let it go.

That’s one of the real advantages of old age. If there is no one else left to remember the stupid stuff you did, you don’t have to remember it, either.

John Robert McFarland

1] It was usually just called Mineral instead of Mineral City, since a church building and three houses don’t really constitute a city.

2] At the time, I thought Solsberry was just a misspelling of the English Salisbury. Later, when I pastored at Arcola, IL, and Jim Cummings was in the congregation, I learned that the town was named for his grandfather, Sol.