It came up in my “spa music” station during a walk with Pearl. I walk with ambient music playing very softly. It ameliorates the vehicle noise a bit.
My mind’s eye was immediately filled with Sam’s hands on the keyboard, picking the piece out of memory. No music to read. He didn’t read music. I barely do.
(Sam is my father. We all called Nancy and Sam by their names. My mom said, “There’s a lot of moms on the playground, but usually only one Nancy.” Many times I called him “Saaaaa-ummmm” in exasperation. Later I called him Gramps, ironically, which he enjoyed.)
When the first chords came out of my pocket, my brain offered up a slide show of Sam’s lovely masculine but very artistic hands on the keys of our upright piano—the one that is pretty much my mother’s only inheritance from her family.
His fingers connected with the keys in a way that reminds me of Vladimir Horowitz, but not as exaggerated. I can see the curve of his fingers, playing the piece, teasing it out of the instrument; not banging out a tune or slapping the keys.
Sam would wait until the house was mostly empty mid-morning or in the afternoon after he had done yardwork and chores, and showered. His bashfulness to play in front of anyone was an open secret. There were no singalongs around the piano in our house. But in those days when I was home alone with him, he trusted me to be within earshot. And infrequently, in the room.
After his stroke, for Christmas, I asked a good friend’s daughter to come over and play for him. She was an ace at ragtime. He loved it!
Later, he regained some of his mobility in both arms and hands, and the occupational therapist suggested a smallish electronic keyboard so he could sit in his comfortable (safe) chair. He had a great time playing the old pieces that he learned by ear.
The photo shows him at 19 or so, working as an announcer, news reader and DJ for what I think was a classical radio station in South Georgia and North Florida, but I’m not sure. The boldface part is what I’m most sure of. Sam was bashful talking about his life too much as well.
I’m thrilled to be writing again. I’ve decided to do more short pieces like this if I’m telling my story; and I have an idea for what are known in journalism as “reported columns” as well as featurettes on interesting people. The former is what it sounds like: a combo of column-style commentary and thinking out loud with some topical reporting as the matrix. Sounds like good fun to me!
As fall arrives, I am firing on all cylinders these days. Still working on my writing and keynote talks, but now I’m finally going to develop and launch an online course on writing. I expect to have more news about that in mid-October, and start teaching a live class in January. I may do a preview on live audio either here on Substack, or over on Zuck’s Face Place.
If you know anyone who might be interested in writing but something is holding them back, my course is going to address that reluctance, bashfulness, fear and doubt. I can’t make them go away but I have worked with at least a hundred or so writers who were able to tame all that and produce good work.
Finally, I am practicing Italian every day now on an app that begins with Duo- and ends with -lingo. It’s fun, and good review after several years’ lapse. But I know that real language acquisition requires much more than “15 minutes a day!”
I can currently shop for i vestiti e gli stivali with my “coinquilina, Chiara.” Fa bene!
Just thinking my parents could have listened to your dad on the radio. Or at least my mom. That’s cool.