I have a love-hate relationship with the piano. My earliest memories of the piano were watching my paternal grandmother play circus songs on an old beat up upright while my sister and I tore all the cushions off her sofa and lined them up in a row to tumble on while she played. I used to love to sit at that same piano and plunk out songs that I learned to play note by note by ear. When my parents and grandparents discovered that I had an affinity for music, the lessons began.
I'm sure I was every piano teachers nightmare. I hated to read music. It's not that I couldn't read music, I could. But I was lazy, and I could also "hear" the music, and as soon as I figured out where to place my hands, I was off to the races. I can't tell you how many piano lessons I sweated my way through waiting for the teacher to ask me to play a certain section of music only to know I couldn't find it because I had no idea where in the music the section was. Like I said, nightmare.
In the 5th grade, I was asked to play Taps at the girl scout banquet. A big event in the life of a girl scout. Every day after school, my mom would say, "you should practice for the banquet". Every day, I'd say, "okay". And then I'd set out to do everything BUT practice the song. The afternoon of the banquet, my procrastination caught up with me when I tried to shove months worth of practice into an hour. The night of the banquet, when it was time, I walked to the stage, sat down, said a prayer, proceeded to play and failed miserably. Scarred me for life. Therapy scarred. Why-I-never-picked-up-another-instrument-till-I-was-well-into-my-thirties-scarred. I haven't played the piano in public since.
But saturday night I wrote a song. And no arrangement on the guitar or ukulele sounded right. In my head, I kept hearing a simple little piano part. But I blew it off and kept noodling around trying to find a guitar arrangement that worked. But the piano was calling my name. So while Tom was in the studio, and the kids were away, I sat down in front of the keyboard, and began to find the chords. Here's what I came up with. I won't be winning trophies, or girl scout badges anytime soon, but it makes me feel good to know that I don't have to live under the negative messages I formed about myself in childhood.
I wrote this song for my beautiful friend, Lori who recently lost her daughter and is reeling from the devastation of grief. The first verse is the way she described grief to me.
Like wading in the water
With my feet on shifting sand
The waves whip up around me
And I’m trying hard to stand
And I think I’ve got my balance
When right outta the blue
The current pulls me under
The current pulls me under
And all my memories of you
It’s a losing uphill battle
And it stops me in my tracks
Each time I remember
That you’re never coming back
And all this treading water
It’s the hardest thing to do
Cause the current pulls me under
The current pulls me under
With all my memories of you
Not a needle in my vein
Not a thing to numb this pain
All my friends they tell me
It gets easier with time
Nothing can erase that
For a moment you were mine
Someday I might believe them
Someday it might feel true
But the current pulls me under
The current pulls me under
With all my memories of you
Peace, love and new beginnings...
Cary