mrs. ed

i received some very sad news today—when i opened my e-mail account after work, there was an e-mail waiting for me from the college i attended about the passing of a dear woman named mrs. alice thompson. she was my college voice coach. strangely, i had posted about her on this blog the very day she died—saturday, january 10, 2009. in my post {below} i had referred to her as mrs. ed—this is what everyone called her.

this is strange, because i did not even know that alice was sick. i knew she had grown quite a bit older since my time at college, and that her husband had passed a few years back after fighting an illness. but i did not know the health or state of mrs. ed—only that she was still with us and missing her beloved, dr. ed (whose real name was ed thompson).

dr. ed was a very dear man. he was one of my favorite people in college. i had him as a professor for some classes, but i knew him best as my choir director all four years that i attended judson college. he was like no person i ever knew. he was a man of smaller stature, but had the tallest personality and spunk of anyone i’ve ever met! and his wife, alice was the same—in height and personality. everyone loved dr. ed and mrs. ed.

dr. ed had had a stroke shortly before i came to judson. so my first year getting to know him was getting to know a man who was getting to know himself again—trying to relearn how to use one side of his body the way he used to. mrs. ed was always right there beside him through all of that. although i did not know mrs. ed nearly as well as i knew dr. ed, they were like one. they thought alike, taught alike, rejoiced alike, cared alike and even sang alike—with the same enthusiasm. dr. ed was the vocal choir director. mrs. ed was the hand-bell choir director.

i had the pleasure of touring five countries in europe for a month with them both, along with the rest of the choir. oh, the stories i could tell about that trip and about them. but another time. let’s just say, it was one of the best months of my life.

i was very sad when dr. ed passed. my best memories of dr. ed are him standing in front of the choir during practice and getting so enthusiastic about the words we were learning in a song. he would give us these grand “pep” talks about how the words we were singing should not just be words that came out of our mouths, but should be words we felt in our hearts! he would talk about the word “joy” or “hallelujah” and he would say, “you should know this word, understand this word, live this word. it should be your middle name!” my best friend at the time and i would giggle. we had a friend in the tenor section who sat behind us that we liked to tease. we had a silly made up name for him—schtu black {inside joke}. after hearing dr. ed’s words, we began to call our tenor friend schtu joy hallelujah black.

i know this means nothing to someone reading it, but it means everything to me—the memories that were created in those choir practices, the choir tours, the voice lessons, the recitals, the concerts. they are among the best memories of my life. i remember sitting on the bus with dr. and mrs. ed on choir tours, and i still remember specific conversations. they were two outstanding, loving people who loved God and made it known in everything they did.

alice passed at about six in the evening. i posted just two hours later. it is strange that having never written about either of them before, i should happen to write a little bit about mrs. ed in my most recent post on the very day she left this earth to be with her Savior and reunite with her husband. i am so glad they will be together again to sing. a college friend wrote to me on facebook today and said she pictured dr. ed waiting for alice with open arms. dr. ed is still missed today. mrs. ed will be missed every bit as much. i am blessed and honored to have known them both. i know my college friends reading this will agree.

thank you for your service and giving heart, mrs. ed. thank you for teaching me about singing. thank you for letting angela sing a schubert song for me. thank you for letting us sing a mendelssohn duet for a recital even though i had already graduated. thank you for who you were. i look forward to seeing you again some day.