A Preview From Walking in Grace 2026

Ours was not a musical family. Dad had a guitar he never played. We kids plucked at the strings, but none of us thought to learn to play it ourselves. As part of a music program in school, I took up the recorder. The hope was to graduate to clarinet and join the band. I liked the recorder and practiced regularly. But my family could not afford a clarinet, and I stopped.

- —AMY EDDINGS

Social media algorithms must have sensed this forgotten pleasure. A video ad for guitar classes popped up in my feeds frequently. “Many adults wish they knew how to play an instrument,” the teacher said.