goin' home

In the New Yorker a few weeks ago, the music of Dvorak was analyzed and I read it mainly because his "New World Symphony" was one of my favorites to play in high school. There's a clarinet solo in it as the prelude to the section "goin' home" that is soulful and, I thought, based on a Negro spiritual. But, the article, contends that this may not be the case; that a Slovakian folk song may be the basis for the melancholy melody. It doesn't matter because I love it anyway and the memory of it recalls the joy I felt in orchestra and band sessions--the music, the learning, and the unique social encounters I experienced with my fellow and sister musicians. It was the rare place in high school where the grades mixed, and how you were placed depended solely on your ability at the time. I witnessed batons being thrown at dozing percussion players, cajoling and smiles used as soft butter to get a nervous soloist (often, me) to relax and let the music flow out of the reed.

Another tidbit in the article: I didn't know that a recent rapper, Ludicris, has used the symphony as background for one of his riffs, but it just goes to show that another generation of musicians can recognize and adapt beauty for contemporary appreciation.

So what is the message of today's blog? About music and memory, I guess. But the phrase of the title evokes death and maybe that's on my mind, too. I had a vivid dream about my mom the night before last and, yesterday, I saw a scene on a soap opera of an elderly woman in the hospital and the actress accurately captured the way the body sags when life's juices have left before the heart stops. I remember how my mom's purple patched arms would just hang at her sides. Until the last two weeks of her life, she still cared about how her hair was combed, and then, at the end, she just didn't anymore. Surprisingly, in her death path she took on the visage of my grandfather--shock of white hair standing on end, jaw angular and sharp. Her hands were not his hands which were large and knobby. His were perfect farmer hands. Her hands were petite and thin-nailed and perfect for the cash register at Ben Franklin's and for sorting out bobbins and threads in the fabric department.

The first year anniversary of her death is coming up in August and I don't know what, if anything, I want to do to mark it. I am the only person in the family that has, with Mark, been at her graveside. It's an ugly piece of rock set amidst a desert crematorium, the land all around covered by desert rocks (it cuts down on water use, I give you that). I did put a ceramic bird on it and a rock from their Green Valley house that I painted with my, Mark's and Aron's name, but someone removed it last time I was there and that pissed me off, so I haven't been back.

As I relearn how to walk, I begin to imagine where I will go, how I will get there, what I will do differently, what I will do the same. I still have a 91 year old dad to pay attention to and I know what's ahead, just not how and when. That's true for all of us and as life's impermanence taps at my office window, I see one of my summer plants has died and needs to be replaced. Not as easily done with people--especially a parent. One dies and another remains but falters. As I wait for Mark's travel return, I recall how it has felt to be alone. One of us will precede the other and I don't want to dwell on that reality--just ponder it so that I will appreciate today: my morning swim, time with a friend, cool afternoon siesta, sweet swallows of the pulp from red cherries. And music playing softly, in the background.