Originally published June 1, 2012

This blog is really about music. My adult study of piano in particular. It’s not going so well at the moment. I’m frustrated almost to the point of putting an ad for my Kawai grand piano in the local paper and calling it quits.

Recently I shared this mood with my piano teacher, who neither tried to talk me in or out. Instead, she sent me to a wonderful website, www.musicalfossils.com, the brainchild of Matthew Harre, a teacher with an amazing philosophy about the reasons adult piano students struggle.

He nailed them all, from wanting to play perfectly to not being spontaneous to physical tenseness and its result on the music involved. I’ve spent the past week reading his point of view and am beginning to equate music with my writing.

It’s all about the editor.

When I write I just put little black marks on a computer’s sheet of paper. I don’t think about what they really say. I just “play.” Later I go back and revise. But when it comes to piano, I never allow myself to just play the notes as if they were a first draft of an essay. I revise, edit, critique as I go.

It’s something to think about: Letting the music flow and not caring about the missed sharp or the wrong fingering. Playing as if it were a first draft. Revising later. After all, as Mr. Harre notes (no pun intended), who counts the wrong notes in a concert?

Originally published May 12, 2012

I just learned that Maurice Sendak died this past week. He who created Where the Wild Things Are and other children’s stories was a staple at bedtime when my children were growing up.

The story of Max, who was sent to bed without supper and embarks on an amazing journey but still returns in time for a still-warm meal his mother brings to his bedroom door, abides in my memory. Even if my children have forgotten, I still have copies of this Sendak classic in both English and French on my bookcase. It doesn’t matter that the French retitled it Max and the Maxi-Monsters.

Some said Sendak’s monsters were too awful, ugly, repugnant. But I don’t know a child who didn’t love them. And what did it matter, when Max turns out to be the biggest monster of all? Wouldn’t any child like that role over imaginary demons or haughty parents?

Sendak wrote other children’s stories, but Max was his most beloved character. I choose to believe that the author was writing something autobiographical. So I salute Max and Maurice Sendak and plan to re-read Where the Wild Things Are regularly. Please join me, and we’ll revel in the wild rumpus that is the heart of the story. What better way to remember the author.

Originally published March 7, 2012

This is the longest road trip Earl and I have ever taken. It’s a warm-up for the one we’re planning mid-August where we’re driving to Yellowstone National Park and back. It will take about four weeks, whereas this one took a little under three.

Here is what we’ve learned: We need to take a larger cooler on the road, so that we can keep water, as well as our other provisions, cold. On this trip, we had to keep the water out of the cooler because it was too small. We need to have trash bags of some sort and Handi-Wipe®s too. You’d be amazed how much trash collects on a road trip and how often your hands get sticky. A large atlas is a must, as are Tums® for a bad meal. A pillow and a blanket make snoozing more enjoyable; sunglasses make staying awake easier.

In scoping a hotel, there are criteria: king sized bed, no smoking, Internet access, working television, breakfast in the morning, and a local restaurant for dinner instead of a chain.

Once we’ve checked in, we need to be wary of what hotel clerks tell us. When one says, “It’s just a couple blocks,” it’s probably a mile or so. When another clerk says, “It’s the next exit on the Interstate,” we need to ask how far up the road that really is. Last night the next exit was ten miles, and we went there only because the clerk said there was a nice restaurant waiting for us. After we exited, we ended up at Sparky’s Bar which really didn’t meet our definition of “nice” because cigarette smoke was the main concession to ambiance.

What we really don’t need is about half the clothes we dragged along because, when we get on the road, we tend to wear the same outfit more than one day. We also don’t need a GPS repeating how many yards to the next turn (as long as you have an updated map system), Starbucks® (although it’s nice to see one every once in a while), and that hair dryer which takes up a ton of room. (Most motels have one, although it may not be the same as the one at home.) And I definitely don’t need the jewelry I brought, unless I am afraid to leave it behind. All in all, I’d say our practice excursion to extended road travel has provided some excellent information.

Originally published February 26, 2012

I can never tell if boaters are an extremely creative group with a high command of the English language or simply in love with poor puns. What I do know is that they name their boats in ways that make me groan.

Every morning here in Florida I pass a marina as I walk to the pool at the main resort. This morning was no exception. On the return trip to our condo, I sipped my coffee (a reward for swimming half an hour) and studied the boats that were moored (Is this the correct word?) in the marina.

Granted this is a sampling of one marina, but here are some of the names of the boats. Nauti Escape. Legasea. H2-Uh-Oh!, Seafari, Reel Love. I’m sure you can hear my mental cringe.

Of course, I’m a purist in other ways when it comes to language. I don’t abbreviate when I text, and about the only symbols I use are the X for kisses and O for hugs at the end of certain emails. I spellcheck those emails before I send them too.

It’s not that I don’t love a good pun, but seeing so many close together in one marina makes me wonder if it’s a prerequisite for owning a big boat. And, to buck the trend, if I ever own one, I’m going to name it simply “The Boat.”

Originally published February 2, 2012

You’ve heard that old song “Tea for Two.” It was written for the 1925 musical “No, No, Nanette.” If you want to be technical, it contains abrupt key changes between A-flat major and C major and consists mostly of dotted eighth notes and quarter notes. It has morphed into a jazz standard over the years as well as a cha-cha and a ballet.

Today a friend and I provided Tea for Twelve, and it had nothing to do with music. Well, just a little to do with music. We hosted our monthly book club and invited members to read Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland written by Lewis Carroll in 1862. Then we plied our guests with an honest-to-goodness tea party complete with finger sandwiches and tarts worthy of the famous Queen of Hearts who loved to threaten to lop off peoples’ heads at the slightest offense.

We encouraged members to dress in costume; and I, being more flamboyant than my friend, attempted to re-enact the White Rabbit and his pocket watch. The Cheshire Cat, the March Hare, the Mad Hatter, and other various characters made appearances; and I was thrilled that this group got into the spirit as eagerly as it did. For a group of retired women, we’re pretty cutting edge.

And the music . . . we did play Jefferson Airplane’s rendition of “White Rabbit” from the sixties and the score from Tim Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland” starring Johnny Depp. I think we slipped The Beatles’ “I Am the Walrus” in there too. It might not have been as sentimental as “Tea for Two,” but it sufficed.

Originally published January 15, 2012

Many people have bulletin boards where they attach items of interest, invitations, recipes, you-name-it. I’m not one of them. Instead, I use the door to my at-home office for that purpose.

It started innocuously about twelve years ago when I received a magnet that looked like a tiny blackboard on which was written in white “chalk” the following quote by Oscar Wilde. “Life is too important to be taken seriously.” At the time, our refrigerator (another object people use to post things) was stainless steel, and the magnet wouldn’t stick.

So I taped it to my office door and reviewed its sentiment regularly as I came and went. When we moved two years ago, I left the old door behind but brought the magnet to tape to a new one. It was quickly joined by a housewarming card my son sent, which was – in turn – joined by a postcard from The Netherlands sent by my other son and then two more from his various European travels. These “Favorite Five” are constant, while other pieces of paper come and go.

Currently they include the instructions for cleaning the rubber floor we installed in our garage (although I have never cleaned it), a coupon for dental floss that is about to expire (need to move on this one), a newspaper article on the Gilmore Car Museum in Hickory Corners, Michigan (This is in deference to Earl’s interests), and a quote from Chief Joseph who led his tribe, the Nez Perce peoples, on a 1400 mile march to avoid conflict with the U.S. Military in the late eighteen hundreds. (We’re on the lookout for some piece of art representing this man who said, “I will fight no more forever.”)

There are the usual receipts, a recipe for Chophouse Salad, and a list of books I might like to read. Also a quote from True Value for the price of a Culligan water filter, the telephone number of the local health care center, and a note that the lady next door owes me $107 for tulip bulbs. It’s an eclectic assortment of bits and pieces, and I actually enjoy looking at them almost as much as I enjoy looking at some of our finer artwork.

Well, maybe with the exception of last October’s bill for the tulips.

Originally published October 23, 2011

Farmers around here extend the growing season by creating corn mazes in their fields and charging admission to city folk like me to enter them, wend their way around the various paths while avoiding dead ends, and come out the other end. Earl and I had never tried one until this weekend when we went to Barbott Farms Ultimate Corn Maze.

I fancy myself to be a fairly good map reader. When we travel, I’m usually the navigator, turning maps this way and that to get to our destination. Earl prefers a GPS, but if I’m along for the ride I want that role. So yesterday when we went to the corn maze, Earl said: “You be the pathfinder, I’ll follow.”

The map we were given (at a cost of fifty cents over and above the admission price) reminded me of those paper mazes you did as a child where you were supposed to stay in the white space between the two lines to complete the route. I used that logic as we entered the corn. In fact, I held onto that logic the entire afternoon which resulted in our being lost most of the time and not completing the course.

I learned as we were leaving that the two lines and not the white space between them represented the course. This seems like a little thing, but it obviously made a difference. My reputation as navigator had taken a hit, and I suspected that before long Earl would replace me with a GPS on our road trips.

However, this morning he said: “Let’s go back to the maze and try it again now that you understand how the map works.” I jumped at the chance to redeem my reputation, and we spent this afternoon back at Barbott’s. Fortunately I’d brought yesterday’s map with us, so we weren’t out another fifty cents.

This time I understood what to do and we marched through the muddy maze (It’s been raining here a lot.) in what I’d call record time. In fact, next year we’re thinking of having a party where our friends join us for the maze and then chili or something like that afterwards. Naturally I’ll want to preview the course before we organize this event, as I plan to be the ultimate pathfinder.

Originally published August 12, 2011

I’d like to extend a personal invitation to Mr. Ben Zimmer to join me under my rock so we can discuss words, their definitions, and their importance. Zimmer is the executive producer of the Visual Thesaurus, an online thesaurus that uses a mapping concept to show the relationships among words.

In addition, he succeeded William Safire as the “On Language” columnist for The New York Times. After Safire’s death in 2009, I secretly bemoaned that there wasn’t anybody out there who could cut through the piteous prose that often passes as professional writing. When I got stuck with some grammar item, I muttered under my breath, “Where is Safire when I need him?”

But I’ve followed Mr. Zimmer for a while now, and I believe he is a most able successor. A column he wrote today talks about how the word downgrade has “taken on powerful significance, to the point that it has vaulted into contention for Word of the Year.”

Word of the Year, you say? Is that like the Academy Awards or the Emmys or the Cleos, recognizing the best in its class for a given time period? Not exactly. The word isn’t always the best; for lack of a better explanation, it’s the one word that most closely typifies the grammatical focus of our country at any given time.

Some of the words that were recently honored are subprime (2007), bailout (2008), tweet (2009), and app (2010). And if frequency is a criterion of the Word of the Year, then downgrade has been upgraded to first place.

Not a lot of people in the general population seem to care about this; but, Mr. Zimmer, if you read this just know I’m glad you’re here when I need you.

Originally published June 9, 2011

Last night a horrendous rain storm passed through our area; it didn’t waken Earl but it did wake me enough to realize that the current hot spell was probably broken in the hours before dawn. I then rolled over and went back to sleep.

When I finally arose and looked outside, our patio was a mess. Chairs were not only upended, but actually had flown over the fence and were lying, spread-eagle, on our lawn. Our grill was on its side and the indoor-outdoor carpet was rolled almost as tightly as it had been when the carpet vendor delivered it. It’s probably a good thing Earl slept through it all.

This afternoon, after the rain clouds passed, we smoothed out our patio carpet and put two huge flowering pots on the open corners to keep them flat in the next storm. We righted the grill and collected the chairs. We even enjoyed a moment outside in the cooler weather.

I was reminded of that old saying about an ill wind blowing no good. This was no exception; because yesterday, before the storm, I planted more flowers in the ninety degree heat. Watered them again in the evening; yet, I could see they still struggled.But this morning their heads were held high and now everything is in place.

Originally published May 19, 2010

I’ve been reading to four-year-olds at a school a stone’s throw from our home. Once a week since March. One hundred seventeen urchins, as Earl and I call them behind their backs. I don’t read to all one hundred seventeen at once; rather, they are divided into seven groups. Which means I read the particular story seven times. By the last reading I’m able to recite much of it by heart.

It took a while for the children to get the hang of it. They needed to become familiar with the routine, with me, with the idea of sitting quietly on the floor around me and listening. But by today, the last day of the school year, they were all ears. I loved it. I think they did too.

“Can you read another story?” they asked. “I like the one about the pigeon.” “Bye, Story Lady.” “Come back soon.”

It also made me wonder if four-year-olds are read to at home. I know parents are super busy these days, and television is a wonderful anesthetic; so I’m not faulting any mother or father who doesn’t have enough energy left at the end of the day to read about the pigeon. I would suggest, however, that reading Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus takes all of ten minutes, which is considerably shorter than a TV program. And, it could be the most rewarding ten minutes of the day for both parent and child.