REBLOG: IF THIS DOESN'T BRING TEARS TO YOUR EYES, YOU'RE MADE OF ROCK

FROM THE BLOG OF AUTHOR COLIN FALCONER

IF THIS DOESN'T BRING TEARS TO YOUR EYES, YOU'RE MADE OF STONE

“We all need to play the music that we hear inside. To do that, some of us have greater mountains to

climb than others. For the Landfill Harmonic, it’s a mountain of trash.” 

Landfill Armonic - Orquesta Reciclaje via NPR

Having known from a very, very young age, that music would be a part of my life, I am always gleeful when I run across things like this. I think that without music, as Beethoven would say, "life would be a mistake." I've tried to act upon this in every way possible, I mean, look at me, I ended up a viola player. The butt of jokes in symphony orchestras the world over.

A funny thing happened during this journey, apart from the getting sick, homeless, having a complete bastard of an ex-husband, Bill Nunnally (you really didn't think you were going to skip mention in this post did ya, ya tar-hearted meany-pants philanderer and liar extraordinaire? You're in for the long haul and you know you deserve it, Lithia, but enough about you. This took a whole 2 seconds of typing.)

The music never died. It just won't quit. In case I think it's gone, I have these friends? Angels? People who have come to know me, yet have never clapped eyes on me and yet understand that ours is a shared passion. The passion to make music. To that end, we have the Recycled Philharmonic. How awesome is this? After all, before Pablo Casals learned to play cello on his gourd that his dad crafted for him in Puerto Rico, when little Pablo was, like 3 years old, way back in antiquity, people were beating on hollow logs with sticks and then jamming said sticks into hollow gourds.

This was actually in the Weekly World News. Y'know the rag that used to feature Bat Boy, so there may be some veracity issues. . .

A Short History of Music, You Won't Find in Any Book:


Oog, or Ogg got the bright idea of tying a few pieces of yak hair to the top of the stick and affixing it to the bottom of the gourd. Voilá! He had him the first proto-type plucked instrument. A bent stick with eohippus tail hair became a bow and pretty soon, the whole cave was stringing away.

I am not sure how long it took Oog and Ogg and crew to discover that by shortening the string length of their now-bowed instruments would change pitch, but I'm guessing it didn't take long. As far as organized groups of like sounds and all that, I didn't take music anthropology in college, I was too busy studying the viola and playing things like Bach's "Unaccompanied Cello Suites" transcribed for viola. The piece Bebi is playing "Unaccompanied Suite #1 in G Major, Prelude" is the first juried piece I played in university. It is absolutely thrilling to hear it played again and so well. His interpretation is well-nigh flawless. 

Music and the arts are the things that differentiate us from the animals; although, I wonder sometimes. We have cats and elephants painting and I believe I saw dogs doing interpretive dance, although I would argue against that as an art form. It's more like the Emperor's New Clothes school of Arts, like the Concerto for Vacuum Cleaner and Symphony Orchestra I once was forced to sit through as a student, because our music professors were working out their hostility issues, or something.

Anyway, this is a love letter to all of those musical people; the musicians with notes in their hearts and beats in their souls, and it's not from me. I'm just a conduit. I was inspired by something ancient and something from so long ago it is an atavistic feeling, but most shared things such as this usually are. Thank Colin Falconer for this lovely find. I must go now; I have a viola that is yearning for some Bach, Sibelius, but absolutely no Mozart!

You can find the Landfill Philharmonic on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/orquestadeinstrumentosreciclados.cateura

There is also a Kickstarter for funding here: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/405192963/landfill-harmonic-inspiring-dreams-one-note-at-a-t

#ROW 80 4TH QTR 2013, MID-WEEK CHECK IN - HOW'M I DOING?

I'm probably committing some kind of mortal sin by using a contraction in a title, but I'm feeling a bit reckless and devil-may-care these days. I just got ANOTHER call from the doctor's office. All of my studying for my latest round of blood work, got me an S-Minus (for Unsatisfactory, per Sundae Rye; a term I never knew existed, but I love it.) Anyway, my hemoglobin is a bit less than 10, which is after taking iron and B-12 shots and all the other hooey. Well, shit.

So, now, the dreaded colonoscopy. The test is fine; it's the drinking and "cleansing" I can do without, and I know what they're gonna find. Bupkus. So, enough of that. As to goals? I feel good, I know after a screaming run to the ER, that I'm NOT going blind; no glaucoma, no macular degeneration,  just the usual lack of depth perception and inability to make my eyes track. 

I tried explaining to the 3rd doctor, I saw on Saturday night, how my brain perceives images. I said, "does that make sense?" He said, "No." As long as I don't have glaucoma or macular degeneration, or diabetic neuropathy, I guess it's between me, my eyes and my brain. I still don't know what in hell's going on. 

Writing? Meh. A little here, and a little there. Trying to get my stuff together and gather resources for NaNoWriMo, which is coming up, and trying to hang with Alex J. Cavanaugh's IWSG group, since I got a huge case of stage fright when I got just a RETURN email from the Florida Writer's Association and told them basically, "Oh. Hell. No." This from someone who can make a total ham of herself on a stage either talking, or playing the viola. WTF?

So, in keeping with that, I thought you'd enjoy what passes for random or what used to be called whimsy, which this is actually neither of those two, because I worked hard on this; I really did. I wrote it a while back and it's the closest thing I have in my writer's "repertoire," that comes to spooky, although, I think the operative word here is "spook" as you'll see in the post. So much for goals. One thing, though. I typed this in a record 10 minutes. Last year, this would have taken an hour! Let's hear it for better living through chemistry? Now I'm off to noodle around on Wolf; that's a definite reward!

PUTTING THE "SPOOK" BACK IN SPOOKTACULAR? OR, E. T. PHONE HOME

#ROW80 4QTR 2013 – SUNDAY CHECK IN – HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MA

Happy Birthday, Ma! You'd be 83 years old today, if you were here. Dammit, as much as we had our bitter messes and fights, we made it right, so I'm writing you this letter. I miss you, so very much. Ma, it's been a long time since you and I have spoken. In fact, it's been over 13 years, and I have a lot to say. We had a lot to say to one another over the years, most of it bitter and unkind. There were reasons for that and as these things go, not all of them are your fault, and not all of them are mine. Being life, it's just one of those things.

You used to scare the Bejesus out of us every time you crabbed down a runway...

It has taken me many, many years to arrive here and develop the clarity and serenity that I have wanted all of my life. Not judging here, but it didn't start well. Being whip-smart as a kid and having an alcoholic father (although, blessedly, one who was kind to me and always told me the TRUTH) and a mother, who wanted the best for me, but was also jealous of me and manipulative in her own right.

Yes, jealous. I wasn't planned; I know it. Daddy told me and would laugh, but you never did. He said I wasn't really planned, but once I “got here, you sure are a hell of a lot of fun!” Silence from you. See, that's how I know. There was always that issue. Then, when you tried to take your own life, when I was 7 and y'all tried to hide it from me, well, that was just confusing, because you see. . .

Wallace Family Christmas, 1956. Complete with Ceremonial Baby Talc

Kids know. You can't lie to kids. They just know this stuff and I knew you weren't shopping at Sears, or whatever. Unfortunately, I still have a hell of a memory. Still, even after all the years of abuse I've heaped on myself. I also knew from that day on, that things between Daddy and you changed and would never, ever be the same. I tried to always pretend they were perfect, but all the hollering and screaming at night (mostly by you) just are really scary to a little kid, and I would be so very anxious, and lay awake all night. I just never felt any security.

And, I could never be what you wanted me to be. Always yelling, or it seemed like it; telling me I was ugly and stupid. Hitting me; then you'd feel sorry and try to make it up. These things are confusing. I was just a bad little kid. No wonder I didn't have any brothers and sisters. I would have liked some, just to take the focus off me, once in a while.

It did and it didn't get better as I grew up. The whole competition thing and I really don't want to get into who you thought I should have married. Plain and simple, you pretty much helped me sabotage my first marriage, but prior to that, I was already battling depression and I didn't know that until just recently.

Lives are just giant puzzles and I find them endlessly fascinating. It's like a whole bunch of strands weaving in and out; some come together and make beautiful tapestries, with subtle colors and shining hues. Some become tangled and snarled and corrode. What a metaphor, I think. Anyway, I have a neurological condition and it is caused by depression; an existential depression that began at the age of 16. I recently found this out from my neurologist, who is probably one of the finest in the country. We dug into my past and in talking, figured out some stuff.

The depression goes hand in hand with what is called familiar tremor or essential tremor, which I observed in you, when things were tense. It is inherited. Nothing you can do about that. You and I worked through a lot of shit together. We had some rocky times; very rocky. I understand more now why you were the way you were and I've long since forgiven and most of all, pretty much forgotten anything we did to one another that was truly horrendous.

I know you loved me beyond reason, as I do you still. That will never change. I still love Daddy, too. He was funny as hell. From him and from you, I received the best of you both. I can think of no finer things than that. We don't get to choose our parents. We can choose how we shape our lives.

You used to holler at me when my socks were run down at the heels; now I know why. Ma, in 1944. 

To that end, though, I have to say this, I did deny you at a time when you needed it most and I paid for it dearly, and you will understand this. I truly believe you hear me when I say these things; here, or in my heart. You were scared, but we had been fighting and I was impatient. I didn't want to hear any more of your shit. I was about 38, and had just moved to Florida. You had taken the time to show me around, but you were starting to push my buttons and we were fighting already.

Funny how our relationship was always so much better long-distance, than up close; anyway, you said, “Mary, I'm scared. I'm sick, and I don't know what's going to happen.” I just ignored you. I really was nonplussed and had no words. You had never, ever opened up to me like that. It's just one of those moments in time. I should have said, “Wait a minute.” I needed to rethink this, or I need to stop seeing whoever I was seeing at the time, but I didn't want to fool with it.

I am so sorry for that, and I know you forgive me for it, but I still cry over it. Because I know how it is to be so very sick and ignored or worse, yet, screamed at and belittled. Bill Nunnally, my 3rd husband, did a similar thing. I remember telling you my doubts about him while you were still alive, and we were living in Charlotte and you were oh, so sick, and you said, “I'm sorry. He seemed nice,” when we visited you in October, 1999 during our 1st Wedding Anniversary. He was anything but, and committed emotional and psychological spousal abuse, when I was sick. So, what goes around, comes around. Jesus, what a tired old adage.

I leave you with this. I have become the person I was meant to be. I am proud of who I am. I live authentically, and I call bullshit, even on myself. I love you and I miss you and Daddy. I'm not really alone. I have friends; great friends who love me and I love back, unreservedly. I live in da 'hood, after being homeless; it wasn't in the game plan, but, it has it's moments. I've gotten a broader education here, but I've also found out I don't need a whole lot to be happy.

Love, 

Your loving daughter, Mary  

aka ViolaFury

October 20, 2013

Lithia, see here for Verbal Evisceration and for anyone else who is interested in aberrant, deviant behavior and what not to do, to gracefully rid yourself of an encumbrance, please feel free to follow the links.