I was late to the Vigil of the Transfiguration, but I finally heard it

As I was stumbling through the stichera, one of the older ladies handed an open book to me. It was the Festal Menaion. ‘Do you want to do the readings?’ she whispered in my ear. ‘There are three of them. You do one, Father will say something, and then you do the next one, and so on.’ As I agreed, we finished the Stichera, moved on to the Tranquil Light, sang that better, and then the priest intoned, Wisdom. Let us be attentive. I stepped out to do my reading, and he went, The prokeimen in the fourth tone. Let me say for the record that the prokeimen – the ‘before-wisdom’ verses that are sung before any readings occur – is actually my favourite part of the service; I am actually known to watch St Elias Brampton videos obsessively just to listen to how they do their prokeimen not only in good four-part harmony, but also with a bit of attitude (often it feels like the bass parts drive the whole thing forward, which makes for a pretty cool effect). But in my distraction, I forgot that the readings are preceded by a prokeimen, which was a bummer because I really like the prokeimen in Tone 4 but didn’t have the words on me. And then the priest intoned: Wisdom! ‘A reading from the Book of Exodus,’ I replied. Let us be attentive.