Our heroes can come in mighty - but small - packages

If I should make it to my 99th birthday anniversary alert in mind and able to move about, I will know there is, indeed, a benevolent God.

And I hope I can celebrate such an event with something approaching the grace, charm and dignity of my friend, Avis Muench.

Avis turned 99 on Monday of this week. Her birthday is one day before mine, but I've a ways to go before I reach 99.

Birthdays at our house are pretty quiet affairs. But for her 99th, former students of hers at high schools in Charleston and Sikeston threw a party Sunday afternoon at Christ Episcopal Church here in Cape Girardeau, where Avis is ever so faithful.

And what a party it was.

You see, Avis -- or Miz Muench, as she is universally known by her former students -- taught vocal music. She trained students whose bodies were still taking shape and maturing to breathe properly, enunciate properly, project properly.

Or else you might get a punch in the gut.

Think about that. Miz Muench is a wisp of a woman with soft white hair and a gorgeous smile. To look at her you might think she was afraid to swat a fly. Don't be fooled. That tiny woman is made of steel. That's what her former students all said. There were no rewards for laziness.

Those students gathered around the organ in the church after refreshments of cake and punch. They are a wonderfully talented musical bunch. Some of them are just as talented on musical instruments as they are at singing. So, in honor of Miz Muench's 99th, they did what she had taught them to do: make music.

Oh, my. How beautiful it was. They sang together. They sang solos. They sang duets. They sang and sang and sang.

And they told Miz Muench how much she had meant to them, how she had changed their lives, how she had spotted talent long before they themselves knew they could sing.

I don't know how they did it, but the former students got through most of this without shedding a tear. Those of us onlookers in the church were wiping away tears of joy -- happiness that these former students were willing to get together on a Sunday afternoon, and happiness that Miz Muench could share her smiles with all of them.

All of us can recall someone – maybe many someones – who had a life-changing impact on our lives. I would put Ethel Handford, a piano teacher in my favorite hometown over yonder in the Ozarks, in that category. (Yes, hillbillies take piano lessons, too.)

Avis reminds me a lot of Miz Handford, who possessed in her living room the only grand piano in town that I knew of. Miz Handford had the same petite stature as Avis. Miz Handford dreamed of a trip to Russia. Her son, a travel agent in Chicago, had told her that if she saved a quart milk bottle full of dimes she would have enough money to tour Moscow. So all of her students paid five dimes a week for lessons.

Miz Handford showed her students that setting goals, even one involving the Soviet Union in the 1950s, was how you could achieve anything. She told me -- and many of her other students -- that we could one day perform at Carnegie Hall if we put our mind to it. Of course, some of us didn't know exactly where this hall was. It didn't seem to be in our neck of the woods.

It was quite clear that Miz Muench's former students were fully aware of the impact she had had on them. How fortunate they are to have had her -- and so many others in their lives

The way her former students talk about her reminds me of the way Joe English's former students remember him. He taught vocal music and band at my high school. The spring concert was a big, big deal. Every girl in the chorus wore a pastel formal. All the boys were expected to wear suits, white shirts and neckties. For many of the young men, this would be a first.

I remember the week before the concert always included one rehearsal period devoted to picking out ties from a large selection provided by Mr. English. From his closet? Who knows. And then came the hard part: learning to tie an acceptable knot.

Yes, we learned all the words to "Redwing." But we learned so much more. We learned how to look our best if the occasion demanded it. What a great-looking bunch we were each year, filling the stage in the old blue-granite gymnasium packed with proud family members who always gave us a standing ovation -- during "The Star Spangled Banner" -- at the concert's conclusion.

Teachers today are touching young lives in ways they won't know until, perhaps, they have white hair of their own. Good for them. Maybe one day those former students will remember a special teacher with a thank-you note. Or maybe they'll show up at for a 99th birthday party and sing a tune or two.

Happy birthday, Avis.

Joe Sullivan is the retired editor of the Southeast Missourian.