“Skye, go practice harp!” my mother exclaimed from across the house. “You have a competition in less than a month.” I did as she said. I went to my block of wood, pulled out the bench, and sat down. I adjusted the squeaky chair to my comfort and started playing some simple warm-ups.

I started with some arpeggios, and then some scales, and then some chords. After about two minutes, I was as warm as I thought I needed to be, so I started playing my competition piece. About two measures in, I had already made a mistake. No worries though. That will magically get better by performance time, I thought. Because I knew there was no possibility of me making that mistake 17 times in a row, I moved past it. Less than four measures later, I made another mistake. I moved past it applying the same logic.

After I finished playing the five-minute piece over the course of eight minutes, I thought, That’s good enough for today. Besides, I already practiced yesterday. I went back to whatever I was doing after my 10-minute harp practice thinking I had plenty of time to fix the mistakes in my piece. This routine continued for the rest of the week: two minutes of warm-ups and a run-through of my piece.

The weekend came along, and we were watching someone’s dog. My father noticed how much my mom and I fell in love with it, even though it wasn’t ours. So I begged Dad to get a dog. I didn’t expect him to say yes. Every other time I had asked him for a dog, he had said no. But his response this time took me by surprise.

In a joking manner, he replied, “If you get first in the harp contest, I’ll get you a dog.” I didn’t think he was serious, but as we kept talking about it, it started to sound less like a joke. First place meant a decent amount of money to buy one. Could I actually have a dog? I wondered. After a few minutes, I realized my dad was actually serious. If I won the harp competition, I would get a dog!

Knowing how much was at stake now, I practiced harp the next day. I did my quick warm-up and ran through the piece. This time I actually listened to myself. My excitement for a possible new dog withered away when I realized I sounded atrocious and the competition was 2 1/2 weeks away. There was no way I would win sounding like a garbage disposal of clashing frequencies. But I wasn’t going to let this stop me. I decided I was going to work as hard as I could to get this dog.

I went back to my warm-ups. I played some arpeggios, scales, chords, rolled chords, trills, inverted fingerings, polyrhythms. I spent about 15 to 20 minutes alone working on the basic, boring, technical side of harp.

Afterward, I started playing my piece. I got two measures in and made the same mistake I always made. But instead of moving on, I stopped and worked on that measure. I slowed it down and made sure I used the proper fingerings. After drilling the correct notes into my fingers, I moved on. When I made a mistake, I stopped and worked on it the same way as the first one. After about 40 minutes, I made it to the end of the piece.

I turned on the metronome to full speed and learned how many hesitations I had. I wanted to give up. There was no way I would get a dog. It had been a little over an hour by this point, and I was exhausted. I wasn’t making any more progress on my piece, so I called it a day.

The next week came, and it was starting to sound less like a garbage disposal of clashing frequencies and more like an actual piece of music. I was beginning to think it was possible to get a dog. I knew I had to continue to work exceptionally hard.

By the weekend of the competition, I wasn’t as ready as I wanted to be. My piece still wasn’t quite up to full speed, and there were a few mistakes here and there. But ready or not, competition day arrived.

I signed in and brought my harp into the performance room. When my name was called, I went to the stage, bowed, sat on my freshly tightened chair, and started playing. I made it through my performance, and the judges dismissed me. I wasn’t too happy about it. I knew about this competition months in advance, but I kept procrastinating. I never truly practiced it until two weeks prior. Even though I worked harder than I ever had, because I had procrastinated, I didn’t do as well as I could have.

Finally, it was time to announce the winners of the competition. They called out the two honorable mentions, but I was not among them. Third place also went to someone else. Then, they announced second, “In second place, we have Skye Malone.” I was shocked. When called up, I took my certificate with a large smile. My family and I packed up the harp, got in the car and drove home. Even though I was happy with second place, I was a little sad because I wouldn’t be getting a dog. I had to get first place in order to get my grand puppy prize.

On the way home, my parents gave me some shocking news. They told me about a dog they had found: a toy Aussie-doodle. They said we would go pick it up next weekend. I was confused. I hadn’t won first place. Why were they still planning on getting this dog? My parents told me that getting first place wasn’t actually in my control, but working for it was. They were proud of the improvement I had made by implementing good practice habits.

I was beyond excited and thankful. We got home and started picking out names for the dog. The next weekend came, and we picked up our newest family member.

The car ride home was full of puppy snuggles and wide smiles from the family.

Not only did I learn how to practice harp properly, I also learned we reap what we sow. The Bible tells us this in Galations 6:7.

When I didn’t put in proper practice, my piece was full of errors and blunders. When I practiced the way my parents had taught me, it improved. If I hadn’t procrastinated and had put in the hard work sooner, I may have won first. But instead, after finally putting in the work, I still received a cash prize, which helped finance this greatest prize of all: a new puppy!