My first meeting with one of my best and closest friends that I have ever had was a unconventional situation. Despite its interesting circumstances, after reading this chapter on perception, all I can say is that I am very grateful that I did not rashly go with my first perception of her and solely judge her on that initial impression I had.
The first time I met my friend, Tanya, was when we were in middle school. We were sitting in the back of orchestra class on the second day of school and if you know anything about orchestra, or being a classic musician, you know that back row seating is like DEATH... ok I jest. It's not that bad and in larger, well-known orchestras where there is hard competition and tough-as-heck auditions to get into the ranks (like All-State, AYSO Atlanta Youth Symphony Orchestra, etc.), even sitting in the back (within the wings of the stage ... sometimes you're literally hidden there!) can be an honor because everyone else ahead of you is so skilled. However, this was no All-State Orchestra and as a well-versed violin player who had climbed the ranks to second chair in her elementary school orchestra (ok, ok, so we only had 15 people total and only 7 of those were in the violin section to begin with... but I was still 2nd chair), I was worried that I would condemned to the back and could clearly hear from my surroundings that not everyone was a fantastic player here.
Especially the girl who was currently being my stand-partner at the time.
At that time she simply kept staring at me with these huge, fearful eyes and looking from me, back to her instrument, and back again. I thought it was a bit odd for the first five minutes, but then shrugged and continued practicing and tuning my instrument to be ready for the beginning of class. In the midst of all the hub-a-hub of everyone chatting and instruments being tuned, I finally heard a quiet voice from my right say, "Um ... do you know why my bow doesn't work?"
So for any string instrument player, one of the key components to playing is maintaining one's bow by constantly rosining it to ensure that it has enough friction to make contact with the strings on the instrument. With this friction, it will not just glide over, but actually grip and pull them to make the vibrations that make music. So in response to her question, I picked up her bow, examined it, and said, "Oh, you just need to get it rosined!"
But then her response was, "Umm... I'm so sorry.... but what is rosin?" By now I was laughing a bit inside because she seemed so clueless and reminded me of myself on my first day of orchestra back in 5th grade. So I proceeded to explain to her how to use rosin while I let her rosin her bow with my rosin block. Yet, even after rosining it, when we tried to pull the bow over her strings the second time, still no noise came out of her violin! By this time I was a bit exasperated as I didn't feel like I had enough time to worry about other people's troubles because I had my own worries to think about with the seating auditions coming up. But I still felt sorry for her difficulties so I tried to teach her a crash course on the basics of reading music and which notes corresponded to which string on the violin. Finally at the end of class I remember leaving while thinking to myself, gosh, she's currently at such a beginner level that I don't think she'll be to catch up with the rest of us.
Now, as I look back on this 8 years later, I realize how wrong I was to perceive her in that way and how glad I am that my initial misconception of her didn't prevent us from becoming close friends over the year and best friends ever since. What I ended up quickly finding out after that day, was that, what she lacked in experience, she made up for in her drive and determination to succeed. After practicing her violin for at least 3-5 times a week for 6 months, she was able to rise in the the orchestral seating ranks from her seat in the very back of the 2nd violin section, to the front of the section- essentially becoming the leader of the entire 2nd violin section! From this experience, I was able to correct my initial perception and see her not as a bumbling first time violin player, but as who she truly was: a determined, eager musician.
Thus after reading Chapter 3, I have been able to better analyze why my initial perception of her was so incorrect and how I can improve my future perceptions of others to be more accurate. I especially really liked the textbook's discussion on "checking your perceptions," because in reflecting on my experience with Tanya, I realize I unconsciously did check my initial perception of her. By seeing her every day in class and being slowly exposed to other aspects of her, especially her ability to really commit to her goal of learning the violin, I was able to check my initial negative perception of her and realize she was a lot more than what I had originally perceived her to be!
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