Two in Travel

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I have spent much of the past two days driving on super narrow, twisting mountain roads, and at the moment I am exhausted. And even though I’ve learned some tricks to keeping the car properly centered and to remain calm when enormous trucks and vans pass within inches of me – going the other direction – it is still a feat of concentration the likes of which I haven’t known in ages. Within only a few precious feet of the road’s edge there is usually a drop off that would mean certain death if I succumbed to a moment of panic or misjudgment, so naturally I am highly motivated to be prudent and safe. But it’s taxing. It feels rather like playing a relentless video game. The scenery is beyond description, and our jaws drop around every bend with the unbelievably idyllic scenery, and it helps to motivate me onward. For a place that neither one of us was truly excited to visit (mostly we felt it was a doable adventure for the two of us before he went off into the world on his own), every moment that we are here we are convinced that we needed to come here. It is changing our lives to be sure.

Last night was a beautiful and insightful experience for us both. I played my original songs in a tiny and love-filled room where every face was looking at me, every person engaged and listening to my songs as no one has ever listened before. They clapped with enthusiasm, and afterward many thanked me and told me how my songs had reached their hearts. To be honest, given the nature of my material and how directly it addresses mid-life and end-of-life issues, I’m always a bit surprised that more people don’t seem to resonate with my songs as strongly as these folks did. But I’m beginning to think it’s a cultural thing. There was a human and intimate aspect to the crowd last night which I just don’t sense from audiences I’ve played for in the US. I might have thought it was just me, but Elihu also felt a different energy there. Usually I resent playing cover tunes and often find myself angry that I am paid to play while hardly a person even seems engaged or interested, but last night I obliged some late night requests with a few Carole King and Carly Simon songs and everyone in the room sang along. I’m a bit jaded and snarky when it comes to playing covers – but it brought the room so much joy that it transformed my thinking about the value and purpose of music. Even my son – a classical composer who has little patience for pop music in general – he was singing along, swaying in a sort of rapture, smiling, eyes closed, leaning deeply into the moment. It was a night of connection the likes of which I have never known in my home country. Eye-opening for sure.

We have met people from so many different countries, and my polyglot kid is in overdrive mimicking accents and trying out short conversations in other languages (his Scottish accent is brilliant, imho). The woman who served us dinner tonight was from Peru, lived years in Argentina, had a home in Greece and longed one day to go to Japan. She and Elihu spoke in French, Spanish and Greek, and we three enjoyed a lovely exchange which ended in hugs and goodbyes as if we were long lost friends. It seems everywhere we go we share stories with people and part feeling very satisfied that we have connected with another human in a beautiful way. I could really never know a better travel partner than my son. He’s easy-going and up for unplanned stops. He doesn’t mind when his chatty mother asks the clerk where she’s from and how she came to this job. Unassuming at first, he’ll join in, and before long the three of us will be laughing together, feeling that unique type of camaraderie which strangers sometimes enjoy in brief encounters. The novelty of being passersby opens the conversation, and a sense of connection almost always comes of it, and what a beautiful thing that is.

[Forgive me please, but the font size is about to change and I’m far too tired to jockey between phone and iPad to get it sorted.]

Elihu is wiped out and is upstairs sleeping. Although I myself have every reason to be asleep myself, I am in the lobby listening to a thirty-something group of US and Scottish tourists become acquainted and compare notes about their cultures and their travels. I’m fascinated with the people who choose to travel. It takes a certain courage to set out into new places – even with all the advantages of cell phones and the internet (btw, screw Verizon’s electronic SIM card – we’ve been without cell service the past two days and it is beyond frustrating – it’s potentially dangerous. Even after a good two hours on hold and working with an agent there has been no resolution. I will raise a bit of hell when I am home and have the time to properly deal with it.) Modern woes aside, there is still no better way to learn about yourself and others than to travel, and I am immensely grateful for this trip and all that I’ve learned thus far.

Into Inverness

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This was a long day, but a very successful one. In the past 24 hours I can recount the blooming apple tree outside my door in Greenfield, eating grilled lamb from a food truck with the Empire State Building in view, picking a flower off of a hedge in Paris, taking in a stunning view of London and emerging from a plane on the tarmac at the tiny Inverness Airport here in Scotland, greeted by the scent of salt air and springtime blooms.

I hadn’t quite budgeted for the great expense this trip will be, and I have a slight sense of panic in my heart when I imagine the two and a half weeks ahead. It’s not cheap to travel, much less to the United Kingdom. The exchange rate is awful and life these days is simply not cheap. But this is a long-awaited adventure for Elihu and me, and we will make it happen however that may be. If it’s ramen noodles every night (it is on this first night!), then that’s the reality. We’ll have our haggis and scotch, but maybe just not as often as I might’ve hoped.

But truly, things went so smoothly in our first day of travels that I can hardly believe it, and it gives me hope that things will turn out well on this trip. People everywhere were kind and helpful. There is nothing that can foster love in one’s heart for other fellow humans in the way that travel can. Right out of the small airport we ran into a German couple with whom we shared a taxi. They spoke limited English, so Elihu got into the backseat with them and had a nice conversation in German while I sat up front with the Pakistani driver comparing the local drivers to the ones back home. We shared some laughs as we each recounted an anecdote from the famous Murree mountain road.

The driver gave me some pointers for driving on the right side – and for a moment or two it seemed fairly straightforward. But then a few times I was too scared to look ahead and so cast my eyes into my lap. As I write this It is after midnight and I am dreading the morning that follows, as we must find a bus back to the airport and then I will get behind the wheel of a car which I’ll be driving for hundreds of kilometers. It’s a challenge, and I don’t know how I’ll meet it, but I will.

We are staying at a sweet but very no-frills Airbnb, and Elihu is downstairs in the common area on a zoom call tutoring a student in Mandarin. This woman has also employed him to help her with her Cantonese – a language that until a few weeks ago Elihu did not know. But he’s been working diligently the past week working on vocab and accent, staying a lesson ahead of his student. Talk about a challenge! That kid is bold. And I know he will be successful. I’ll take my inspiration from him.

There’s simply too much to impart here, as I sit with my legs folded under me and my neck cramping to see the small monitor. My head is swimming with images and memories of the people I’ve seen, the kindnesses given to us by so very many people who assisted us in our time of need. I am so humbled by the care we received from complete strangers. I am amazed at the variety of people in this world. Even here at the local Tesco we met a man from Nigeria and a woman from Poland with whom we shared some nice moments.

I love my hometown, and I am comfortable there to be sure. But sometimes in life we need to get out and see how different we are to remember how much we have in common, no matter where it is that we live.

The Calm Before

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Tomorrow, Elihu and I are traveling to Scotland. We have been preparing for months. Yet even so, on this, the final morning before we embark, I sit, unable to focus, surrounded by the unpacked contents of my tiny under seat bag. This trip will be a challenge for me in many ways, the first being how to choose what goes in the carry-on.

My intention with this post was simply to document a sample of the ‘before trip’ me; to create a record of how I was feeling at the outset. I know the phenomenon of the idealistic thinking that comes before the much grittier, much less sexy reality that follows. In spite of – or perhaps because of – all that I’ve read, learned and watched about the place, I have the small country fixed in a certain way in my thinking. Sure, I know it’s not all stunning mountainscapes and ancient castles – but right now, that’s the backdrop that prevails. However, being the realist that I am, there is a nagging sense of dread hanging about me in anticipation of all the unforeseen mishaps that inevitably await us.

Back in March, when Elihu and I were about to hit the return button and buy our flights, he hesitated for a moment, and we looked at each other. “What could go wrong?” He said aloud, a smile growing on his face… A beat passed, and together we both said “Everything!” And we laughed as he tapped the key.

It’s the “everything” that’s got me a bit queasy this morning. It’s a gray spring day, the house is quiet, essentially back to normal; two tubas have returned to the living room, the birds come and go on the feeder and aside from this mountain of crap at my feet, things feel pretty normal. But I know what’s coming. I fairly dread the first leg – two layovers, one long – too long (easy to fall asleep and lose track of time), and one too short – we’ll have to get through the chaos of Heathrow and make our last flight with no time to spare. It’s that shit which stands in the way of our adventure. I think my dread is reasonable. But my world-traveling son is measured and calm and practical. He’s what makes this possible.

(Also, let’s be real: Elihu booked the cheapest flights possible from perspective of a man in his early twenties. If I’d had the cojones to stand up to him – and the financial means, too – I would’ve done what any adult of my age group would’ve done and booked a direct fucking flight. Maybe even business class. Hell, I’ll be paying for this trip decades hence, what’s anther $2K down the travel toilet? But no, I raised a fiercely frugal son. He dismissed all of this direct flight nonsense out of hand. Ugh. At times it has me angry. I have only so much energy – and extra expenditures of effort add up. Passing on bunks and hostel-like digs, I layed down my one single must-have: a private bath. That’s my one ‘luxury’ request. Thankfully, that request was met.)

I have the general concerns of airports and connections swimming about in my head, in addition to the prospect of having to drive on the wrong side of the road from the wrong side of the car. And I am fairly expecting the rental agency to say that they have no notes in the system that I required an automatic transmission. Believe me, I am expecting the unexpected. But what can I do but let it go? Tiny, tight roads and rotaries going the opposite direction give me a constant, low-level of background stress. My car better be an automatic. I just need to get through the travel bottleneck of the next four days and then I’m sure I will breathe easier.

The kid’s still sleeping. Last night he, grandma, Uncle Andrew and I went to dinner at the Wishing Well as we do each birthday season (Elihu turned 21, and I am now 61). He had the frogs’ legs, as he has every birthday dinner since he was 5. It was a pricey affair, but it was the only occasion at which all four Conants are present, so it’s an important landmark in our lives. The restaurant is old school – a moose head hangs over the fireplace, Rob is there playing piano to greet folks as they enter, and black and white photos of famous race horses, owners and jockeys adorn the wood paneled walls. It’s an iconic place. (Or as our German exchange student Leevi would say “It’s a vibe”. )

I’m going to the Y to racewalk and exercise a bit. Sometimes it’s the best thing I can do to calm my mind. This first to-do of the day is now done: 1) Write short blog post. The rest can wait.

Good bye from a quiet cottage in the country on a gray, spring day. I’ll report back later from the bottleneck.

Blogging from the Bar

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People are important. People are not important. They matter, and yet they don’t. As with everything else in this world, this is a situation of duality. Both ideas coexist at the same time. But truly, in the ultimate scheme of things, none of us individually really means a whole lot to the totality of our species. It may sound like a depressing thought, but the universe really doesn’t care. The caring part is up to us.

I spent an afternoon recently at the emergency room with my mother, watching – and sometimes even smelling – the folks who came, waited and then went. I saw a large young woman with a distant, disconnected look in her eyes – she appeared to be heavily medicated – and I watched as she was admitted into triage and then carefully walked back to her seat by a member of the ER staff. I smelled a homeless person before I saw her; the pungent scent reminded me of an old farmhouse, maybe a barnyard – and so my associations at first were pleasant – until a funk began to grow – the sweet smell of decay; the smell of a human unable to wash. (My mother’s words from just an hour earlier came to mind: “I took a whore’s bath” she had said when describing how she’d prepared herself to go out to the ER.) The stench quickly became too much for me, but I remained in my seat so as not to hurt her feelings by moving. I saw elderly folks, wearing masks as they waited. They arose from their seats in a feeble, cautionary manner. We all experience weakness and vulnerability, but it’s not a pleasant truth to face.

All of these plain, ordinary people had been in such a state of need, and yet the staff was so kind and tender when they received each one of these patients. I marveled over that. These were not beautiful people, they did not stand out as exceptional – in fact, had I seen any one of them on the street I might easily have passed them by without a second thought (or perhaps with a critical thought, if I’m being completely honest) and yet there in the emergency room they were all cared for and asked after with kindness and respect. It was very moving to watch.

I thought about the deaths of a few people just the day before, on a bridge in Baltimore that had collapsed. I remembered being surprised at the traction the story had had – and yet when I heard in first-person the stories of the families who had lost someone dear, it instantly became real. It’s so easy to disassociate from people because they’re removed from our own experience; do we really feel the pain of those who die in dire circumstances in far-away places on the globe? We may want to, but I don’t believe we truly can. Yet when it happens close to home, and right in front of our eyes, we begin to sympathize in a deeper way. The situation is made human, it becomes real. Of course all tragedy is real, but it doesn’t always feel to be. 

In the emergency room, there were numerous mini tragedies underway all the same moment. On the outside, these folks looked unassuming and unmemorable, and yet each was being treated like the precious human they truly were. It was heartwarming, it was reassuring. It was humbling.

I thought of Pompei in ancient times. The volcano erupting and swallowing thousands of people. When I was in high school, I saw a touring exhibit of plaster casts that had been made of actual inhabitants of the city during their final moments – in the poses they struck upon their deaths. Those frozen figures were both distant to me and yet very real all at the same time. When I hear of disasters on the news, I often flash back to the sight of those anguished individuals, and I realize we humans, no matter our place in history, cannot ever be protected from tragedy, pain and fear. And no matter how it befalls us, not a one of us is beyond the purview of death. At best, we can only hope for a peaceful transition.

Every human who has suffered or died was as real as you or me. Those who have experienced frightening demises may seem a world away, but their stories could easily be ours as well. This thought is never terribly far from my awareness. And that day, while waiting in the emergency room, it came close to home again.

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For some reason my mother and I had a heated argument as she prepared for the drive to the hospital. Since then, we’ve spoken a few times on the phone and, as it comes easy to us, we’ve compartmentalized very successfully and were able to fall back into the “I love yous” before too long, and then things became normal again. 

But goddamit, may I not be as distrustful and defensive as my mother when I enter my elder years! I have taken to using the phrase “It’s not a hardship” when speaking to my mother about a situation in which a decision must be made, because for my mother everything is a hardship. Yet saying this aloud seems to make no difference – it does not reach her. “We can take your rollator in the car or not”, I will say, “We can take Braim Road or Locust Grove – nothing makes a difference to me – but if it does to you – just say something!” But that’s not how my mother operates. Passive-aggressive asides said under her breath are commonly used as a vehicle of primary communication. Not speaking up for her needs is her MO. It’s simply how she’s lived her whole life. Much as I’d wish that common sense and my honest declarations might make a difference, they do not. She makes simple non-issues into topics of debate. I have told her numerous times that I am a sixty-year-old woman, I have run a successful business and raised a brilliant child – what makes her think that I can’t make basic choices as we make our way out the door and on to our destination? I have never received an answer to that query.

When driving my mother home (I have known that driveway for over fifty years) she will still point to the driveway lest I miss the turn. Good lord. Really? This is the level of distrust and control with which my mother lives – at least with relationship to me. It is endlessly frustrating. I do know that she believes me to be a control freak – and in light of the deep and fundamental distrust she feels for me and my choices, I can understand how it affects her responses to me. But still. Really??

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Days have now passed since my mother’s visit to the ER – one which ended up in an overnight stay and a surgery in which a stent was placed in her kidney – and she is back to her usual self. General anesthesia at her age always makes me a little concerned, but she and I appear to share a high tolerance for the stuff that knocks us out. There do not appear to be any lasting effects from the anesthesia. And that is good news.

This near-the-end chapter must feel a little strange for her, perhaps even a little scary, but it’s not something she reveals. I tried to investigate further the other night when we had dinner together, but she didn’t offer up any insights. (I had bought some lamb, string beans and potatoes for her, suggesting she make herself an Easter dinner. In that her prime creative expression in life has been that of being an exceptional cook, I was happy when she offered to make dinner for the two of us. And it was so delicious. When I arrived at her house and she was in the midst of preparing everything – in spite of her steeply bent-over spine and arthritic hands – I realized how lucky I was that my mother, at 89, was still making home-cooked meals like this. In spite of how crazy we make each other, when she finally does leave us, I will miss this time.)

Even though I am glad to have her here with us – and to still know the sense of home and permanence her presence provides – there is a part of me which almost wishes that the Band-Aid be ripped off already. I wrote a song called “House of Cards” in which I ponder this strange place of worry and not-knowing. Will things become dire? Will my mother fall, will she experience an event that changes everything in an instant? Will the entire remaining estate go to pay for her care until she dies? Will she die in a place other than her home? My one main goal is to ensure she does in fact die at home, but one can never truly be guaranteed of that outcome. I also worry about her being bored; her life is very small, very repetitive. It seems her whole day is simply about getting dressed, eating and then going to bed. In between she feeds and watches the deer outside her windows, and she enjoys a drink in the evening while watching the umpteenth episode of MASH or All in the Family. Can this be enough? It would likely drive me insane. But perhaps as one enters the truly aged years the need for stimulation and new experiences wanes. I can’t imagine being in a place like that, but then again, just ten years ago I couldn’t have imagined that my own body would age as it has, or that I would find myself wanting go home and be in bed by eleven.

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I began writing this at a local Irish pub as a means to learn how to use my new Bluetooth keyboard and iPad setup. I began writing with loud music playing, a beer at hand. It’s also where I’m concluding this piece. At a bar, with the energy of people all around, again with a beer at hand. I can’t imagine a life without this experience, and yet I’m fully aware that it’s made possible by relative youth, health and vigor, and a certain place of privilege in which I exist.

But no matter the level of privilege into which we are born, the primal losses unite us all. May I find it in me to navigate the coming unknown waters with compassion and patience. And even as the contours of my life change in those impending and profound ways, I intend to savor every moment of these earthly pleasures, knowing deep in my heart that it will not always be thus.

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Post Script: My song “House of Cards” explores the worry of not knowing how life will play out. “Depression Era Girl” is a song about my mother; writing it helped me to organize the sorts of idiosyncrasies I mention in the post.

Before too long I will have an EP on all the platforms so that you may finally hear what I’ve been doing for the past year. I love songwriting, but it sure feels good to write for this format again and I hope not to let four months pass before posting my next piece. I deeply appreciate your still being here!

Xmas in NYC

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This, I suppose, may be counted as a true diary entry…

Yesterday I returned from a brief two-day trip to New York City with my son. For me, it was absolute perfection.

Elihu and I had made no plans ahead of time, save to visit with our friends. That in itself was the real reason for our excursion; the four of us enjoyed two wonderful dinners followed by long, unrushed and deeply engaging conversation. I awoke in the middle of the first night to the sounds of the street ten stories below and enjoyed a dreamlike and reflective moment of being there again, in a place so different, yet a place where I felt so at home. It restored my spirit for me to be again with our friends, for me to be again with my son.

When Elihu and I arrived in Manhattan mid afternoon on the first day (I’d met him at his dorm in the morning and we’d taken the train south to the city), we walked through densely populated sidewalks to visit two brass stores near the station. The first place was cold and stiff. Elihu was able to try out instruments, but under careful watch, and he was closely timed. When we inquired about the ‘other’ brass shop in the neighborhood, the manager flat-out lied to us, saying it had gone out of business. We decided to walk the few blocks anyway, taking our chances. The shop was still there. It was a true mom and pop store in the midst of the city. It was funky and full of amazing instruments – and lots of soul. A shop cat slept in the chair, and the proprietor himself was at the bench doing repairs. Elihu tried out pocket trumpets, mellophones and tubas at his leisure. We left having made a new friend in the owner.

On our second and only complete day in the city, my son and I walked through a few neighborhoods in the vicinity of Little Italy, afterward going uptown to visit the iconic Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center. In Chinatown we stopped several times in search of some hot tea and an opportunity for Elihu to speak Mandarin, but as it turns out, most of the population there speaks only Cantonese. Not the same at all, and so we didn’t have the ‘in’ we’d thought we would at the local places.

Nearby Katz’s seemed a natural choice for lunch, but we were quite surprised to see a block-long line (in keeping with the ‘Disney-esque’ and touristy character of this current NYC), so we passed in favor of a Middle Eastern place across the street where Elihu surprised me with his ability to chat rather easily in Turkish with folks at a neighboring table. (His ear for languages and his ability to jump in and try them out is truly impressive.)

The two of us enjoyed that sort of ‘knowing’ that only good friends share; we exchanged smiles at many snippets of overheard conversations. Passing Rockefeller Center, we burst out laughing when we heard a guy with a thick New York accent remark as if completely surprised, “That’s a friggin’ big tree!” We heard Tony Pots n Pans playing the grooviest stuff ever on his junk drums and a street guy enthusiastically calling out “Feliz Navidad” in well-timed intervals while a trio of hot young women danced… We witnessed so many beautiful moments the likes of which can’t really happen in any other place. Our brief visit was a delight.

On the second morning I took my final look at the loft I’d known for so many years, and I said my goodbye to our friends and then to Elihu. On the street, I took a last photo of the building, blew a kiss, then headed to the subway uptown. At Port Authority I got on a Greyhound bus. The window seat was comfy, the day was gray.  Elihu and I exchanged some texts, and I learned that he was on his plane at Newark, and they were about to taxi. Soon he would be at his father’s home in the Midwest.

I read a book, checking the map every so often to see our progress. I marveled over the stone walls running up and down hills through the woods we passed, I craned my neck to catch a glimpse of the Catskills to the west. In just a few hours the bus arrived in Albany, where I forgot all about my Lyft app and accepted the offer of a hustling cabbie for a ride back to my car at the train station across the Hudson River. As I got onto the Northway it began to snow, and when I arrived at the Hillhouse, a dusting of white covered the ground.

A few hours later mom and I went to dinner at a friend’s gorgeous historic home deep in the Greenfield woods. A fire burned in dining room’s hearth and the long table was beautifully decorated with an elegant red and white table runner, red glass plates and antique crystal stemware. Candles flickered in the windows. We arrived shortly after the guests were all seated, so it was a surprise when the hostess received us with a champagne toast of greeting, all of the glasses raised to us. I sat at the table, looking at all these folks from my small town whom I’ve known for many years now, and I marveled at my amazing fortune. From city to country in one day – from one loving reception to another. Amazing, really. For a woman who often laments her plight in life, I can’t argue that my life is a good one.

On this Christmas Day, I know very well how lucky I am. I don’t always feel as if I am – but I always know that I am. I saw a lot of poverty in New York City. I saw homeless people sleeping in awful places, I saw unwell people in dire circumstances. For every moment of joy I experienced, I witnessed another person’s tragedy. And I cannot begin to make sense of it. There is no sense to be made. This is an unfair and unjust world. And I don’t think it will ever change. But what I do think is that we can kind and helpful to other humans. That is the only certain way in which we can improve things. Help as we’re able, encourage as we’re able.

Although I don’t personally hold any religious beliefs about this holiday, what I do believe is that this is a time when people’s hope for a better life supersedes all else. When all people – housed and unhoused, well and infirmed – choose to feel a sense of hope and possibility.

Merry Christmas to all, and may hope continue to live in your heart.

PS: It was 37 years ago today that I went on my first date with Elihu’s father. Who could ever have guessed how that one night would change my whole life? I am sometimes sorrowful things didn’t go as expected, but mostly I am grateful. What a strange world this is indeed.

Gedenken

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I’m fairly sure the Germans have a word for it. They are good at unapologetically mashing together a bunch of words, thereby making a whole new word which more perfectly describes some phenomenon. At the window just now, looking out down the hill and over the tops of the trees, a feeling washed over me. I lingered in it, trying to feel it as deeply as I could. Trying to understand it as best I could.

I was kneeling on the floor by the Christmas tree, looking out of the picture window in the living room. The sun was bright, and it highlighted the cobwebs and the dirt on the window frame. The grass outside was resting in matted clumps; I haven’t had the money to cut the lawn in years. These days the property reeks of neglect. The decaying wooden window frame and the cracked pane of glass itself, held together only by a sheet of tinted cling film confirm that too. On the sill there rests an antique glass bottle with a garden of moss and tiny ferns inside. Years ago, Elihu and I came upon it on a winter walk in the woods. It is as captivating and mysterious now as it was when we found it. It’s been there for ten years, a tiny universe within a jar, continuing somehow to live. Getting dustier and dustier.

As I sat there, I was caught up in this feeling of acute sadness mixed with a sense of expansiveness. It’s hard to convey. One moment without end. Loneliness and dust and sunshine and silence. But I recognized this feeling; I’ve had it in lots of places. What is it about? It’s not quite sorrow, it’s not entirely unpleasant, but it hurts just a bit to feel. It’s a certain sort of aching. It feels as if I’m missing things – and it feels as if I’m also resigning myself to that missing. 

My house – at least the living room – is a very cozy place, especially so at this time of year, with the tree and candlelight and lovely decorations, and it has an effect on everyone who visits. When they enter the big room, people sometimes sigh or pause for a moment. Some even open their mouths. The living room here is a beautiful country sanctuary at Christmastime. And for the most part it does the job; it helps me to forget how lonely my life is, it helps me to forget that my best days are now most likely in the past, it helps me to forget that one of the major remaining events in my life will be my mother’s death. For a few weeks of the year, it is a very pretty distraction. And while I’m grateful for this space, sometimes it makes the contrast between the now and the never-to-be even harsher. I’m missing something, I just know it. But I just don’t know what that is.

For me, writing helps soothe the aching. It helps me to believe that all this longing-for-what-I-don’t-know isn’t for naught. You know, the old writer’s idea that every experience, no matter how crappy, is worth it simply for the sake of the story. So. Here’s the story – only it has no ending.

Even when I box up all those family treasures in a few weeks, turning the corner into red and white Valentine’s Day decorations, the ache won’t dull. In fact, it will become more acute as I wrap the ornaments and strip the mantle of the pine boughs. There will come again that one afternoon of the heavy heart. There will be the empty room, and that annual moment of reflection. It happened again, and it has gone again. I’ll stand there, hands on my hips, taking in the room now vacant of decorations, with pine needles and ornament hooks scattered across the floor, the only apparent color being the brown of the couch.

I wonder at all my fellow western-world humans who, like me, haul out the decorations each year, install them and then pack them away. They too must have those moments of rumination – coming upon old family trinkets and remembering again the stories that go with them – they too, like me, must feel a sad sort of “what now?” feeling in their stomachs when faced with an empty room afterward. It’s not just me, I know it. Anything I can possibly think or feel is certainly not novel or new.

As my son grew up, he spent all of his Christmases, save one, with his father. Alone in the house on those Christmas mornings, I’d look out the big window at the hills in the distance and wonder at the scenes going on at that very moment. Exhausted parents, shrieking and delighted children, living rooms covered in a sea of spent wrapping paper. I remembered how it was when I was young. And it was all going on right at that moment – somewhere out there. On the one year that I did have Elihu with me, it was so cold and lonely (literally, we were low on heating oil) that he actually cried. On Christmas.

The sun is now on the other side of the house, and it helps tone down the ache. Not sure why. Maybe it feels closer to evening – helped by daylight savings time – and that makes me feel like I’m closer to the nightly respite of sleep. Only that’s not really true. I have mixes to listen to and corresponding notes to make. I have original songs I need to revisit and relearn. I have a few shows to book and folks to call. There’s a slow leak in my tub drain and the basement sump pumps are in constant use, so I have to find a plumber. And I will make myself get to the gym. I’ve been good about that recently, no sense losing my momentum. No students today; I’ve been given the gift of time, and I’m going to use it well.

Day after tomorrow, Elihu and I are taking the train to Manhattan. We’re going to stay for two days with some dear friends for a final time in their Soho residence. They are retiring soon and moving to far-off Utah. This brings to a close a thirty-plus year history of visits. Ages ago, when I was a touring musician and performing in the city, I’d sleep on their floor. We remained friends, and long after the bands were over and after I’d begun the single mom chapter, my son and I continued to visit. After Elihu returned from a trip to Europe a few summers ago, he found his way to their home first, before heading back up north. There will be no more landing pad in NYC now, but that’s a minor loss compared to the fact that I can’t be sure when we’ll see our old friends again. I am going to savor this final visit. By Christmas, just five days hence, Elihu will be in the Midwest with his father, and I’ll be back here, alone in my cottage in the woods.

Before I know it, this eagerly anticipated visit will become just another memory. It’s enough to inspire a wistful sigh. I suffer a tiny heartbreak at the thought. But that’s the way it works here on this mortal plane. Expectancy, experience, memory.

The passage of time – or rather the unceasing forward movement of it – can be a blessing or a curse. If one is in a bleak situation – in jail, in a hospital bed, in a nursing home – passing time is itself a challenge. When I broke my neck as a young adult, I spent two months in a bed, unable to move. The wait was grueling. The boredom was maddening. Time positively dragged. These days, while I’m not entirely thrilled about being here, I do realize I’m in a unique and valuable spot. I am filling the space with songwriting and performing, which is good. At the moment, there’s no end in sight to the material; there’s always something waiting to be created. And if I apply a small bit of discipline, it means that I not only have something to show for my time, but it also passes more quickly – in fact I reside in a timeless place when I’m creating. I like that.

The feeling that inspired this writing has dulled now, and now the urgency of my to-do list has begun to tug at me. The out-of-time thing has once again taken place during this writing session, and now I see that it’s later than I’d realized. Or later than I hadn’t realized.

My takeaway from this on-paper rumination is simply that which all of us know, but seldom consider too deeply. Most of our lives are simply made up of memories. And with every forthcoming moment we have the opportunity to make another one. Memories are the only things during our lifetimes – be they accurate or self-tailored to suit our needs – that remain.

So, it’s time now for me to loosen my chair-stiffened joints and get going. There’s much yet to remember ahead.

Ambiverse

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Yesterday, my 88-year-old mother and a friend drove north into the Adirondacks. Essentially, it was a leaf-peeping trip, but along the way they visited the lakeside house where my father’s family had summered from the nineteen-aughts through the sixties. It was the house where I was conceived in August of 1962.

About a decade ago, I took mom and Elihu up to the Severance home. No one was in the main house, so I searched the grounds for the owners and found them having a large family gathering in a screened outbuilding. The owner happily gave us a relaxed tour of the house. He enjoyed the stories that mom recounted from more than a half-century ago. I enjoyed seeing the rooms and matching them up with my father’s stories. I spent a moment at the top of the stairs, imagining that young boy, long past his bedtime, sitting there listening to the eruptions of grownups’ laughter as they sat downstairs playing pinochle. But my biggest curiosity was to see the room. Easy enough, it was at the top of the stairs. A cozy bedroom under the gable that looked out and over that grand, descending lawn and the lake beyond.

When my mother and son and I stood in the room together, I felt the closure and completion I’d been after. My existence had begun in that room, and, as a result, Elihu’s life had begun there, too.

My son’s life had also begun in a lakeside retreat, one with a similar view (Torno, Italy). Like this place, the site of Elihu’s conception was also high above the nearby water, and on the south side of the lake. If you were to examine a map of each location, they look incredibly similar. My son and I both began our lives lakeside, looking out to the mountains beyond. This is something I very much like to know. Somehow, it grounds me.

A massive new house now sits too close to the driveway, and a few small outbuildings appear to be missing. The house itself has been painted, it is no longer pale yellow, and the shutters are now blue. The immense tree in the turnaround of the driveway has been taken down. It seems there has always been a tree there; it does make perfect sense. But new money doesn’t always abide by those classic rules of balance and aesthetics. No matter, it’s under the care of someone with resources. That’s the key to a building’s survival. The place may be changed in many ways, but it still exists. The phantoms of the home as it once was still hug the new periwinkle shutters and bare front yard. My father still lives there as a five-year-old boy bringing barn kittens into the house. The Confederate General and his family still live there, slightly dazed at their new Northern environs, but finding enjoyment in the cool waters and pine-scented woods, nonetheless.

These days I feel I am living in an in-between time. Things are this – and at the same time they are also that. My son is in college, closer to graduation than high school, yet he is close by, and I am able to see him fairly regularly. My mother, although visibly aging into frailty, is still living her own life, driving to the Adirondacks, regularly reading The New Yorker and feeding her outdoor wildlife friends each day. I myself look young enough to fool people about my age but am old enough to feel the oncoming infirmities. This and that. Both, at the same time.

Sometimes I feel as if I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop. Or at least the next chapter to identify itself. Lest I sound as if I’m complaining, I wish to say that I am not. I am simply feeling a little off – a little out of my body, a little unsure as to what it is that I am. My roles have always been fairly tidily described. But now, these days? I’m kind of in a nether role. I’m not a caregiver anymore. Not for the kid, and as it stands right now, not yet for mom. I’m in a rare place, this I know. And so I’m filling the space. And filling it easily.

I’ve begun to write songs. And while it may seem a mere hobby – on paper it would satisfy that definition – it feels to be more than that. A tiny spark ignites inside my chest when I envision writing songs and performing them. And then, if I imagine a band behind me, it gets so exciting that I don’t dare explore it further. It would be too big a disappointment if I began to care too much about that particular outcome, never to see it happen. But then again, why the hell shouldn’t I dream? Is that not what leads to creation? Have I not played behind dozens of other people who themselves had the conviction of self to assemble a band in support of their own vision?

It appears to be time for me to step up. And I am in the process of doing so. Step by step I am beginning to ascend. Or, as a band leader once put it to me, I am, to use his words, beginning to “ramp up”.

About a year and a half ago I had a rapturous musical experience which was followed quickly by an excruciatingly difficult period. I lost almost half of my hair due to the stress that it caused. I stopped working out. I started eating and drinking way too much. Then I suffered a back injury. After six months of brutal despair, I knew only I could get myself to a better place. And so I began to work my way up in the only way I saw available to me. I began attending open mics in search of a new musical tribe.

The open mics were challenging to endure, especially in the beginning. Long slogs through dozens of bad musicians playing done-to-death songs on out-of-tune guitars. Yet I tenaciously continued to attend open mics everywhere – even in Chicago – fascinated by the hard and earnest work that so many people were putting into their performances, even if, at the end of the day, they were far from performance-ready. I also went to the open mics on the hunt for the gems – the sleepers, those magic songwriters who stop by to work out a new idea, or who are there to fill a night because they’re passing through town… (That’s a bit of a fairytale outcome I now realize – although at the Caffe Lena open mic I actually have heard and become acquainted with a few “real” artists.) On the whole, there were no sleepers. The “real” musicians and songwriters were out playing real shows.

Tiring though they may be, the open mics have been a very important step in my ascent. They give me an opportunity to test this new skill of songwriting. They provide me with a goal. They provide me with feedback and input. They have opened doors for me to do my first solo shows. They have been a necessary step on the staircase ahead of me. They are a great tool, to be sure.

The first song I wrote was born of sheer need. I was going mad. Bereft and alone, without son, prospects or piano students, I pulled my keyboard outside into the sunshine on a late summer day because I had nothing to lose and no reason not to. Moved by the dire situations of two dear friends, I began an aural contemplation on the whys of it all. And by the end of the day, I’d written my first song.

It feels a bit naïve to actually call myself a songwriter at this point in my evolution – I only have about 30 songs completed and ready to perform – but I feel as if it’s a really perfect tool of expression for all the interior stuff that’s going on in my head right now, and it tugs at me daily. And at this time in my life, when I am not distinctly in my middle-aged years nor yet in my truly aged years, it seems to be a sweet spot for this new adventure to take place. I can still carry and setup my gear, I’m able to offer enough interesting covers to fill some single jobs, and I can perform a few sets of well-written original songs decorated with plenty of charming backstories.

Panic attacks still tap me on the shoulder and threaten to reappear, but I’m working on it. Silencing the self-sabotaging monkey which pulls me out of that place where I need to be in order to perform well should be handled by now, but it is not. I’m working on it. It is getting better. And I also gotta slow the fuck down when I talk. These things I know, and I practice every chance I get. I’m deeply appreciative of all the time I have to write and all of the opportunities I have to perform – and to work on telling that monkey who’s boss. I’m trying my very best to ramp it up.

I’m no longer at the bottom (although I’m not even sure if I know where the top is). What I do know is that I’m somewhere in the middle of it all right now. I’m en route.

And even though I’m not “there” yet (and I do fully realize that “there” may well simply be right here and now), for the sake of naming things in a physical world where we organize our lives through time and accomplishments, let’s just say that I am definitely on my way to a new place.

For now, I reside in the ambiverse.

To my friends near and far, you can watch my upcoming solo set at Caffe Lena (here in Saratoga Springs, New York) through their live stream. The show is on Sunday, October 29th at 7 pm. I’m up first, so tune in close to 7 EST for my set. Link here.

You can read a sampling of my song lyrics here.

Project

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When my son Elihu was four months old I had a thought. Quite literally, it went like this: Omg, I can’t wait til this project is done. Kinda feels like it should be wrapping soon. The way I felt about my child was, internally, the same way I had felt about making a record. You write, arrange, record, and then it’s done. When I realized that my child was not a recording, I was flushed with an urgent sense of panic. Wait – what? When exactly was this ending? Wait – this was not a project! Holy crap! This was forever! This was an actual human that I was in charge of! I was deeply surprised at myself. How was it that I’d never thought this through? I was filled with fear of the most urgent kind.

(When I was in labor – at home in my bed – and my doula was trying to help me, she dangled a onesie in front of me as some sort of enticement to hang in there until the reward came. I remember thinking – what in hell is that for? Lady, that piece of laundry means nothing to me. Don’t distract me (what was I doing again and why?) and my god, please let’s get this thing over already.)

Clearly, I have never been much of a planner.

Now, twenty years later, thinking back on my panic at the realization that my infant son was a life-changer and dependent entirely upon me, I realize from a new perspective that the project has been satisfactorily concluded, and finally, the post-release tour has ended. The content is good, and it’ll have a long and robust shelf life. But the job is done, and I’m free to move on to other projects – smaller ones with less on the line. Things I can see begun and done without waiting two decades. It’s a good outcome, and I’m deeply grateful for the freedom to embark on new endeavors. Even so, it makes me wistful, living here in this empty house with the uncut grass waving all around it… But I’m too tired to become teary and nostalgic and wish it otherwise; I’m feeling my age and thinking to myself that I made it just under the wire.

Sometimes I cannot believe that I got us both through that passage. And I can tell you, it was a hell of a lot more work than making an album.

My energy has been drawn elsewhere the past few months, as evidenced by the longest-ever pause in between essays across the twelve-year history of The Hillhouse. It strikes me a bit incongruous that at a time when I’m not on the hook for driving a kid to and from school, when I don’t have to make meals every day or shuttle tubas and airplanes around – a time when I’m merely accountable to a handful of piano students – I find myself feeling short of the time I need to get my creative projects completed. When I was working and being a mother, I was still able to find the time to write essays, and yet now, somehow, I’m just not. Only so much time, only so much energy. I’m using both those commodities in other ways now.

It may surprise people to learn this, but I have never written songs before this year of my life. Took me sixty years to get around to it. I’m good at creating parts – good at arrangements and decision making, but I’ve never been the one doing the creating. I’ve always been a sideman. And now finding myself twenty years on the other side of my life’s main project, I’m learning that the whole world works differently than it used to. Plus I’m not young and cute. Yeah, that stuff has currency. Things really do change.

Songwriting is interesting to me; it serves primarily as therapy (why is it that the folks who really could use therapy the most are the least able to afford it?) and it also creates something which I began to feel a need for as I entered the open mic culture for the very first time: new material that hadn’t been done to death. You could say I began songwriting out of necessity. And now that I’ve started – I can’t stop. It’s crazy to me. I’ve become a prisoner to this process now. Ideas come to me in the middle of the night – usually my most productive time is from 5 am til 10 am – and I’ll sing them into my voice memo. Then the work then begins as I cull and piece together ideas. It becomes sort of like a puzzle. And until now, I’ve always hated puzzles. But this challenge is different – it demands resolution. But man, the content is often primitive, and I can’t help but be self-conscious about the quality. Some songs come together quite nicely, but most of them don’t. It was so much easier all these years to offer my opinion about content someone else had already slaved over. Oy. Who knew? Not me. Like I said, I’m not always good about thinking things through.

There’s a new adventure emerging now. I’ve already done a few solo shows and have a few more on the books. I’ll be participating in a local songwriters showcase soon at Caffe Lena, here in Saratoga, and that’s kind of a nice way to mark my first calendar year of writing songs. I’m realistic enough to know that I’m not an established artist, nor will I be at this point, and that in this culture I’d be hard pressed to carve out a living room tour even if I were, but it’s not a deterrent. In fact, it’s sort of freed me up not to worry too much about the outcome and instead enjoy these new experiences.

I admit to feeling a good deal of conflict about spending so much time on something that will never net a penny, but I’ll just have to sort that out myself (it is therapy, after all). I hadn’t seen it coming, but it’s here. Songwriting appears to be my new project. And I’m not even sure when it’s gonna end. But some things you just can’t plan.

And now for the diary portion of this post:

Elihu is doing exceedingly well, living and working (with a salary and not a word of English known by a single coworker) in Tianjin, China. He has traveled a lot – covering a country as large as the US, visiting different climates and navigating through a variety of regional languages and hard-to-understand accents. I am SO grateful for the blessed satellites which allow us to enjoy two-hour long conversations which cost us nothing. This is a far cry from the days when a mother saw her child off on a ship never to know of their whereabouts or well-being. I am deeply satisfied in Elihu’s personal successes. I am happy that he still feels me to be a friend, that we can cover such a wide range of subjects in our conversations, that we two can find the same things funny, the same things fascinating.

Blog Slog

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If I wrote for a column, or if my material appeared in printed and/or published form, I doubt it would be thus. But as it is, my writing is relegated to the status of “blogging”, and my writings are not considered to be essays, but rather, they are called “blog posts”. An uglier word than “blog” cannot possibly exist. Nor could a piece of writing be held in any lower regard than the common blog post.

The notion that people who blog (I disdain the use of this word as a verb) struggle to create content is maddening to me. If you don’t wake up in the morning bursting with “content”, then do something else with your time! Write because you desperately wish to express yourself, write because you have a need to communicate and share witness with others. Write because you have insights to share with your fellow humans. Creating content for its sake alone seems like pure insanity to me.

When I am called a “blogger” it becomes easy for people, including good friends, to disregard my posts as mere entries in a diary. And even though they may indeed serve to chronicle my life’s events, my writings are so much more than that. But, for the sake of argument, let’s say that they were merely mundane journal entries – even if this simple estimation of my writing was considered to be true – how is that not of some interest? I personally believe that diaries can be wholly captivating.

From time to time, I myself enjoy going back over archived posts and re-reading them. Recounting Oscar Wilde’s words about his own diaries helps to restore my spirit, for I tend to agree with the man: “I never travel without my diary. One should always have something sensational to read in the train.” Indeed.

Here comes the diary entry:

Elihu is living in Tianjin, China for the next several months. He’s enjoying his post at an aeronautical engineering company which makes drones. He has found his tribe. His boss understands Elihu’s talents and skills and gives him opportunities to use them well. Now past the first exhausting few weeks, he is beginning to fully explore and enjoy his new environment.

In that China is such an enormous country, there are many languages spoken there; Mandarin was chosen by the government as a national language so that its many citizens could communicate with each other. Elihu’s four flat mates speak Mandarin as a second language just as he does – so you can believe my “little linguist” is busy trying to add a few more languages to his list. Eight and counting….

Thanks to WeChat, Elihu, his father and I can communicate instantly. This is what frees me from undue worry. Elihu and I sometimes chat for a half hour, as easily as if here were here with me in the kitchen. Having this window to another culture is fascinating – it’s such a rare experience!

My son has created a wonderful life for himself. And as his world expands, so does mine. Proud and grateful mama am I.

Big B Day

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Today is my 60th birthday. Throughout the past few months I have experienced a slow, burning sense of dread about becoming this old. Feeling keenly the paradox of finding life in and of itself a pure win, and yet at the same time feeling inextricably trapped in a nightmarish scenario of decay and irrelevance.

Strangely, yesterday and today I have been covered in a sort of calm. It’s a new feeling, not intense or forward in my thoughts – but instead, running in the background like a maintenance program. I have not experienced anguish or lament at reaching this landmark birthday, but rather I have been feeling a general sense of peace these days. This is new to me, and unexpected.

I am a vain woman, and it would be silly to deny it. But I am also an insightful woman. I counterbalance my vanity with the awareness that I am vain. (Not that it gets me off the hook entirely, but I offer that by way of partially absolving myself of that distasteful character flaw.) But as things feel from where I sit in this moment, I care less than I have in the past. Sure, I don’t want you to see me in full light with a great lens, but if you do – it won’t slay me anymore. Cuz my turn at youth is up. I get it.

It’s not as if I won’t still play the game – I’m still a vain and insecure person – so I’ll play it alright. But somehow, today, it doesn’t feel quite the same. It just doesn’t feel that critical, that urgent. I’m 60, not 40. Not even 50. Nope. I’m older. And it is what it is.

To tell the truth, what I’m feeling is a sense of freedom.

I don’t believe an outlook can truly change in an instant, or on some landmark day, and yet I can honestly say that I’m feeling differently right now than I would have expected. Feels kinda like I just don’t wish to hold myself accountable to standards that I simply can no longer meet. You know, the physical ones. Cuz things are different now. They really are. In just the past three years I’ve felt a decline. I can’t fathom cleaning up my five-acre property the way I did in the past. It’s beyond me now. I can’t reset the stones and hardscape like I did a decade ago. I’m not confident about cleaning my own gutters anymore. I know that I’ll never ride a motorcycle or handle lines on a sailboat again. These things do kinda break my heart, but I also know that I’ve had more than anyone’s fair share of great experiences. I can move along without regret.

My son is on his way to China for the next four months, a dream of his come true. My mother and brother live next door, and I am doing relatively ok. I’m poor on paper, but rich in life. I have a handful of dear friends whom I love, I have a beautiful baby grand piano and a huge picture window which faces the distant hills. I’ve got it good. So I’ll just take what I have and hold it dear.

Thank you, mom, for bringing me into this adventure, and for giving me everything I needed to make this life a pretty good one. I hope I’ve done the same for my kid.

Happy birthday to the spring babies of the family, Elihu and me.