It makes perfect sense to me that Mom finds music to be an effective vehicle for communication, between "her world" and "ours". I say so because she ALWAYS used music as a strong means for communicating. She sang like a goddess and danced - at times like an electric storm, at times like a weeping willow in a soft wind. She carried with her her famed bag of musical toys - maracas, tambourines, egg shakers. castinettes, sticks, hand drums, and a weird instrument that created what sounded like mighty crashes of thunder. Her sister Karen was a belly dancer; her brother Tedd is an amazing singer/songwriter/musician. She and my sister Shelly harmonized like doves in synchronized flight. And I...well, I don't sing or play an instrument. But I love dancing for the same reasons Mom did - because it frees the soul, is great exercise, and is a brilliant non-verbal tool for creative and spiritual expression! And truly, deeply, madly...MUSIC SPEAKS TO ME.
So I've decided that - since Mom keeps sending me all of these messages through songs on the radio or on t.v., I need to come up with a "name" for that form of communing between us. What it really feels like, and I think what is most fitting, is that she is SINGING TO ME.
When someone sings to you or plays a piece of music they mean specifically for YOU to hear, the ingestion of their message takes on a completely different meaning than when someone speaks to you in so many words or sentences. The emotional effect is quick, deep, and all-encompassing. Analysis doesn't get in the way of what you're feeling. If the song is sad, sadness permeates the core of you. When someone tells you about something sad that happened, you may likely process their speech in your logical, cognitive brain centers before allowing it to sink in and allowing yourself to rest upon it long enough to FEEL the pain involved.
But when you SEE visual images of something sad, like a seal being clobbered for its coat for instance, you are struck HARD and FAST by the very pain you SHARE empathically with that animal. Similarly, when you SMELL something that is attached by mental association to a vivid memory, you are pulled immediately and intensely back to the moment that memory was made. And of course, following this line of reasoning, when you HEAR a piece of music that moves you, you are moved purely and memorably.
99% of the time, when I am driving in my car, and feel a deep, deep pang of LOSS, and the crushing grief that plows me over in the wake of it, I now know that is Mom telling me to TUNE IN and LISTEN. That she is there with me, and she wants me to know and understand that. So I do. I reach for the radio knob and simply leave the station where it lies - I do not change channels. I have come to trust now, through repeated and consistent experience, that when I push that on button, she will be singing to me. And she is. She is rocking me in her arms like she did when I was a child - and throughout my life in ways both literal and otherwise. And telling me "Please don't cry, Baby. My darling, don't cry. I'm here. Mommy's here".
Yesterday, she sang to me...TEARS IN HEAVEN, by Eric Clapton. He wrote this song to his young son after his untimely passing...And now, I share it with you.
TEARS IN HEAVEN
Would you know my name
If I saw you in heaven?
Would it be the same
If I saw you in heaven?
I must be strong
And carry on,
'Cause I know I don't belong
Here in heaven.
Would you hold my hand
If I saw you in heaven?
Would you help me stand
If I saw you in heaven?
I'll find my way
Through night and day,
'Cause I know
I just can't stayHere in heaven.
Time can bring you down,
Time can bend your knees.
Time can break your heart,
Have you begging please,
begging please.
Beyond the door,
There's peace I'm sure,
And I know there'll be no more
Tears in heaven.
Would you know my name
If I saw you in heaven?
Would it be the same
If I saw you in heaven?
I must be strong
And carry on,
'Cause I know I don't belong
Here in heaven.
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