Three years ago, within the realm of one of my favorite hobbies, I fought an epic battle against my mother's harsh expectations. There, I learned that sometimes in life, the greatest challenges we face are with ourselves.
Over ten years had passed since I first started playing piano. At age thirteen, I was nearing the final levels of the Royal Conservatory of Music for Piano. I leaned out of my window and closed my eyes. The soft summer breeze brought the smell of freshly mowed lawns and heated asphalt to my nose as the warm sunshine soaked my hair and face. I sighed as I thought about what happened that morning.
"I passed!", I announced triumphantly. My heartbeat slowed from the gallop three seconds ago to a content "ba-dump" as I leaned back in my worn-out red chair, proud and relieved at the same time. I took a deep breath to release the remaining tension in my body and let my feet swing as I sat quietly, waiting for my mom's verdict.
"Eighty-nine percent, huh...", she said in a slow, monotone voice, "That's not an A."
"But I passed!" I protested. The tension that had left my body a mere two minutes ago returned with a vengeance. I picked up a pen sitting on the table and attempted to squeeze the life out of it as I glared at my mom.
"What", she continued in Chinese after noticing my death-stare, "Your lessons are expensive. If you had practiced more, you would've gotten a higher mark." With that, she strolled slowly back to the kitchen, and I left for the sanctuary of my room, giving the stairs a thorough beating on the way.
That same night, I had a piano lesson. My teacher, Mrs. Lai, congratulated me on passing my exam with a warm smile. She then treated me to a delicious cookie that magically appeared while I was not looking. After finishing the cookie in approximately two giant bites, stuffing my cheeks to the point where I resembled a chipmunk more that I did a human girl, I sat back down on the black piano bench worn with age. With slightly sweaty hands, I handed the level nine piano books to Mrs. Lai. She stashed the books back into her collection of piano books, scores, and pieces and fished out the level ten books for me. I shakily scanned through the new and much thicker book while feigning confidence as I tried to reassure myself that I had plenty of time, almost two years, to practice for the next exam. Two years was what all my friends got to prepare for their final exam before entering the world of ARCT, the Associate of the Royal Conservatory of Toronto. With one last deep breath, I told myself, "I can do this!", and the lesson carried on.
Soon after, high school started, and I became lazy. I neglected my need to practice once again. Whenever that happened, my mom was guaranteed to be there, snapping at my heels like a rabid Doberman at every corner I turned and every step I took. The more she did that the more I hated piano. The more I hated piano and refused to practice, the more she nagged. Every tune coming out of that wretched instrument from hell sounded like a nightmare and my fingers burned every time they touched the keys. I only played during these times so my mom would stop nagging and leave me alone. Fortunately, I did willingly practice at times because my attitude was very different when the monster was not home. That was when I didn't need to defend myself, and my piano-loving side would venture out and convince me to practice. She was horribly worried that I wouldn't get enough practice to pass the exam, since it was my goal to get to ARCT Performers. We both knew that if I didn't pass the coming exam, my piano career would be over.
One day, my routine battle with my mom worsened by a hundred-fold when Mrs. Lai told me that my mom had signed me up for the level ten exam without telling me in a desperate attempt to force me to practice. That meant that in total, I only got less than a year to prepare for the exam. My immediate reaction was complete silence. My chest constricted painfully and my thoughts clouded. A bottled-up battle cry threatened to erupt from my voice box. Right then, I decided to show my mom that she couldn't control me. I decided not to practice on purpose.
Now, not only did the keys burn my finger and the tunes sounded like a screeching child, my mom and I were also screeching at each other. We screamed until our throats were hoarse, doors were slammed, tears (mine) flowed. Between the screaming, silence filled the gaps. My piano-loving side would tearfully beg and plead everyday, "Just practice! You know that if we practice, she'll shut up! Please! We're running out of time!". Unfortunately, giving in was not an option. If I practiced, it would mean that my mom would be victorious. That would mean losing. I was not about to lose so easily.
This meant that I was not only fighting one battle anymore. I was now fighting two. I became almost bipolar as I fought my mom while my two sides fought each other. I only practiced when I felt like it. Time passed like water through my fingers but while practicing it felt like if I jumped up, it would take me three years to touch the ground again. I felt like a bobble-head, my personality bobbing back and forth between piano-loving and "ego-tastic", the pleading voice in my head growing softer and weaker with every argument between my mom and I.
In the end, I failed the exam. There was no way that I could have gotten anything done such a bipolar state. My piano-loving side screamed at me for failing, for letting myself down, but I was just tired. This war that lasted around half a year stole the energy that used to grace my fingers and strapped lead weights onto my arms. My eyes refused to look at the music sheets and my spine took on the shape of a permanently drawn bow. I told my mom that I needed a break, and so she "paused" my lessons.
Ever since then, I have not been allowed to take piano lessons. Only after the exam and losing my lessons did I realize that maybe, if I had only listened to my piano-loving side and practiced, I would still be able to do and improve in what I love doing. Maybe then, I would have been able to reach my goal.
Some of my friends do not understand why I do not just continue on by myself without a teacher and reach my goal that way. Many say, "If you like playing so much, why don't you just play? Just practice by yourself.". But every single time, I can only shake my head sadly and explain to them that now that I am in the final years of high school, added onto the fact that the pressure from having a piano teacher and exams looming in the future, piano has gone to the bottom of my list of priorities. Also, I am discouraged every time I play now because I can feel my skills slipping away. Funnily, right now, the type of songs that I am best at playing are the sad ones that twist your heart like a wet towel that needs to be wrung out and dried until crisp and brittle. Maybe I am playing the background music to my own life unknowingly. Maybe.
I have asked, begged, my mom to let me take lessons again, but her answer was always, "If you promise to play three hours of piano a day, seven days a week, I'll consider it." It's almost as if she was trying to repeat those events from three years ago. I know that after a while, I will neglect practice again. As much as I love playing, I cannot stand the chance of maybe having to play something that I despise over and over again. Therefore, to this date, I still have not accepted my mom's deal. My piano-loving side tries hard to convince me that I will be able to practice three hours a day, seven days a week, but I think that even she knows, that over time, I will grow lazy once again. Even so, every time I see or hear a young piano player playing the songs in ARCT that I had picked out in advance, my heart aches, my tears flow, and I am filled with regret. My vision swims and my chest feels as if a black hole had opened up inside and was sucking everything into its murky depths. I fight the urge to curl up on the floor into a ball of remorse as I wonder if that pianist could have been me.
If only I had conquered myself, I would have been able to please my mom, which in return would benefit no one but myself. I really wish my ego could have digested that fact. Unfortunately, it still has not been able to. Nonetheless, this lost battle taught me that sometimes, the greatest challenges we face are with ourselves.
