Mourning In the Music

Remember me and catch me if you can...

“Dance space” in the lanai with the ironic 6-pt star that once represented the original family that built our home. Entire floor laid by the owner’s hands.

I opened Daily Mail two days ago and saw the first big headline about Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce, with no less than seven more stories to follow about them. Strange I thought. I immediately jumped off and turned the music on as thoughts rolled through my mind. Even the news is just too hard to report. The DM is known for vivid images of all types. Especially of crime and war. I try not to entertain it, but once in awhile. I might be the only person on earth that will never attend a Taylor Swift concert or really care about her star status. I know I’m not alone, but it sure feels like it. I don’t have a clue who Travis Kelce is. I do know who Sting and David Beckham are. I’m a big fan of both.

We all have our music, our people, our generations.

I am not looking away from images of war. I also have photojournalist friends. I pray for the documenters of history. What they see is not felt until it’s over. There is a certain kind of adrenaline, a Holy protection in story telling, that shields one from the harsh realities of what is unfolding right before their eyes.

This new war has broken many seasoned journalists from day one… a hardened, experienced coroner in tears. So brutal, so evil the intentional acts, it’s hard to find the music. The relief.

When I was mourning heavily I listened to the children playing on the elementary playground across the street. I wanted to shut the windows, their voices serving an odd pain and simultaneous music to my heart. The grass kicking up, joyfully running with friends.

How do we find the music when our pain for a loved one is so deep we don’t know how to go on? when it’s a child? the end of a life, a relationship, a hope, a dream? entire families gone? countries suffering.

I caught a brief video picture of a young boy, wearing a bright red shirt, not much older than my beautiful brunette grandson, standing by himself, looking around in the middle of nothing but burned out grey. He had a backpack on. Immediately, I thought of Schindler’s List and the little girl in the red coat. Later, her lifeless body, a color pop stacked against death in an open cart. That thought took me to John Williams’ ever so haunting, award-winning musical score. Like The Book Thief, Williams left the gift of mourning music. A reminder to never forget.

Play it, pray it. Weep with them, for them.

Before our own life took a painful twist, the only song I was requested to sing, for nap or bedtime (not well), was “Remember Me,” from Disney’s Coco. I never thought I could hear it or sing it again. When it plays now I am removed as if I had cried every tear I ever had. I yearn for a happy song, as if I am protecting a part of my heart that says, “you did the work, so don’t open it back up again.” How could I get this far? I’ve thought about it. I guess in the heavy pain of things there is a God-given process of weeping, of self-inflicted extra heavy grieving that must rise and bubble to the surface in order to shake off all that is hurting and paining the body. Our minds have this way of holding back as our bodies absorb all that pain for us.

That physical soreness, possible illness, is something we can only live with for so long.

We must open our arms and embrace the fullness of grief. No one can compare grief when the body is feeling it with every fiber it has.

It is a long dark tunnel. There is always Light on the other side. Even if you can’t imagine it. It’s waiting to be seen.

I have found that humans are capable of the remarkable in the worst.

God gave us natural therapy in the arts, in music, nature, sport and creativity. They are at our disposal to be used as gifts in all seasons. Especially in hard seasons. When silence consumes, at the least… play the music. It is one of the best therapies known to man.

“Music can lift us out of depression or move us to tears – it is a remedy, a tonic, orange juice for the ear. But for many of my neurological patients, music is even more – it can provide access, even when no medication can, to movement, to speech, to life. For them, music is not a luxury, but a necessity.” - Oliver Sacks, author and Professor of Neurology at NYU School Of Medicine

We said goodbye to my mom and brother this past Sunday after a near three week visit. It had it’s lows, highs and in-betweens. Mom’s oldest, dearest friend passed away right after they arrived, the heat was terrible, we had wonderful get togethers, attended a few of my husband’s concerts, (someone who does a lot of “natural therapy” caught a cold), a horrific act of terrorism sparked another war… and we are still here.

Gratitude.

I danced with my granddaughters to “Catch Me If You Can,” a high pumping bass driven disco-style, let it all out, clap your hands, kick your legs up kind of song…. in a space where no one had danced in a long time. A space intended for dancing from the moment I saw it. I was known to break out the moves, but there lay a stagnant shiny floor, walked across, day after day after day. Perhaps there was a glimmer of memory as the floor came to life. But… there we were. Making new memories. We had tea with Grandnana, ate yummy food, played and laughed. It was so good to laugh.

Trusting in stories I am not writing. Trusting in futures I know nothing about.

Knowing my eyes can overcome the mourning.

ox