Un Peu de Succes

Remember this thing?


















This is the quasi-choose your own adventure game that is the Ecole Normale de Musique.
As you may remember me saying back in September, I was expecting to be in the second year of the 4th level--at the end of this year, my path would be chosen for me: I would either be placed on the badass "performance" track (see left track) or the ultra-lame "teaching" track (see right track). And if I wanted to attack the Winter Wizard with my emerald wand, I would turn to page 173. But I digress.
When I first got here, my teacher bumped me up a level into the 5th "teaching" division. As of last week, she confirmed that I was doomed to stay in this level and live a life of mediocrity and quiet desperation.
I was disappointed and slightly devastated upon hearing this news last Tuesday.
Then I thought about it. Hell, I wasn't even expecting to be in the 5th level this year. To expect to be bumped up yet another level would just be greedy. I accepted my place, and I vowed to do the best I could anyway.
I was even ready to tell her today that I was fine with staying in said "teaching" level.
But then, one of those "blue moon" things happened.
I played well.
My Chopin "black keys" etude sparkled, the variations from Beethoven's Op. 109 sounded sort of coherent, and I was able to stumble my way through a bit of Albeniz' "El Puerto." I received the following comment:

"Hmm, now I don't know what to do about your level."
"Well, I was thinking--I'm fine with the teaching division."
"You've made lots of progress in eight days...okay, let's try the performance division."
"Are you sure this is a good idea?"
"Sure, why not."

Sweet.

Of course, this is France. She said she would "call the secretary" to confirm my bump-up, but I won't count my chickens until I get some kind of letter signed by Sarkozy himself confirming that I am now indeed in the "performance" level.
But it still means that my piano teacher has some kind of confidence that I'm getting somewhere, which was celebratory enough for me to treat myself to a Kir (i.e., wine with currant syrup. Divine).
True, my exams are now ridiculously hard to pass at the end of the year. True, I went to a cafe with my Chopin etudes just to see if the waitress would talk to me. True, I still have really weird looking toes and lots of back hair.
But the tides have shifted ever so slightly in my favor.


On another note, I made ratatouille tonight!




















Now if that's not a good day, I don't know what is.