"Caroling, caroling, now we go..."

I feel like all I've been doing in my ward these days is trying to get people to sing Christmas songs.

As much as I love Christmas songs, I'm sort of afraid that it's coming across as the only thing I can think about at this time of year. Really it's not - it's just that a lot of people like Christmas songs, and so there are lots of opportunities to sing them at this time of year, and I have kind of found myself at the center of several of these opportunities. The problem is that (and this is a bit baffling to me) more people seem to like to listen to them than to actually sing them.

First there's the ward Christmas program. Now, I am the ward organist and so this is not technically my responsibility. But our ward music chairperson has been put in charge of coordinating the Christmas program for our last sacrament meeting before the break, without a choir director, or really a ward choir. If you have ever served on a ward music committee, you will immediately recognize that this is cause for concern, if not outright panic. (If you have never served on a ward music committee, you probably have no idea what the program entails, just that there's this nice Sunday once a year where you get to listen to music instead of talks.) So, since we don't really have much of a committee, I have been helping out. Which means trying to recruit people to sing in a choir that meets only sporadically and keeps running into scheduling snags, like cancelled church meetings. And because our ward music chair works many evenings, I have also become something of the choir director, in charge of leading rehearsals from my seat at the piano.

Then there's Enrichment. Our December activity has been in the works for two months, and has met with more snags than ward choir rehearsals. Because this is my major calling, I have been worrying about it almost nonstop since we began planning, and it is only within about the last week that I've felt confident that it's going to actually work out. And the activity that has finally been coming together involves caroling to members of the stake, whose names we've gotten from local ward leaders. I'm excited about it, actually. I think it's going to work. I hope people aren't tired of singing, or being recruited to sing, by the time it happens.

Number three is a tradition from my former roommate Julia. In her family, throughout the month of December, they gather around every evening and sing Christmas songs, a cappella, by candlelight. She carries on the tradition out here in Michigan, inviting anyone who wants to to come and join her. It was one of the first things I ever did in Michigan, way back when I stayed the night with her when I was first checking out the school. And it's been one of my favorite parts of December for the last two years. So now that I don't live with her, I've been trying to get friends to come with me to sing at her apartment. I'm going tonight, in fact, with a couple people, but my enthusiastic advertising via a mass Facebook message met with almost no response. It's so sad because I was kind of hoping to go more than once. And hoping that other people might realize how much fun this is (but maybe caroling a cappella by candlelight doesn't sound like fun to most people, I don't know).

Finally, I have somehow found myself the organizer of a (possible) service activity. While exploring possibilities for our Enrichment service group, I got in contact with a retirement community that needs carolers in the month of December. This doesn't coordinate well with our Enrichment schedule, but we have (or I thought we had) lots of people who enjoy singing in our ward, and I thought it would be kind of nice to organize a group of people to do the activity. I sent out an email to the entire ward, and then, because I really, really want this to work out, I sent an additional message to all the ward members on my Facebook list (because more people pay attention to Facebook messages than ward emails). I have decided that if I can't get at least eight people (you'd think it wouldn't be that hard) then I'll have to call the retirement community and let them know we can't do it. So far I have four, including myself. I'm not sure if I can be optimistic about the other four.

Here are some things I'm learning. 1) Boys resist singing. If I get enough people to show up for the service opportunity, I suspect that not a one of them will be male. In fact, I even considered sending my Facebook message just to the girls, but decided I ought to be optimistic (and democratic - there are plenty of people I sent the message to who I am quite certain will not come). And getting guys to come to choir is like pulling teeth - several of them are enthusiastic and say they'd like to sing, but only two showed up at our first rehearsals.

2) It's hard to get people to do things that are not blatantly social and that don't involve a lot of people. It seems like there have been lots of big activities with lots of people invited lately, and people (including myself) are quick to jump on those. But a small, unobtrusive evening thing, like choir practice or singing by candlelight or caroling at a retirement home, doesn't attract big audiences. Which is sort of too bad because as much as I like major social events, sometimes it's nicer just to have a few people, or to do something that feels a little more meaningful.

I am, however, grateful for the people who are enthusiastic about participating. And my frustrations come more from the perspective of the organizer - if I were not the organizer, I'm not entirely sure if I'd make many of these things a priority myself (though I'd like to think I would). And I've also found that being an organizer can be emotionally draining. You become personally invested, and you internalize the enthusiasm in the hopes of having that enthusiasm rub off on other people. And so when your efforts fall short, you feel a little bit of a sense of personal failure, and sometimes people's decisions not to participate feel a little bit personal, even though you know it's not anything personal.

I feel like in the last couple months I've been doing a lot to try to get people together for various reasons, social or church or otherwise, and part of me really enjoys it. Part of me always has. And it's incredibly rewarding when things come together successfully - I find that I care less whether I have a good time than that everyone else comes away having enjoyed there time or gotten something out of it. But to some extent I feel like I've been so busy planning and doing things, and being involved, that I don't leave space to just sit back and have quality time with people. It's about balance, like everything always is, and I think it's something I'd like to work on in the new year, though I don't know exactly how.