My Pleading Heart

Colonel Brandon gave Marian Dashwood a pianoforte in Sense and Sensibility. She ended up marrying him (I can't quite blame her).

In Vanity Fair (at least the movie version as I have not read the novel), when Amelia's family becomes poor and destitute, Dobbin buys Amelia's piano for her and has it delivered to her. Of course this action illustrates his true love for her, but stupid Amelia thinks that George Osbourne has done this grand gesture. It isn't until much later in the movie that she learns the truth and eventually comes to love Dobbin.

AND, just this week on Tuesday's episode of One Tree Hill, Nathan surprised Hayley with a nice keyboard that he bought with the money he was supposed to use to buy himself a car. Oh how sweet and terribly unselfish he was. (By the way, they are married...and I think they're just juniors in high school. Come on now, it's the WB.)

So, true love in the form of piano delivery is no stranger to fiction. But what about fact? GET THIS. Before Sandra and Derek were even officially a couple/dating/whatever, he had an upright piano delivered to her home! After the concert, I heard her tell the story. When the piano came, she said she fell on the floor. (I can't quite blame her.) She ended up marrying him.

The moral: If a guy buys and sends you a piano, he totally and utterly loves you! So, I'm hoping that some boy will buy and send me a piano one day (because in case you didn't know, I foolishly got rid of my piano earlier this year...too long of a stupid story to get in to at this point).

After hearing the Derek/Sandra true life piano story, I have hope that something like that (which only can be characterized as pure magic) can happen to me too. I'm sitting here this evening totally wishing that I had a piano. I usually have the urge to sit down on my old piano bench when a hymn is running through my mind. I used to really enjoy playing: hymns, Christmas carols, and Michael W. Smith songs (come on, he may need to retire, but he's a good pianist). I will now tell you why I wish I had a piano.

My great-grandfather, Grady Smith Blackwell, was a musician. I didn't know this until I was hurricaned in over Labor day at my grandmother's house in Atlanta (I was up for a family funeral and since Hurricane Frances came storming through FL, I stayed about 5 extra days). I went down the way to my Great Aunt Anne's house which is the old Blackwell Farm (where my great grandparents raised their 8 children). Aunt Anne is the last living Blackwell child and my mom's dad, Bob, was her brother. So, seizing the opportunity to talk to the last living Blackwell, I asked a zillion questions. (Also, my grandfather, Bob Blackwell, died before I was born, so I never knew him. I wanted to get as much information as I could from his sister.)

During my inquiry, I learned a lot about my great grandparents too. Annie Blackwell, who the children called Mamere (the french word for grandmother pronounced mah-may), kept a candy dish by her chair filled with Hershey's chocolate. She was a Methodist and received a service award. She was also beautiful. Grandpop was a musician. He played several instruments and...wrote his bride a song! I flipped out when I learned this bit of information. Aunt Anne told me that when I came back for a visit in October (which happened just last weekend), she would have gotten it out of the safe for me to see.

So, last weekend I went to visit Aunt Anne. As promised, Grandpop's song was waiting for me. It was tattered, but very beautiful! He had gone through the pains to actually get it published as sheet music with a very fancy design on the cover. It is entitled "My Pleading Heart." The copyright is MCMVII (and being the Roman Numeral Queen of the Sixth Grade that I was, I instantly recognized the numbers to mean 1907). Aunt Anne told me that the date is significant because that is the year that Mamere and Grandpop married.

Here are the lyrics:

Oh! Annie, take thou my poor heart:
'Tis all I can offer thee.
It is bound so fast with earthly ties
It cannot rest with me.
Close love is like a clinging vine.
Oh! keep it, love, with thee.
How can I make it eternal thine?
I'll keep it every for thee.

Chorus:
Let other tempting voices cry,
"Come back, love, ne'er to part."
My darling, do not let it go,
Or you will break my heart.

It never has been offered yet
To any one but thee,
And if you cast it from your side
A sorrowful man I'll be.
I wish, I long for better things;
At night I kneel and pray.
In pity, love, I beg of you,
Cast not my heart away.

Another may guard your life and cherish,
And claim you all his own;
But my love for you will never perish,
Like the sungod on his throne.
It will blaze thro' all the seasons vernal,
It shall be my rod and staff.
His love my fade, mine will be eternal,
'Tho I may but see your photograph.

Ok, how sweet is Grandpop? I wish I knew him. I wish I knew Mamere. I wish I knew their son, my mom's dad, Bob Blackwell. I wonder what I would have called him? Maybe I would have called him Grandpop just like his children called his dad. I have decided that my children will call my mom Mamere (even though my brother's kids already call her Grandma...it doesn't matter because by the time I get around to having children, his kids will be really old!).

So, I wish I could take this sheet music and sit at my piano and play. But, I will have to wait until some lovely boy sends a piano to my door.