# 22 — PEN PALS AND RECORDINGS
In my most “recent” entry, I mentioned a mission trip that I made to Kingston, Jamaica: Fellow young adults from my church and I visited the Missionaries of the Poor (M.O.P.), a religious order of consecrated Catholic men and women who dedicate their lives to serving the poorest of the poor. It was such a life-changing experience that not only brought me closer to God, but it also produced such great fruits of deep friendships that I believe will last a lifetime. Our time in Jamaica taught us the beauty of living in simplicity as the M.O.P. Brothers and Sisters do, and one of my friends suggested that we parishioners bring this lifestyle with us back home to California in the form of handwritten letters to be exchanged among ourselves. She called this idea, “Hearts in Communion,” which I found so wholesome.
Here’s how it worked: Each month, we would be assigned a pen pal, and the partners would exchange letters on a weekly basis. There is no “prompt,” so we could write anything we feel called to discuss. After the month is over and a handful of letters are exchanged, we would re-assign pen pal partners. Although we were originally meant to write to a different person each month, I thoroughly enjoyed exchanging letters with my first partner that she and I are still exchanging letters on a regular basis. I attribute the joy in this experience to the fact that we have a good friendship but are unable to regularly see each other due to busy schedules. That being said, we look forward to checking our mailboxes in that great anticipation of seeing a letter addressed to us, sent from the other person. Of course, it is a blessing when our schedules line up in a way that we get to see each other in-person and simply catch up — whether we attend a liturgical service together, share a delicious meal, or simply enjoy each other’s company in silence or individual activity.
This regular heartbeat of exchanging letters has really taught me how much I take my friendships (or anything, in general) for granted. Every hangout with my friends have much more intention and attention now. I don’t easily feel the temptation to check my phone or verify appointments. As the cool kids would say these days, “I lock in” when it comes to being in the company of others, especially if they are my family or friends. In fact, I find that these lessons have been transferable to the wonderful world of classical music. I am very spoiled to have instant access to hundreds and thousands of capital-G Great recordings of my favorite compositions, whether I listen via YouTube, Spotify, or some other streaming service. That being said, I am grateful to these for at least giving me the opportunity to discover such music that I otherwise would not have heard of.
About ten years ago (2015), I entered the conservatory and truly became enlightened with the literature of keyboard music. My friends and colleagues kept telling me that they were spending long nights in their practice rooms because of an upcoming “Concerto Competition,” but at that moment, still in the youth of my collegiate education, I had never even known that instrumental concerti existed! Although I was intimidated and didn’t dare to entertain the thought of entering that Concerto Competition, I was enlightened. In that state of fascination and binge-listening to countless recordings of random piano concerti on YouTube, I came across Maurice Ravel’s (1875-1937) Piano Concerto in G Major. I absolutely loved it. In fact, I would say that I refused to learn it simply because I would enjoy listening to it more than playing it (and certainly more than practicing it).
Of course, I eventually found other fantastic works and “let go” of listening to Ravel’s Piano Concerto. That just happens in a world full of seemingly endless discovery: the vast, expansive realm of Western art music. Sure, I would eventually stumble upon a recording of the French composer’s Piano Concerto here and there, but those episodes of Ravel-centered obsession would be short-lived. Each encounter felt as if I was hearing the voicemail of a friend whom I first met in my freshman year of college, and I would be reminded of my child-like sense of wonder. Just as I would even replay that voicemail so that I could hear my friend’s voice again, I would replay a recording of that Concerto. Just as I would re-read my pen pal’s letter to me, I would replay a recording of that Concerto.
A few days ago, I attended a concert with the Pacific Symphony in collaboration with Romanian pianist Alexandra Dariescu, and they performed that Piano Concerto written by Ravel. Ten years after my introduction to that piece, I finally watched a live rendition of it in the concert hall. They did not disappoint. Aside from the fact that the orchestra and the pianist performed so beautifully and technically well, this concert felt personal. It felt as if I met my friend for the first time in ten years; yet, somehow, it also felt as if it was someone whom I had always known and am just seeing again as if our hangouts are routine. I knew exactly what the Concerto would sound like because of the hundreds of times I listened to recordings of the piece, yet Dariescu’s own rendition in the concerto hall made me feel as if I never knew the music beforehand.