The room was dark except for the light of the full moon, a natural light intensified by the snow-covered landscape. I stood in the entryway to what was fondly called the music room, in which my father sat behind the grand piano, a Steinway. Picture windows, extending the length of the first floor, provided access for a quiet, natural coolness to bathe the open and adjoining rooms.
In the distance the snow- and ice-covered Raritan River, a thin broken thread of white, snaked its way through the darkened patches of forest. The lights of New Brunswick sparkled on this sub-freezing December evening, the second day after my return from college for Christmas break.
It was late. The tension-filled dinner had ended. My brother and I had carried the residue of the muted but rancorous exchanges to the safety of our respective bedrooms in the back of the house. Our mother, quietly seething, could be heard at the other end of the hallway, rustling about in the kitchen, puttering, cleaning up after having made much ado about a job she insisted on doing alone.
Moments later and restless, I was drawn back to the main part of the house by the sound of my father playing the piano. He loved to play extemporaneously, sitting before the keyboard, facing into the distance while passionately playing whatever tune drove his fingers to touch the keys. And I could hear him doing so with abandon.
Our mother also played the piano, but she played “by the book,” memorized notes from sheet music without improvisation, never venturing into the unknown of self-creation and extemporaneous-never-to-be-repeated expressions. She would often chide my father for his unshackled riffs, and he would cease playing his magic and return to playing memorized hymns to please her.
Years after my father’s death, she told me the story of the time he passionately gave her a soulful kiss, an intimate gesture she rebuffed and made him promise to never do again. Much as he played piano to suit her wishes, I believe he also acquiesced to her style of romantic intimacy. “I love you, Doe,” was a frequent response to her requests.
I had responded to his playing, but also wanted to say goodnight. Now, as I stood in the alcove, I saw him hunched over, his hands momentarily motionless on the keys. The silence was broken only by the sounds of his sobbing. I noticed, too, that the kitchen had grown quiet, and he sat alone; an air of defeat and resignation seeped into the semi-darkness. I watched as he lifted his head, his silhouette outlined against the Raritan Valley as he returned to facing the world beyond the confines of the music room.
And then, as I continued to take him in, tears clouding my vision, he turned from the window, addressed the piano, straightened up ever so slightly, and began to play. In the place of muffled sobbing there arose a sweet outpouring of blissful sounds, music that began to dissipate the heaviness that had permeated the evening. He played with abandon following his soul’s lead, a composition both melancholic and exuberant, spontaneous and freeing.
My father was passionate about much in life, but he was also stifled and inhibited, caught in a conundrum for which he had some responsibility. I was nineteen on that December evening, and didn’t understand his sobbing and my response to it other than that I loved him.
Now, years later, I have a deeper understanding of that night. I too have lived a passion-filled life with stifling and inhibited periods for which I bear responsibility—I too know what it feels like to be “alone in the world.”
by 
R … as soon as I get your mailing address (please send it), I am sending you a copy of Larry Carlton’s Jazz Guitar (close to piano!)album: “Alone/But Never Alone.”
Love ya in C, Roger!
Chuck
You paint this poignant picture of long ago with deeply felt tenderness toward your parents and their relationship, as well as the differences between them. It is a touching tale which clearly has had a life- long impact upon you and your soul, as you plumb the depths of how we mortals love and yearn for attachment in the midst of being ultimately alone. You have expressed so much so beautifully.
This is so beautifully written as was your last post about the owl and the rabbit. I could see it and I could sure could feel it. Write on, write on.
I’ve never been astute at interpreting poetry but this is what I got. You’ve painted portraits of two very powerful figures….a large, strong, loner owl who has to kill to survive. And your father, strong, masculine, talented , passionate. You describe them both with awe and admiration. And you watch each of them in situations, that because of their nature and choices , they are ultimately alone in the world. Rilke’s poem expresses a desire for connection, vulnerability, togetherness…..and yet a deep need to stay true to one’s soul, one’s power and passion….even if that ultimately means being alone ….with our choices and loneliness. Your struggle is poignant and touches a chord in all of us. Sometimes I think we (I) feel like the little rabbit….vulnerable, trusting, and yet clueless about what the end result will be of choosing to be so alone in the world.
Well done. Good reminder that we can be lonely even in a crowd. It seems to be as much or more within us as it is external.
Roger, we can be lonely but not alone… A woman asked me to put her name on the church’s prayer list – her breast cancer has returned and she has decided that there will be no further treatment. And, she said that our prayers made a difference in her life. She called yesterday to say that she would not be in church for the next several weeks. She is going down to their summer cottage – by herself – and is looking forward to being alone. Her surgery will be in September. And, she asked me again to keep praying for her. Truly, she will not be alone – she will be surrounded by prayers of a group of people who probably don’t know her. Her serenity encompasses all of us and we know that we are not alone…
Jenny
Roger – a recent experience with a woman whose breast cancer has returned – and she had decided that there will be no more treatment; she is preparing to die. She asked for the prayer chain’s prayers – because they helped her so much. Her surgery will be in September… And, she said that she will not be in church for several weeks because she is going to their summer cottage where she ‘can be alone.’ And, again, she asked for our prayers. She may be alone but I don’t think she will be lonely – she will be surrounded by the prayers she has requested. Her serenity encompasses all of us in a way that I cannot explain – but I accept it.
Jenny
Roger, your images and stories draw me back into my recent hospital stay. I was in a shared room, with my roommates (two of them over 5 days) barely three feet away, though always separated by a privacy curtain. We’d talk occasionally, overhear more than we should about the others trials, and then drift back into isolation. Nurses would come and go, connect for a moment, a day of moments, then disappear as another shift ended. People everywhere, always interrupting (to draw blood, to check vitals, to bring medications) with much kindness but leaving in their wake a profound aloneness – treasured but feared. Leaving behind broken, wounded bodies everywhere alone. At what point does the rabbit give up the struggle? That unsettling question drifts wordlessly around hospital wards. Fortunately, courageously, your father lifts his fingers to the keys and somehow draws music from his broken, lonely body. I shall not soon forget that image, and the gentle, tentative hope it conjures.
Roger,
I can only read this piece as a spectator because the dysfunctional dynamics in my own home were completely different. Although I did feel a spark of jealousy because everyone of my siblings has musical talent except me, and I, as a fan, for reasons completely mysterious to me, gravitated toward loving and collecting classical and jazz piano albums. And as a fan of such I do know how music roils my soul, not only when I am troubled but also when I am celebrating. Thanks for the piece.
Roger,
Life is a solitary experience. We relate to others and joy and meaning stem from that but one must find meaning through individual actions. The father in this poem experienced that solitary satisfaction by virtue of playing what he felt. My grandmother played music that way and took joy in it from her tender years until she was 65 at which time she went back to junior college to learn to read music. Also her joy in the singular activity of playing her piano enabled her to reach out to others as she shared it with many kindergartners as well as her numerous family members each of whom has his/her own song composed by her (about 20 of them). Life is bittersweet. Each of us is at some point in the odyssey. As an elderly person 74 years of age I am trying to find something that has meaning going forward. Right now I am muddling.
In the last two weeks, one of my closest friends made a decision, that ended today with her memorial service. Having bee at emory hospital for some time, the doctors discovered a fist-like knot in her intestinal tract that had been using her pain. She was no stranger to pain-an eight year heart transplant survivor, breast cancer survivor, and for the last three years a dialysis patient. the recent ailment had caused her weight to drop to the mid-eighties. Three months prior to this setback, she lost her only daughter to cancer at the age of 39.
When the doctors told her about the intestinal problem, they said surgery was possible but risky. She chose to come home, open her door and say good-bye for two days to her friends. We came in legion. Although it was hard for her to speak she managed to thank all of us who loved her for being present. A gift.
I understand feeling alone and taking the time to reflect yet I wanted to present the other side of this option, to surround yourself with joy. There is strength and hope in the name of love. As she stated before her death, ‘don’t be sad, be glad I was here’. I indeed am glad.
I guess I am fortunate in that I have never been what you could consider truly alone. Sure, there are times when you are by yourself in the woods, fishing, reading when the house is empty. But these to me are natural feelings. I guess the only time I have felt alone was after my sister died. The lonesomeness then was realizing I was the only sibling left. There are times I like to be alone.
I interpret the message here as one person seeking to escape the emotional bondage another person had tried to put upon him. The operative word is “tried”. To be ourselves and to be the person we are destined to be; by God, genetics, personality brings joy and healing to ou relationship with our self and our relationship with others. Observing a parent attempting to interrupt this amazing gift is heartbreaking. We want to defend the injured parent but are frightened and sad that he cannot defend himself. Such s contradiction that the father who inspired fear in us is afraid to be the man he was created to be