For my Grandmother:

Every so often, I’d like to comment on the music that’s  important in my life,  and the memories associated with it.  I continue to be astounded by the power of music.  I heard several piano pieces by  Franz Liszt one Sunday at church.  I sat there in the pew and let the music wash over me, it was so beautiful.  Anytime I can sing choral works by Mozart, I feel transformed, the music  is so simple and yet so beautiful.  George Winston recorded a tribute album to jazz pianist Vince Guiraldi, which includes a cross-section of the music composed for the Peanuts TV specials.  But the two pieces that bring me to tears are the last two cuts on the CD, Remembrance and Theme to Grace/Lament.  I remember listening to that CD when my grandmother died in 1997.

My grandmother was the most important person to me, other than my parents and siblings.  My mother’s mother, she was the secretary to the town manager in a small town in Connecticut.  She would always call me by my first name, not my nickname.  I recall her only raising her voice to me only once, probably out of exasperation over my inability to mind her, which wasn’t often.  I remember climbing the tree in the front yard to her home, looking out for her Chevy Nova coming up the highway.  Our family would spend part of the summer with my grandparents.  My grandfather worked for Ma Bell, and he introduced me to the game of golf.  A gift, I regret, I never thanked him for, but I always remember him whenever I take a club in hand.

My grandmother gave me many gifts.  First, she instilled in me a love of reading.  I have a photo of her, sitting in a folding lawn chair, reading to me while I sat in her lap.  I loved hearing her read the Tales of Uncle Wiggley, the rabbit gentleman and his many adventures with his animal friends.  The second gift from my grandmother was the gift of music.  She didn’t sing, or if she did, it was a thin, wavering soprano.  She didn’t play an instrument.  She did have a phonograph and a wonderful console radio in the living room.  I have memories of waking up to the smell of freshed brewed coffee, sizzling bacon and the radio.  One Christmas I received a Panasonic table radio.  It was AM only, but it was my guide to places I had only seen on a map.  For awhile, I lived in central Maine.  For me it seemed to be as far away from anything as one could get.  I used to lie in bed with my earpiece plugged in, and I would slowly tune the dial and pick up stations in  Boston, New York City, Chicago, Fort Wayne, St. Louis and Hartford, CT, where I was born, not far from my grandparents home.  I would get so excited whenever I found WTIC, because that was the station my grandmother would listen to, while cooking breakfast on those warm summer mornings.  Somehow I felt that, by listening to that station, I was able to be closer to my grandmother.

My grandmother also aided and abetted my youthful corruption.   In the summer of 1970, my cousin Steve introduced me to The Beatles.  I was nine years old and unaware that this influencial group had recently broken up.  But I was so excited by this music.  I had no idea what rock and roll music was.  I knew that I enjoyed borrowing my grandfather’s Zenith transistor radio and taking into the backyard.  I would lie in the hammock under a white pine and listen to music and to the Red Sox games.  Didn’t everyone listen to Ken Coleman, Johnny Pesky and Ned Martin on warm summer days?  But most often I would search for a good station with pop music.

One day, when my cousins were visting my grandmother’s house, they brought along “Let It Be”, the next-to-last album The Beatles recorded, but the last they released.  I was hooked.  What amazed me was, looking back, that my grandmother didn’t get upset and ask us to turn down the music.  We didn’t have it up loud to begin with, but the idea that someone, an adult, was willing to tolerate our music was new.  Later in my misspent youth, my mother would show us the same respect for our music, while my father would constantly be yelling at us to turn it down.  Of course, my mother also impounded my copy of “Venus and Mars”, which she later regretted.  I had to sneak tthe album  out of its hiding place, play it in my room, and sneak back to replace it.

The details now begin to fade, but I do remember my grandmother buying “Let It Be”for me.  She went to Caldor and bought it  for $3.95.  She would over time,  later buy for me  “Abbey Road” and Paul McCartney’s second solo album, “Ram”.  She also gave my the console when we moved to Massachusetts.  It, unfortunatley, had outlived its usefulness. The radio had spotty reception and the needle was worn, and I didn’t have the desire to tinker with it.   I never used it again.

She died of Alzheimer’s Disease in November 1997.  She was beginning to show early stages when she attended my wedding in 1987.  A little forgetful to start, but over time she began to deteriorate. I remember the last time I saw her.  It was the summer of ’97. She had been placed in a nursing home after my grandfather was unable to take care of her.  The Alzheimer’s had progressed to a point where she needed 24/7 attention.  My wife and I had driven down from Maine, to visit her in Massachusetts.  My mother had briefed me before the trip.  She told me that my grandmother wouldn’t recognize me, that she couldn’t communicate with me.  When I walked into her room, she was resting on her bed having returned from lunch.  I sat next to her and reached out for her hand.  As I gently held it, her eyes opened and she looked at me.  I don’t care what doctors and scientists say.  I don’t care what research has shown.  All I know is when she opened her eyes and looked at me, there was a twinkle in her eye.  As she looked at me, I knew she was aware that I was there.  I believe this with all my heart.  Then she squeezed my hand.  She couldn’t talk to me.  She didn’t have to.

I miss her so much.

We all come to different forms of music in different ways.  We are influenced by classmates, girl or boy friends, even teachers.  My fifth grade teacher encouraged us to bring our albums and 45s to class, and he’d play them before the final rang.  He also exposed us to some of his tastes.  Where were you when you first heard Iron Butterfly’s  “In-a gadda-da-vida”?  Thank you, Mr. Tripp.

Looking back, I realize that this special woman gave me a gift that has stayed with me all my life.  Music has carried me from youth to teen to adult.  It has carried me across the Atlantic Ocean ( 1979, Gerry Rafferty “Baker Street”, heard it in a German youth club while fumbling my way through a conversation with a cute brunette, who couldn’t speak good English).  It carried me into matrimony (1987, Anita Baker “Sweet Love”, the first dance with my wife) and into divorce (2008, Keene  “Everybody’s Changing”).  I remember summer camp dances (1976, Rolling Stones “Wild Horses”, caught redhanded dancing with a girl I wasn’t supposed to)  and high school prom (1979, Eric Clapton “Let It Grow”, feeling that it was a good as it would get..silly me).   And, of course, The Woman Who Broke My Heart (2008, James Taylor “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You)” , I would sing it to her.  I still smile when I hear it).

I will occasionally revisit some of these musical memories.  Just short blubs, nothing too detailed.  And only when my memory gets jogged.  Just enough to make me say, “Wow”.