Songs in Our Hearts

I'm preparing to leave now, my father still fighting and still refusing to cede his earthly existence. Of course I expected a much more sad outcome when I left Palm Beach on Saturday, so this is in many ways is great news. One thing I have learned during this ordeal is that even the smallest of medical triumphs create ten more questions, often one's I don't have the answers to. What I have tried to do through this is stay in the moment, never letting myself veer to far ahead of the situation, which as humans we're all guilty of from time to time. So I will visit today and let my father know this time I am leaving, as he seems to have some of his cognition. I will return as his improvement warrants, though for now I know my presence is needed back "home", even though I have many, many, memories as well as friends and family here in Pennsylvania; my home is in Florida with my daughter.

However upsetting the past month has been, it has been at times equal parts joy and fun. PinF was raised in a household of music. I thought to myself as I looked on at my three brothers at Sligo's, how many people there would be surprised to know that my mother is very much responsible for the show they were seeing. Having learned the guitar while she was still raising her five sons, PinF can recall many nights sitting at kitchen table singing with his mother to famous folk songs. PinF's father was always a lover of music as well, though his love was for the listening enjoyment that the songs and the music gave. I remember going over to Lansdowne Avenue as a boy with my dad to the record store so he could purchase the latest Johnny Cash album, something we as his son's were all raised on. I was recalling a fond memory of how when we were all children, my parents took all of us to the Spectrum to see Johnny Cash live in 1969 or so. I guess they couldn't get a babysitter.

My mom was more hip with the music, Carly Simon, Carole King, and James Taylor come to mind as music of my youth, something quite cool as I could listen to any one of these singers today and they would still be cutting edge. It was many a reggae shows she attended with all of her son's as well. So it's always been about the music in our family, mom playing and dad cranking corny country stars on the stereo. Still, it would be our youngest brother Scott who would benefit most directly from my mother's guitar skills, learning at age 7 or 8 to play, everyone else who plays either learned later in life, or in the case of my brother Bill--was self taught.

The music has always revolved around all of us, so when I arrived at the hospital Sunday morning I had my CD walkman and a set of earplugs; figuring one many can only watch so much TV. Not to mention I know how my father LOVES Frank Sinatra, so I intended to allow him to "leave" that hospital room and drift off to better and less painful times. It worked. No sooner had I put the ear plugs in and the dulcet tones of Frank began to fill his ears he seemed less tense, he even let out a smile. Then he started to try to snap his fingers, he couldn't, but I knew what he was trying to do. It was all about the music again, he was for the first time probably free of all his pain and worry and I could see in him the peace of the moment.

The power of music has never been lost on anyone in our family as we have such diverse tastes that nothing really surprises any of us. The other night of music proved that power yet again as I looked around the room and saw the numerous family and friends who had come, all drawn to the music. It was an incredibly pressure releasing event, allowing all of us to just put down all our troubles of the past few weeks and enjoy with so many special people in our lives. Many of the friends I saw are friends I have known and loved for thirty years or more, their own lives woven into mine. These are the people who color us in, these are the one's who "knew us when", nights such as these are made more special by their presence. I had the good fortune to be contacted by so many old friends during my father's illness, some I had not heard from in years. Each of them brought their own tune to my father's still playing song of life, and for this I am touched and grateful. They know who they are, and how much their words and company has meant to myself and indeed all of my brothers over the past month.

So as I prepare to leave, I ready myself to go out the way I came in--with music in my ears. My father is far from out of the woods, but he's making progress, so I'll monitor events for a while from home and see where we go from here. Still it was kind of neat to see the music bind us all as one this weekend, though my father would have loved to have been there, I know in his own way he was "there", listening instead to Johnny Cash, and Frank Sinatra. The music has always been our bond, and it's nice to see how it can bond through the tough times just as easily as the good. It's easy to have a song playing in your ears, the secret is to get it to play in your heart. PinF will touch base with you all when he returns to FLORIDA. Be well.