Milli Vanilli

It's no secret that my family has pretty much no musical ability. We can't make it through "Happy Birthday" without laughing because we're so bad. In spite of years of piano lessons, I can hack at best a few hymns to be used in emergencies when the pianist doesn't show up to Relief Society. If it weren't for the piano lessons, I may be able to sing blithely oblivious to the way the notes I sing bear little resemblance to the ones in the hymnal. Singing in the church choir is, obviously, out of the question. Singing anywhere, except along to the radio when nobody but Huck is in the car, is obviously out of the question.

I'm fairly open about my singing ability. I have a funny anecdote about how I lip sync at church and one time in college a new roommate complimented my beautiful voice and my other roommate guffawed because she knew I lip synced all the words. I refuse to be the singer when Zach's family is playing Rock Band, which they do surprisingly often. I thought my lack of singing ability was common knowledge, which is why when I got an EMAIL (another can of worms . . . email is NOT an acceptable mode of urgent communication, people . . . if it's important, pick up the damn phone) from A, my sister-in-law asking if I would sing alto with her for a grandchildren medley of How Great Thou Art at Zach's grandpa's funeral, I didn't hesitate to respond "Nope."

But it didn't work. My sister-in-law called our house to beg Zach to make me sing. The program said that the "grandchildren" would be singing. If I sat out, I would have been the only grandchild sitting in the pews. Which also means that I would probably have to keep my eye on the thirteen great-grandchildren who would be unsupervised during the musical number. During the viewing Zach and I were sitting in the back of the empty chapel next to his mother while G practiced her solo of Come Thou Fount when A came in to encourage me to join in the musical number. "I will if I can lip sync." I told her. "If you can lip sync?" my mother-in-law asked incredulously. "Yeah, I can't sing." She turned to Zach, "How did you manage to marry someone with no musical ability?"

So I got up with the grandchildren. And I lip synced.