Skip to main content

Into the music

I stood in the stillness for a long moment, watching dust motes drift on the gold-colored space, aware of shadows shifting subtly, the sun rising.

I moved to the window and watched the rising sun with a sense of awe. I had not seen it in longer than I could remember; it brought memories of warmer, gentler times that grew around me momentarily stronger than the present darkness. I dreamed of Lysander, though briefly, for we had shared such a small time, and then further back my mind's eye reached, to my time with my mother.

She had disappeared when I was sixteen or seventeen. My father I had never known, and without her I was completely alone, except for old Agatha on the roof, here, and some other neighbors.

It was not a question of my dependence on her. She and I needed each other emotionally far more than I needed a parent. Our world was too decentralized already to allow for the traditional means of income. We both foraged for what we had. But without her, I noticed the cold that had slowly permeated our world, and all alone I found that void unbearable.

I never learned any clue about where she had gone, though others I knew disappeared around the time she did with the same abruptness.

I listened to the morning sounds with a sense of acceptance: the clear air ringing in my ears, branches scraping a glass window, even the faint chirp of a bird. In that void I heard music rasping out of tune, echoing somewhere from the reaches below.

Startled, I focused on the sound, prickles going all over me as I realized I was not alone. But a wolf could not play music and a human, no human could give me cause for fear now. I, once timorous of strangers, would be happy to meet anyone.

I moved slowly down the stairs toward the ghost sound. With the stirrings I created it vanished, and only when I stilled for a long moment could I sense it again. On the landing I leaned into the window. I could hear it more clearly. I looked down the dizzying length of the building. I would have to descend fifteen, maybe twenty flights of stairs to reach the source, but the beckoning melody offered me a diversion I could not refuse. I descended quickly.

Popular posts from this blog

The secret to a happy home

I finished Marion Harland's guide tonight and I wonder ceaselessly at two things. 1. She is so down on America! Even more than I am. She complains of things in which I am so well-steeped I could not see them for what they were. In particular, American style and cookery. It is true that our food, which we count as so much more generous in portion than the overseas counterpart, is as coarse and indecorous as it is plentiful, but as an American woman I cast up my hands and declare I would rather spend my time on something else. She makes an interesting point about American women's fashions. In France women wear what looks good on them, and in America women wears what comes off the manufacturing line in the latest style. It is very conformist, and I have to admit I feel it in myself, for I would be embarrassed to wear something that is "out" even if it flattered me better. 2. Harland's other point I feel clearly from last night's experiences. I looked in my journ...

Helen Keller

Reading this Women of Influence book is causing me to remember another of my great childhood loves -- "The Miracle Worker," the story of Anne Sullivan and Helen Keller. It was Anne Sullivan I really loved, and still love -- it always made me heartsick to think of her sacrifice, devoting every waking minute to another human being, with almost no life left to herself, until she died in old age, and Helen Keller required another translator. But God -- she must have known it -- that's the best way to live -- it is to have every moment of your life swallowed in supreme goodness and satisfaction. No wonder I loved her, and no longer do I feel sorry for her -- I envy her. I thought of her today perhaps because when I was around eight or nine I grew aware that she and I shared the same initials "AS." Today is the first day that I am Amanda Monteleone at work, and I have written my initials "AM" dozens of times already. It's strange, but the satisfaction of...

Sprouts

Sprouts Originally uploaded by ladyhildegarde . I am getting sprouts. Hopefully they are carnations. It is such a beautiful spring day. It's good I'm taking the chance to come outside: I have craved a moment to reflect on something beautiful.