The Story of a Balloon

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This past Tuesday my band Nymbis made an audition video for NPR’s Tiny Desk series. The project came upon us all at once, and some of the challenges it presented were where to record it so last-minute, and if we could somehow perform for a live audience. Once we decided on The Studio, the event just kinda came together.

The floor is now absolutely wrecked due to an immense and almost overnight surge of moisture from below the slab (no, there sadly was no vapor barrier in place) and it is now on the market with a handful of marginally interested parties. But I’m not worried. It’ll sell. It will sell when it’s time, I know it. Somehow, that place has always been quietly magical. The Studio will not be rushed.

There was such wonderful energy in the room this past Tuesday; so many good friends came by to enjoy the space one final time, and to support the band. Our percussionist and bass player welcomed twin boys in October, and the babies were there too. There were fine bottles of rye, cheap cans of Labatt Blue, pizza and bagels with shmear. Two friends brought a little summer picnic setup, complete with wine glasses and tiny charcuterie plates. We had a wild light show projected onto the large slanting ceiling and our lighting designer had brought some large white balloons to catch the black light. Such a fun and festive vibe, despite the single-digit temps outside and the failing floor.

That week I had a bad cold, and on Tuesday it was at its peak. In addition, my back was horrible; I had to be very careful and conservative about movements. But I had gear to move. Chairs and tables to load into my car and into the room. The usual stuff it takes to put on a show. Up until tape rolling I felt a mess, eyes watering, sneezing, back sore. But somehow, when we played, my body shut it all off. I consider that a small miracle. We all know the show must go on.

As I was assessing the room from my post behind the keyboards, it occurred to me that I was in the exact same spot where my father had sat at his harpsichord so many years before. Maybe not a big thing, but still, a thing. And although the events of the night were moving fast and there was no time to linger in nostalgia, I was able to take on the beauty of the moment. I was on stage making music with my some of my very favorite people, in a room full of friends whom I love, and we were all fully present and enjoying the moment. It was a rare epicenter of experience. Even as I played, I was able to marvel over my good fortune. Imagine, one last concert, one final party in that space. It had been dark for two years, and now here it was brightly animated and filled with camaraderie.

Could anything be more perfect?

The following day I came back to clean. Something I’ve done dozens of times. Post show, post Airbnb guest. The big room must always be swept and mopped. As funky as that floor is now, I still had to erase hundreds of salty footprints the crowd had made. It needed to be realtor-ready. I spent about an hour on the place. When I was finished, I stood in the center of the stage area. Underneath the floor where I stood were two hairs – one of my father’s (he had just died a month before I had the new floor put in) and one of mine. I had laid them both on the slab before they were sealed up by the boards. It’s always been the spot where I stand when I reflect on this place and all that has gone on in that gorgeous hall.

I sensed some movement, and so I looked up and to my left. There was one clear balloon drifting down from the center of the room and moving toward the back wall of the stage. I’m pretty sure my mouth fell open – I do remember saying aloud “Where the hell did you come from?” I swear I had cleaned that place. Emptied every last piece of detritus. It was empty.

I was compelled to follow it. The balloon came to rest against the stage wall, just at my eye level. “Really?” I asked it. I mean, this was crazy. I became still, I engaged with the balloon. I was there for it, witnessing it. I extended my palm and asked if it would come to me. It moved to the left, staying at eye level. I followed. We stopped. I extended my hand and it moved to the right. And there we rested, unmoving, together in an absolutely silent room bathed in the low-slanting rays of afternoon sunshine. A few moments passed, and I dared to speak my thoughts aloud. “Dad?” It seemed too poetic, too staged. Too too. We remained there for about five minutes, until I lost the staring contest and sat down underneath it, back against the stage wall, looking out into the large room.

After a few more moments passed I walked back to the spot in center stage. And I sang. I leaned into the stunning reverb of the room, oohing minor, medieval-sounding lines. Like Gregorian chants sent up into the tops of the snowy pine trees outside the balcony windows. I sensed movement again, and turned to see the balloon had moved to the front of the stage. It then leapt out into the abyss of the main room, did a small circle in the air, and headed once again to the back of the stage. By now, I had adjusted. I was less surprised. I was under the spell of the balloon.

But there was nothing more to do. I had sung, I had communed with the balloon. I had sat in the purest and most absolute silence I have ever known. It was time to go.

I walked to the back of the stage where the balloon hovered, still at my eye level. I placed my hands on either side of it, and I kissed it. Then I left.

When I got in my car, I turned for one final look, expecting to see the balloon forty feet away at the back of the hall. I might’ve gasped for the small shock if I hadn’t already been communing with the thing for the past half hour. There it was, like a child in the doorway, watching a guest’s departure. Until this point I had been fully in the moment – grabbing my phone had not even entered my mind. But now, now that I was in the car and the spell had been broken somewhat, I felt it would be ok to take just one pic. Were it not for the photo, I’m not sure I could possibly convey the surrealness of my experience. I felt I wanted some evidence, some confirmation of what had just happened. Still in a state of disbelief, I continued to shake my head back and forth as I drove the roundabout. And I was just about to leave the property, when I took one last look back at The Studio.

The balloon now hung in the large picture window; it was a powerfully poignant sight. Longing, but not. Sad, but not quite. Matter-of-fact, really. Just a balloon quietly saying goodbye to me alone. Goodbye, balloon.

I shared this experience with Elihu. Not a thing about it was unbelievable to him. But then he and I have had a number of strange experiences, both together and individually. Now we share them as casually as recounting a funny overheard conversation on the subway. I was glad for his witness, and I was hoping that sharing it would pack it away neatly in my mind. But I couldn’t let it go. Had I done the right thing? Was it a missed opportunity? Was it dad? Was it a collective of energies? What had just happened here? I wasn’t satisfied to drop it.

Last night I decided that I would share this with my mom. That was a stretch, because she is not a believer of esoteric ideas (or so she says; she still prides herself on once learning how to perform Reiki) and jumping into such a conversation would need to happen at just the right moment. But that wasn’t going to happen. Her woodstove had cracked the night before, so that took up a good chunk of time of going over options and safety concerns. My vote – use the damn stove, it’s six degrees out. Next came the endless nattering and commentary on the news presenters. Last night her issue was with the glossy, blown-out and ironed hairstyles; she insisted that it was age-inappropriate on the older women. Here our country was, falling into a dystopian modern-era McCarthyism, and she was going on and on about hairstyles. Oh my god. This was clearly not the time to share my balloon story.

Curiosity, and the need for some kind of closure – something I could take as an answer – pulled me back to the darkened hall. After leaving my mother’s, I drove to The Studio and went in. I was slightly apprehensive, but reminded myself that there was nothing sinister here. Unexplained maybe, but not sinister. I flicked on the warm overhead light… The balloon had come to rest at the foot of the old roadside sign which we’d brought in for the show. There it was. The end of the story.

Confirmation. A single white balloon come to rest after its journey around the perimeter of the storied music hall. The definitive conclusion of an era.

Best ending ever.

Under Over

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This past week I’ve been feeling off. Down, dark and scared of the other shoe dropping at any time. Some moments it’s really terrifying. So I try to soothe myself by eating with a vengeance, or drinking as much as as college boy. I stay busy. I keep myself distracted. I pass the days waiting for the nights, when I take my faithful Ambien and check out. But even then my dreams won’t let me be. My dream life is rich and busy, and most mornings I wake without a sense of having truly rested.

Something has felt different for me over these past few months. Something is nagging at me, and it’s been growing and growing. I’m trying to identify it. So many stressors. Hard to know what’s at the root of my ill ease. It’s a cocktail of many things I suppose.

If there’s any wisdom that I have gained from 62 years on this planet, it’s this: take your hunches – your instincts, your tiny afterthoughts, your conscience (my son and I have always called this the “God voice”), magnify it ten times – and then do what it tells you. Hear the message, heed the message. (Most of the time it’s been a really useful tool for life. I recommend it.)

My thoughts have been consumed lately by one nagging thought, but I can’t tell if it’s the neurosis of an aging woman or an insight from the ether. The voice keeps saying “You just need to outlive your mother”. My mother is ticking along at 90, with only a few short-term memory slips. On the whole, she’s very much who she’s always been. Me, I kinda feel like I’m waiting for some major health shit of my own to hit the fan. So many of my peers have suffered awful and unanticipated health crises; why not me too? I’m concerned; as the cotter pin holding that’s holding the whole Conant project together, I can’t leave until stuff gets sorted.

I’ve had a couple of strange feelings in my body, one being a persistent pain which travels around the upper left quadrant of my chest, sometimes under the breast, sometimes in the armpit, sometimes like a line up the left side of my neck. I’ve thoroughly employed my “God voice” technique here – asking for an assortment of tests over the past year, yet at this point my doc and I are basically giving up the search and are attributing it to a referred pain from a decades-old broken shoulder. But I’m not convinced. What to do? I think I’ve done all I can. Or have I?

I’ve been working on the physical crap inside my house for a while now with some good progress. Elihu’s big move to Brooklyn this summer gave a huge push to our household’s downsizing. He wanted to move out with all of his worldly possessions taking up just the space of two large rolling suitcases. And he did it, purging the rest. Inspired by his progress, I took up the charge and continued the project after he moved out. But still. So much stuff.

Just how is the garage always full after ten years of garage sales? The way in which we Westerners amass physical clutter is astounding.

My mother has begun to let go of the idea that I will eagerly inherit her house and its contents. There was a time, a few years ago, when she’d thought that naturally I would move into her house after she was gone. When I pointed out to her that I already had a house – and that I, as an aging empty-nester would have no need of a large, four bedroom home, she looked genuinely surprised. She’d just assumed I’d want all this stuff. It’s been a journey, but I think she’s finally coming to understand that her Baccarat wedding crystal and her well-worn Limoges china are of little value in today’s world. It’s sad. It is. But it’s the reality of this physical plane. Dust to dust. Only so many museums. Only so much room for our stuff.

As a creative, I naturally have notebooks upon notebooks (let’s not even consider the hundreds of cassette tapes of demos, rehearsals and ideas). Even though the reality is that I will not revisit and reanimate 99% of those ideas, I still wish to keep all of these for my lifetime as space allows. They’re only of interest – and comfort – to me. Once I am gone, into the fire they can go.

What I do wish gone is all the extra paper that I’ve hung onto. Programs, set lists, photos, ticket stubs, doodles, letters, diaries and so on. Things essentially only meaningful to my mother, my son and me. I so wish that I could indiscriminately grab piles and throw them onto the fire pit! But then I see a hand written letter from me to my parents when I was a child at camp, and I think “Oh! Elihu and his children will get such a kick out of this one day!” Myself, I find letters and notes of a personal and intimate nature of interest. But will my grandchildren find this ephemera fascinating or irrelevant? Will I even have grandchildren?

I admit it, I’m stuck. Taking a breather here. The burn pile will grow. I just need a minute.

The Studio is finally on the market after two years of town bureaucracy and lots of other back-and-forth legal nonsense. I emailed the architect to tell him the news, and it bounced back. A quick search informed me that he had died a year ago. He was an old family friend, so this was sad news. But it also seemed to confirm that things were truly in cosmic order. The time had come to let the place go.

My brother Andrew is another item on the unresolved list.

Just last night as my mother and I tried to discuss the topic, I saw that not only were we not any further along in the process of discussing his caretaking, but we had backslid. My mother and those of her generation have a hard time getting honest about personal things, and having a mentally unwell child is, in my mother’s eyes, a failure on her part and a point of shame. So how does she deal with this? Denial. Lack of willingness to see the problem. You can’t solve a problem if you don’t think you have one!

My brother is as hoarder whose house is something you’d have to see to truly understand. He cannot throw things out, whether mementos or garbage. There is no distinction to him. He is a deeply intelligent person, but he has been consumed by his disease for most of his life. He hasn’t had a job in over 40 years. Has no dentist, no doctor. He isn’t even in the system; his dysfunction is such that he cannot follow through on any administrative endeavor. One year I got him food stamps, but he never followed through to keep them. He lives with an enormous inguinal hernia hanging over his crotch. He’s an alcoholic and does nothing but sit in front of the TV at mom’s. She gives him pocket money (his only income). She gives him her car to drive. She makes him dinner every night, fretting aloud about what he will and won’t eat, and what she’s got planned. Some nights he goes on a bender and never shows. My mother waits it out with no idea if he’s alive or dead (Andrew won’t answer his phone). Many times through the years I’ve had to peek through the window panes into his shack to see if he’s ok. But if he saw me doing this, he might fly into a rage, so there’s some risk involved. My brother showers, eats and watches TV at her place, then retreats to a tiny, dilapidated farmhouse at the foot of the driveway. Dysfunction of the highest order.

At present, everything is propped up and working. Mom has a reason to live; she has been a consummate chef and feeder of people for her whole life. She has someone to check in on her, take out the garbage and collect the mail. Andrew has dinner, booze, entertainment and shelter. They enjoy a symbiotic relationship. No need to dismantle things. But one day, shit’s gonna fall. And inevitably, it’s gonna fall on me. I’m as ready as I’ll ever be. But I’ll feel better once we finalize the will and get Andrew’s future care plan laid out. If mom won’t believe me that it’s a major concern, she’ll believe our family attorney. It’s on the immediate to-do list. Maybe my heart will lighten a little when we get our plans defined on paper. Maybe.

When I opened my eyes this morning, I turned on my phone and began the search for some dopamine to start my day.

Instead, I found a New Yorker article about a man my age of Jamaican descent who’d lived nearly his whole life here in this country and who had been deported by ICE to a maximum security prison in Eswatini. The agents employed needless violence.

The next story I read was authored by a mother who had lost her only two children. Both sons as teens committed suicide. They were deeply intelligent, insightful young men. But they were driven to such despair by either this world, their temperaments – or both – that they took their own lives.

Following in my feed came a post by a friend whose only child was killed a year and a half ago. She and I were both single mothers of only boys, both jazz singers, both from Chicago. I’d always felt a bond of some sort with her, and her loss has become a part of my life in some small way. I can’t help but feel a mixture of heartbreak and guilt when I think of her situation – and fear for the safety of my own son. But my reality is still comfortable. Hers is not.

This whole fucking world is brutal. And I am feeling it. I’ve got it good, I know I do, but I’m feeling the weight. The Trump era has ratcheted up the stress level on this planet for sure. It’s definitely playing a part in my unease. I long for freedom, peace and comfort for every last one of my fellow humans, but it seems further off now than ever before.

I’m under the spell of overwhelm.

My Line

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Yesterday I had a show. It was outdoors, a mild and windy fall day, with most of the audience seated many yards away, gathered around fire tables or under umbrellas. Not the best place to share nuanced music without the metronomic assistance and high-end sonic clarity of a guitar. But thankfully, at this point – now two years into my experiences performing as a singer-songwriter – I have come to expect the unexpected, and I’m able to make my thing work in spite of minor challenges and less-than-ideal performance situations.

So I did my job. I made the older women in the front row cry, I sent ripples of laughter through the crowd, and even had a mountain biker take a break from his ride to stop, listen and then wait to say hello afterwards. I also shared a song about my discontent with the nation’s politics, and although I could see the women in front squirming with discomfort as they disengaged from me, checked their phones and avoided eye contact, bless their MAGA hearts, they didn’t get up and leave. In fact, they came up later and told me how much they’d enjoyed my set. A win in my book. Message heard, if not received.

As I wrapped cables and loaded up my car, I was feeling content, and had a smidge of that post-show energy. Not quite ready to go home. I checked the Caffe Lena site and saw there was a singer-songwriter there, starting in just a few minutes. It would mean a chunk out of the money I’d just made, so I hesitated at first. Then, as I did a bit more research on my phone, I learned that this fellow had a congenital eye disorder. Like my son. Actually, just the opposite – this guy’s losing his rod cell function, and my son has no cone cell function. Either way, low vision and the diminishment of it has been a main theme of my son’s life, and at the forefront of my concerns as a mother. Easy decision. Let’s go hear this guy.

Being on a budget, I don’t often go out to hear what’s going on in the musical world. There are world-class musicians at Caffe Lena numerous times each week (I knew Lena Spencer as a child; the room has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember), yet I simply can’t afford to attend. A couple of years ago I took a chance and just decided to go there on one random, unplanned night. I had no idea who was playing, but I had a bit of cash and felt like splurging. I sat in the audience, mesmerized. Was that what a real singer-songwriter sounded like? Could you really tell stories in between your songs like this? People listened? Where the hell had I been all of my life? How was I only just getting this now? Having spent my musical life as a sideman in pop and rock bands, this folk world hadn’t appeared on my radar as an adult. And since I had just written my first handful of songs at that point, Grace Pettis got me thinking… This looked so satisfying, so gratifying. Seems strange that it was all so new to me at the age of 60. Ignorant old newbie.

Once, a year ago or so, an old friend of mine in LA texted and said that a fellow who he’d produced was playing in my town – did I know the venue? – and if I did, he’d get me a comp. It was Caffe Lena. So of course I went. The singer I heard was Chris Pierce. It was the second big step in the expansion of my songwriter’s mind. By that time I’d written over 30 songs, and I’d begun to do solo shows, so I had a different perspective from the year before. Meeting him afterward was also enlightening. Me, I’m often a bit short with folks after I play; I kinda want to get my car loaded and just go home after a show. But that’s no way to build relationships. Honestly, it’s just not being very nice. From Chris I learned the importance of warmth and connection. He was patient and unrushed, listening to folks telling their stories of when they’d heard him before, or how much a song had meant to them. It was a beautiful thing watching him hang afterwards. It was a lesson in humility for me. A huge gift.

And then there was last night. The fellow I went to see was Mark Erelli. I wish I could say that it was inspiring, but actually, it had me feeling like a clodding fool of a writer. I’ve come to be a little jaded about songs; even though I myself employ all the standard conventions and forms, I’ll sometimes think to myself, when hearing a songwriter, “here comes the bridge”, or “here comes the six minor” or some such nod to the next likely move. Last night, as I struggled to convey my feelings about the show, I blurted out that the fellow’s bridges were somehow “bridgier”. Seriously. Every one of this man’s songs was a profoundly beautiful surprise. Though I’ll admit that I still don’t listen to a lot of songwriters even now (most of those who I do listen to have me checking out after the first chorus), last night I was enraptured (as was everyone in the room). Plus, his duo partner James Rohr played not only the most sonically gorgeous piano sound (from a keyboard) I’ve yet heard, but he supported Mark with just the loveliest and most economic comping, fills and solos. The composite sound of the two of them was a warm bath of rich, deep, pure sound. What a lucky thing I decided to go out last night.

This morning, in an attempt to feel a bit less disheartened about my abilities as a songwriter, I turned my attention to the song I’d written most recently. The ideas had been in the back of my mind for a few months already, and I’d just been waiting for the right moment to try and get them all together in the same song. I sat on the couch in the warm morning sunshine last week and scanned through a couple of notebooks, reviewing the lines and ideas I’d written down. Somehow (as it often does for me) the song came together within a couple of hours as I sat down at the piano began to play and sing. And, as with most songs, it wouldn’t leave me alone for the next two days. This earworm of a song on repeat sometimes convinces me that I’ve just written something really good. But then today I had to remind myself that “good” is relative. Yeah, my songs are mostly good, a few are great, but many are (maybe they feel even more so now in the wake of hearing Mark) just placeholders. Experiments, moments in time caught on paper and in my memo app. And while it’s tempting to feel down about my lack of subtlety or ingenuity, I’m going to choose instead to remember that I’m new to this. That I am expressing myself in my own voice. Hell, I suppose it’s a minor success that I’m even writing. I’m not disappointed in my work so much as I am aware of how much room for improvement there is.

I’ll never be Nashville slick. But I have so much more on board than I did at the start of this new chapter. It may well be the main endeavor that sees me to the end of my turn on this plane. When Elihu left home I didn’t know how I’d make it through or what I was even waking up for, but now I think I have a better idea. And after hearing some truly great songs, I am humbled, but not deterred. Writing and playing songs has been a fine use of time. My ending became a beginning.

And I’m happy it turned out this way. (Hey – now there’s a good line for the notebook…)

Upswing

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This sure is a crappy time in history in which to be experiencing an upswing in my life. But I’m going to fully embrace the exciting experiences that lie ahead. I’m never unaware of my privilege, nor am I unaware of the horrific downturns that will befall so many souls on this planet in the coming months and years. Nonetheless I am going to put all of my energy into my music, my recordings and performances. Many of my new songs express my feelings about the turmoil of the planet, and that, I have to believe, is my energetic contribution to the world. I send the world my love as I offer up my music – holding my breath all the while, along with so many of you, as we watch the upheavel of our world.

There must be some energetic component to my current state, otherwise I could not possibly understand it; everywhere I’ve gone these past few weeks people have been offering up such lovely compliments. Strangers at the Y say they’ve noticed the progress I’ve made in my fitness, folks I know in town say that I possess a certain look in my eye – some have even offered hugs of what I can loosely describe as being congratulatory. But for what, exactly, are they congratulating me? What is it that I present which compels them to approach me and offer such kindnesses? I have stalled in my weight loss and I am wearing the same old clothes I’ve had for years. I certainly look older than I did even six months ago (this is the witching decade as far as looking ‘old’ takes place – that will have to be an entire essay in and of itself). What then is this ephemeral hint that I am broadcasting? Perhaps it’s confidence. I dunno. Maybe it’s because after a long window of child rearing and then empty nest grieving, I’ve finally discovered something that I am good at – and which I deeply enjoy. Maybe it’s reflected in the way I carry myself. Dunno. Not entirely convinced. But I do feel more hopeful about my prospects for creating and performing than I did a year ago at this time, and maybe that’s the thing that folks are responding to. Really, who can know?

There’s not much more I feel the need to add here. I’ve just felt a shifting of things in my life recently, and having not written much lately, it seemed to merit expression. Thank you for being here with me for this, which feels like a new chapter in my life. Thank you for bearing witness. I really do appreciate it.

Passage

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The longer one waits, the more difficult it gets. It’s been half a year since I’ve written anything here. Since our visit to Scotland and Sweden this past spring, our lives have been dense with activity. Elihu has been immersed in his final year of college, and I have been busy writing music and working with a new band.

Moments of clarity and inspiration have come and gone… In a flash, I’ll know just how to approach an essay; there will be a certain insight, a certain story that calls out to go first, but then I’ll get pulled away by a domestic task or the bell of a notification on my phone, and my attention immediately spins in another direction.

And then there are the larger distractions, too… A tree falls across my driveway. My hot water heater craps out. The zoning board denies my application. My keyboard won’t power on. My tire keeps going flat. I forget passwords and waste an afternoon resetting them yet again. The inboxes of my too-many email accounts are hundreds of messages deep and need tending, and I almost always have music to shed for an upcoming rehearsal or gig. Never mind. If it was such a clever idea, it’ll come back.

Um, not likely. A fickle memory has become my new normal.

These days my ongoing mantra is WRITE IT DOWN – no matter what it is. Interesting thought? Song idea? Lyric? Errand? Write it down. In a mere two seconds it will disappear forever… I don’t really understand how or when this all happened – but something has changed. My logical mind searches for landmarks or easily recognized turning points, single events which might help me quantify the process – but no distinct evidence emerges. It’s taken me the past six months to understand that the me who exists today is not the same woman who existed one year ago. It appears I have undergone a change. I believe I have become old. And if my flimsy short-term memory is not enough to convince me, the crepey skin sure is.

Before you protest, please know I am simply being factual. I wish it were OK in this culture to declare oneself old, and have it be accepted. Euphemistic phrases like “such-and-such years young” and “age is only a number” loudly convey our denial about being legitimately old. And it drives me nuts. I am old. It’s not my favorite thing to say out loud, but the markers are here. As a woman who has derived a good bit of pleasure from looking sharp, put-together and, well, young, this is not an easy admission to make. But who ever said life was easy?

I have really bad osteoarthritis in my hands too, and it’s gotten noticeably worse over the past half year. Over the past two months even. It’s tempting to feel sorry for myself – what a lousy fate for a musician! I was wise to make a little video a few years ago of me playing my tenor uke – cuz I can’t come close to pushing a string down on a neck. I feel ironically fortunate that my instrument requires only open-handed, lateral movement. It’s becoming a bit harder to navigate some fingerings, but for the most part I’m doing OK. And these days I don’t take this stuff for granted.

Elihu is doing very well in college, and is finishing strong. I look on him in utter amazement. He is not only academically successful, but he is a thoughtful observer of life. He has a clever sense of humor and a compassionate heart. The eye of an artist and the rigor of an engineer. Too much? Meh. Indulge me… My son has maintained an A average in his studies of aeronautical engineering, he has started some clubs on campus (indoor aeromodelers, philosophy, international language group) as well as served in a group of Chinese language mentors, and he is also in student government, requiring late nights of administrative tasks and budget allocations. He’s now fluent and literate in five languages, and conversational in several more. He also plays tuba in the symphony and a variety of wind ensembles – plus he gets all over town on public transit with his tuba in tow, sporting his favorite porkpie hat, sitting in with funk and jazz bands. Proud much? Maybe a little.

In spite of feeling the mortal clock ticking faster these days, I am in a very nice spot right now. I’ve lost some weight, gotten quite a bit stronger (I racewalk 2-3 miles a day and spend about an hour weight training) and – this is the biggee for me – I am writing songs regularly. Year before last I wrote my first song, and I’ve been writing ever since. Sometimes a month will go by and I’m too busy to sit down and listen for ideas and I panic, thinking surely I must have written my last song. How in hell do ‘real’ songwriters do this? Come up with albums and albums of material? And yet, I’m beginning to get it. Kind of. I now have many more songs than I could ever hope to record, and even choosing ten out of the lot is difficult. But now I must choose just five songs for an EP that I’ll be recording in the new year. Not easy. I’ve ended up sending out my homemade demos to a number of friends in search of their input – informal marketing research of sorts. But it has not yielded the consensus I’d hoped for; my tallies show almost all songs getting equal votes. Not a bad problem to have though.

One year ago I made a decision to play anywhere and everwhere I could. Performing my songs was still a new thing and I wasn’t as in control of my performances as I wanted to be. Tempos weren’t locked in, my focus was easily thrown off, and being in the spotlight as a solo artist was new and I felt a bit unsure of how I needed to present myself. The only way to get better was to be persistent. I find open mics to be grueling affairs, but they are also a great resource. Between those and a good number of solo shows, I’ve learned a lot this past year; it’s been surprisingly fruitful.

The exciting thing is – it’s not over, in fact, it’s kinda just beginning. I’m in pursuit of some future I do not yet see very clearly, but one I am trying my best to create. It’s a little scary sometimes to think I’m starting something new at this age – but isn’t that what we humans do? We move, we pursue. And as Elihu launches himself into the world this year (he will most likely be attending grad school in Stockholm, so his absence from my life will be profound) I too will be entering a new chapter.

It seems we will both be graduating soon.

E and E in E

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At the pace with which we have been moving for the past few days, it’s hard to remember it all; where we’ve stayed, how many towns we passed through, how many stops we made, who we met. In the evenings I cull my photos while Elihu gives his online Mandarin tutoring sessions, so we don’t often have a good moment in which to recap together. Hard to believe we left one week ago tonight – feels we’ve had a month’s worth of adventures since then.

We’ve done so much, but sometimes we feel just a mite cheated as we often miss the classic tourist moments. When I’m driving, I’m concentrating, and I can’t really enjoy the scenery, and Elihu is often engaged with navigation duties. This afternoon we enjoyed only fifteen minutes of a hour-long bus tour, but we made our choices, and hopping off of the bus was necessary to make this perfect day happen. Elihu and I always have off-the-beaten-path experiences the likes of which very few enjoy, and today was no exception. My one superpower is being able to talk to anyone, and to engage them in such a way that before long they’re telling us their story, and an interesting conversation always ensues. We had some very lovely ones today.

We passed by the Parish Church of St. Cuthbert’s (the oldest Christian Church in Edinburgh, founded in 670 AD) and soon we were talking with an older woman who was weeding the garden. Her friend Fred joined us next, and we four had a lively chat before a younger man on his lunch break stopped by and added to the party. I slipped into the church (which was closed to the public) to use the toilet and was stopped by a church member – but when I told him that I’d been chatting with Anne, he waved me in with a smile. Perks of the superpower.

We met up with a fellow I’d been corresponding with online for several years – he rode his motorcycle up from London just to see us in person. That meeting then changed the trajectory of our plans; we are at the moment staying in a lovely mom and pop hotel near his friends’ place, rather than staying at a far more tony (and expensive) hotel we’d originally booked. Who knows what new experiences we’ll have and the new people we’ll meet as a result? It’s serendipitous things like this which make our trip not only memorable, but which enrich our lives in ways we could never have imagined.

It’s late, and I have many photos to review – plus Elihu is in the next bed giving his very animated (and loud) Mandarin tutoring session. (Btw – he is a pretty fantastic teacher. I’ve never heard him give a lesson before and it’s truly impressive to hear him in full-on teaching mode.) I’ll wrap this installment soon.

Tomorrow we say goodbye to our car, which has taken us from Inverness to Ullapool, through the Highlands and into Edinburgh (city driving was surprisingly not bad – in fact I actually enjoyed it) and then across back roads to a point somewhere in the countryside north of Perth. Although it was a real challenge to manage these narrow and twisting roads, I am a bit sad to know that the driving portion of the story is almost over. And I’m fairly certain I shan’t have another go at it in this lifetime. But how lucky I’ve been to have learned this new skill at my old age. How fortunate we have been to see the deep interior of this country as very few tourists ever do. How wonderful it’s all been until now.

And it isn’t over yet.

But first, to sleep. Goodnight, dear Scotland. We are both very happy to be here.

Greenfielders at Doune

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It’s been a very full day.

Today Elihu and I drove half the length of the country, and made six stops.

We began at the tourist town of Fort William (after partially consuming a strange breakfast of sweet baked beans, broiled tomatoes, bland, large sausages with an unnervingly creamy feel, dense, bread-like triangles and a whitish mixture with no flavor at all and a texture like curdled yogurt which we could only assume by context to be eggs) before getting back on the road to Glencoe and then onward through the Highland mountains. On a Sunday there was no letup to the traffic which passed us on the other side of the tiny and twisting two lane road. More stressful than the towering lorries which whizzed by us at quite a clip (again – going the other way) were the motorcycles. It seems that bikers and their machines are quite different in this country – all of them leather-clad and having various luggage carriers on bike profiles which I didn’t recognize. No open-faced helmets on Harleys here! Riders were athletic in their presence – zooming easily past us whenever the road permitted. Often in small groups and with very loud and high-pitched engines, when they drove by en masse it was hard to keep relaxed and focused. Like I said before, driving in Scotland is stressful.

It’s late and there’s too much for me to recall now save a digest: Hairy coos (which we smooched and fed and from whom I got my first tick), a small horse farm (a random stop on a small road), Doune Castle (from Monty Python and the Holy Grail), another small farm (again, just pulled in to say hello), a pub in the town of Bonnybridge (self-proclaimed UFO capital of the world) where the locals were in the midst of a very loud karaoke night, the engineering marvel of the Falkirk Wheel lock, an Indian takeaway place where we chatted for a long time with the Pakistani/Scottish owner, then finally our hotel for the night.

Getting here involved several dozen rotaries and a good 125 miles of tightly turning roads. And we still have no phone service. But we’re here, and from what the map tells us, it’s just a few blocks’ walk to the sea.

Today’s memories seem to both of us like a week’s worth of adventures. Elihu has finished his tutoring notes for his language students, and I have jotted down what I’m able in this late hour. It’s time for bed. Til the next installment…

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.