I admit, I’m not crazy about piano music. Music without words seems almost empty to me. But the piano piece within this post is so… haunting. It brought tears to my eyes. I encourage you to go listen, to feel the sadness, to experience the beauty.
Now, the reason why I am posting this on Jamie’s blog is because the heavy emotions I have felt writing these posts and translating his letters is sometimes overwhelming emotionally. Most of the music you will find on http://mynameisjamie.net/sonni-quick-improvisational-piano-music, which are twelve more pieces written because of this emotion I felt when transcribing his letters. There are a few, though i wrote for other people. “I’m Sorry” was written for my mother. “Sadness” was written for my daughter. But it was hiss letters that made me want to write again. I hope to include them with the book I am writing, “Inside The Forbidden Outside”.
I had been sick for a long time. I had to quit playing. My brain wasn’t communicating with my fingers so I couldn’t even hold a pen and write my name, so I couldn’t play the piano, either. I had to type with one finger. I couldn’t scramble an egg. My husband did everything for me. All I could was stand and look at my piano with a feeling of such sadness and loss. My last gig was about 12 years ago. I didn’t feel I had the right to call myself a musician any longer. I lost my identity. I lost everything. I lost myself. I lost a store I owned that catered to the tourists coming off the cruise ships in Key West. My husband and I had to downsize into a 10×10 room in my mothers house. I thought I was moving home and would have a family who cared. That was stupid. I was gone too long and they had no idea who I was and didn’t care to know. At the first time of any problems while sick they erased me. I’m still erased. I wasn’t worth the time of trying to find out who I was. The have no clue. I became easy to sweep under the carpet. I doubt, at this point, it can be fixed. Those were hard times, while I was waiting on the liver transplant list.
Those who have a profession built on who they are will understand the grief that comes with losing something that represents who you are. What if you were a painter who couldn’t paint? An athlete who could no longer play a sport he trained his entire life for? An inmate who was denied a life at all and was locked up in a box that was 5×8 big, smaller than most bathrooms? …
