Between Mozart and Mendelssohn
published in Contemporary American Women: Our Defining Passages, ed. Carol Smallwood and Cynthia Brackett-Vincent, All Things That Matter Press "09.
When my mother dies I’ll have one less reason to play piano. But it’s a pleasure for me. Fifty years ago she would give me five dollars for an hour lesson with Mrs. Franke, a lady who didn’t know how to yell or be sarcastic. We talked and played and enjoyed the piano together for eleven years. I was never very good, never practiced very much, never disliked having to go to lessons because there was no reprimands or lectures, just music.
I played for fun in college when a piano was available and took my old upright with me when I moved onto my husband’s farm. I taught my kids to make music and paid for their lessons, played for church occasionally and accompanied my children at school music contests.
And now, I go to the nursing home once a week and play during mealtime for my mother. At ninety-eight she’s wheelchair bound and mostly confused. She knows me and my family, only a few others, but can still tell Mozart from Mendelssohn. I chose to make life easier for everyone by playing at lunchtime—no extra setups or moves, no need to stop and clap or announce tittles and composers. I play my short, simple inventions, preludes, arias, nothing too long to get lost in, just melodic themes and some waltzes.
When Mom first moved into the nursing home she thought it was okay, but within weeks the daily hymn sings and inspirational musical kitsch got to her. She was up to her ears in Christian music that imaged heavenly bliss ahead. She was bored with it all. I told her I’d come over and play something classical, checked with the staff and set up a schedule.
All this makes it possible for me to be in the same room with Mom, share memories and common interests but not have to converse, which is almost impossible considering where she thinks she is and when she imagines it is. For me, that’s as good as I can wish for. The care she receives is wonderful but the situation is grim. My mother never forgot a name or a face, ever. She was excellent at keeping dates and information for the family. Now she can’t remember where she is, who’s around her, what meal she had last. None of which matters. But she knows the music she always enjoyed, and thankfully, the other residents like the distraction during mealtime, so I play piano. It gets us all through one more part of one more day. My children badgered me to stop trying to correct Grandma. I felt the need to remind her of when it was, who was still living, which picture on the wall came from where. I finally gave in to them and went along with the flow of her memories wherever they went. It’s been easier on all of us.
I have to go visit, to sit together outside watching birds feed and flowers bloom, but it isn’t that great a time. She’s so diminished it seems to me she’s barely there. But I can still bring her an hour of happiness, and therefore I ought to. This was all I could find to do that I still enjoyed and she liked. I play piano, her musical favorites.
I am truly surprised that a mediocre talent of mine has carried through my life this far and benefited me this well. It’s unexpected. I have no musical ability to play anything, with small, short-fingered hands and almost no coordination. I make mistakes mid-piece, forgetting which key I’m in or hitting two notes at a time, but no one seems to mind, and Mom’s lost most of her critical attitude about performance. After one high school musical I was in, she told me that she really didn’t enjoy amateur productions that much. I stopped asking my parents to attend anything. But I remember feeling untalented and unworthy. Now she listens and hears I don’t know what. But she’s happy. Sometimes she thinks she’s in a concert hall, red velvet cushions, and fancy dresses. Sometimes she’s knows me.
But it’s the music that lives. Mozart would recognize nothing in our twenty-first century so much as his music. All else has changed, even the alcohol he drowned himself in. Having a liver transplant would have kept him going for a few more years and a few more symphonies, but would he have wanted such longevity as Mom has? I doubt it. I don’t. I play Bach’s Aria in D Minor: Enlightening Thoughts of a Tobacco Smoker, and worry less about my mortality, more about my sanity. This thread that I picked up at the age of five, playing piano, is still in my fistful of therapies. I am calmed by playing, just as Mrs. Franke always calmed me down after a week of school stress. I am indebted and ready to pay back the debt, note by chord by movement. I hope someone plays for me when I’m too far gone to notice or thank them.
I played for fun in college when a piano was available and took my old upright with me when I moved onto my husband’s farm. I taught my kids to make music and paid for their lessons, played for church occasionally and accompanied my children at school music contests.
And now, I go to the nursing home once a week and play during mealtime for my mother. At ninety-eight she’s wheelchair bound and mostly confused. She knows me and my family, only a few others, but can still tell Mozart from Mendelssohn. I chose to make life easier for everyone by playing at lunchtime—no extra setups or moves, no need to stop and clap or announce tittles and composers. I play my short, simple inventions, preludes, arias, nothing too long to get lost in, just melodic themes and some waltzes.
When Mom first moved into the nursing home she thought it was okay, but within weeks the daily hymn sings and inspirational musical kitsch got to her. She was up to her ears in Christian music that imaged heavenly bliss ahead. She was bored with it all. I told her I’d come over and play something classical, checked with the staff and set up a schedule.
All this makes it possible for me to be in the same room with Mom, share memories and common interests but not have to converse, which is almost impossible considering where she thinks she is and when she imagines it is. For me, that’s as good as I can wish for. The care she receives is wonderful but the situation is grim. My mother never forgot a name or a face, ever. She was excellent at keeping dates and information for the family. Now she can’t remember where she is, who’s around her, what meal she had last. None of which matters. But she knows the music she always enjoyed, and thankfully, the other residents like the distraction during mealtime, so I play piano. It gets us all through one more part of one more day. My children badgered me to stop trying to correct Grandma. I felt the need to remind her of when it was, who was still living, which picture on the wall came from where. I finally gave in to them and went along with the flow of her memories wherever they went. It’s been easier on all of us.
I have to go visit, to sit together outside watching birds feed and flowers bloom, but it isn’t that great a time. She’s so diminished it seems to me she’s barely there. But I can still bring her an hour of happiness, and therefore I ought to. This was all I could find to do that I still enjoyed and she liked. I play piano, her musical favorites.
I am truly surprised that a mediocre talent of mine has carried through my life this far and benefited me this well. It’s unexpected. I have no musical ability to play anything, with small, short-fingered hands and almost no coordination. I make mistakes mid-piece, forgetting which key I’m in or hitting two notes at a time, but no one seems to mind, and Mom’s lost most of her critical attitude about performance. After one high school musical I was in, she told me that she really didn’t enjoy amateur productions that much. I stopped asking my parents to attend anything. But I remember feeling untalented and unworthy. Now she listens and hears I don’t know what. But she’s happy. Sometimes she thinks she’s in a concert hall, red velvet cushions, and fancy dresses. Sometimes she’s knows me.
But it’s the music that lives. Mozart would recognize nothing in our twenty-first century so much as his music. All else has changed, even the alcohol he drowned himself in. Having a liver transplant would have kept him going for a few more years and a few more symphonies, but would he have wanted such longevity as Mom has? I doubt it. I don’t. I play Bach’s Aria in D Minor: Enlightening Thoughts of a Tobacco Smoker, and worry less about my mortality, more about my sanity. This thread that I picked up at the age of five, playing piano, is still in my fistful of therapies. I am calmed by playing, just as Mrs. Franke always calmed me down after a week of school stress. I am indebted and ready to pay back the debt, note by chord by movement. I hope someone plays for me when I’m too far gone to notice or thank them.
