all the way (part 1)

This blog is not based on positivity.

For all my life, music has been my guardian angel. Like the soft touch of an invisible feather and angels wing is to another person, my angel has been music. Now don't start singing Phantom of the Opera tunes, because this is different.
I'm not Little Lotte whose lost her father and wants to reconnect emotionally with him through some opera phantom.
I'm someone whose life has been enriched with music since the age of 4.
My grandmother is a piano teacher. Has been, for years. She started me off playing classical piano at the ripe age of four years old. I learned to listen to music and be able to play it. Then, I learned to read music and play it. When I was old enough not to fall asleep while sitting in one place for more than two hours, I accompanied her to the symphony. For years, my weekends were spent with my grandmother as we attended the symphony to hear countless renditions, interpretations and presentations of artists that I have long since forgotten their names, but not their sounds.
I'm not going to lie; it's not like I never fell asleep during it. But the sounds played over and over in my head.
My mother was a singer. She sang earlier in her career, and also had a long running singing gig in Hawai'i while living there. She still sings beautifully. When I was very young, she was part of a barbershop quartette and also a larger singing group. She would have the most beautiful outfits to wear...
My father would take me. He was never officially trained in music, but he was introduced to it young, I think, and took right to it. To this day he is playing around with new instruments all the time. (He doesn't have a singing voice). He plays fiddle, mandolin, pipeflute, irish-button-accordian, concertina, and a bit of piano.
I love my parents, and I love music.

While traveling through Europe, I wasn't on any normal tourist jaunt. I was traveling for myself, with myself, and had to deal -a lot- in myself. It's the hardest thing I've ever done.
I've been let down more than once, and hurt harder than I thought I could be.
It's exhausting; living.
and, Growing.

Somehow, someway, I learned the phrase "If you want to make God laugh, show him your plans."
and it came true...again, and...again.
But Somehow, Someway... I ended up with an apartment in Vienna, Austria; with friends that started becoming very close; with a family-type atmosphere here; with someone who has filled my life in a way I didn't think it could be filled.
And, with a determination to study at the Konservatorium Wien Privat; Private music conservatory.
I wanted to study opera there. I spent more than the tuition on vocal coaches to get my voice in shape for the audition. I was excited but not hopeful the first day.
and... I made it in! Off to the 2nd round.
I was nervous.
and...

I had an apartment, three flatmates that had become friends, and to whom I promised to stay and be a responsible rent-payer for the next year. -Even if I didn't make it into the conservatory. I had spent about 300 euros on elaborate lighting design in my room to make it feel less like an office and more like a dreamlike, artists home. I painted the walls with original designs I made myself. I even got into botany for the first time of my life and bought orchids. I had made the first jump in my life; the first commitment that a commitment-scared girl ever made. and not just ONE and not just ANY ONE COMMITMENT.

I made a commitment to stay, no-matter-what.
I made a commitment to find a way, even as a possibly Visa-less foreigner, to earn more than 300 euros per month to pay rent.
I made a commitment to find work, somehow, no-matter-what.
I made a commitment to live across an ocean, and a country, 12 hours by plane away from the only home I ever knew, for the first time in my life, to a country where people don't really smile at strangers, and don't speak my language, and I can't yet speak theirs well enough to explain WHY I smile at strangers.
I made a commitment to study music.
But I got rejected.

At least I have a home.
But I made plans. I was so afraid of taking that jump; of finally deciding to focus on the one thing that has always brought my passion, life, love, energy: MUSIC.

Another girl, Anastasia, who went before me and also made it to the 2nd round, flew all the way from Bulgaria to come and audition. Her family took all the money they had and put it into her training, and a train ticket there.
She got rejected, as well.

"C'est la vie" the french saying goes.
But now I have to figure out how to make a new plan.
They say that everything happens for a reason, and yes. Good did come out of this journey.
But I thought I was right; that what I was doing was right. And I just don't know why, yet.
Why did it lead me so far, to not bring me all the way?