let joy choose you: music

Since birth, Eli has been very musically inclined. He loves music in a way that I cannot comprehend or relate to. It seems to be innate. I have no musical abilities at all. In church, if I am singing even remotely near Chad, I know he is thinking "Good Lord, make it stop...." When I dance, it looks like I am doing the worm, only standing up. And my musical tastes are of constant scrutiny. So I don't need to go on to explain that this child's musical inclinations are definitely not from me.

But Chad on the other hand is VERY much into music. He played drums from middle school on through high school, then in a band for years. Whenever he has said "Hey, listen to this song from this band I found.", that band has had a breakout hit soon after. Chad's Mom was always in choirs at church while Chad was growing up and Chad's father was one fourth of a barber shop quartet. Needless to say, Chad has an ear for music and coordination to actually perform it, given to him by both of his parents. So I believe Eli has taken after him and his side of the family in that arena. Here are some signs that Eli loves music:

whenever he hears music, he stops and exclaims 'music!'
when he hears music, he breaks out into dance that has evolved from standing still and wiggling to now running around and wiggling
he does rap beats on cue
one of his two favorite things to play with is his drum
anything even resembling a drumstick is used as a drumstick
any instruments that other kids have becomes an obsession to Eli

To illustrate the last point, we were at a friend's house using their pool and they happened to have this music table with drums, a symbol, and other things I don't know the names of (remember, not musically inclined here...). As soon as he saw this musical table, he was hooked. This music table started out in the house, but when he threatened to wake the other sleeping children in the house with his dismay over having to go outside without this music table, we brought it outside. So here is a little picture story of what occurred after that.

It started out by the door and Eli loved playing it. But then it got to the point where he was obviously not leaving it, so moved it closer so I could try and coax him into the pool (which is what we were there for, mind you). As you can see, he couldn't find a drumstick, so he is using a plastic kids spoon.

Me: "Elijah, why don't you come swim in the pool! It is nice and warm. Your friends are swimming too."

Elijah: silence

Finally I do coax him into the pool for a short swim, but then he eyes the music table and it calls his name in a way that only he can hear.

So here he is, all wet, playing with the spoon, though he has finally found the drumstick. And then when his other friends want to play too, he pretends to not see them......