Yesterday morning in the blue chapel of the Poel music school, about fifteen cello students took turns walking onto the stage and playing solo with a piano accompanist … and an audience.

I played miserably.

Of course the idea is to place the finger on exactly the right spot on the string to create the exactly right pitch.  And to draw the bow across the strings in a manner that creates a rich vibration of sound.

It didn’t happen … much.

I wasn’t particularly nervous.  I smiled at the audience before the pianist began his eight bars of introduction.  My bow and I were ready.

Even as the “wrongness” began to accumulate, I still had moments of feeling the music, of my body swaying.  And then those moments withered away …

At one point I realized that my right hand wasn’t holding the bow firmly.  And once the bow simply slid off the strings.

Halfway through, I got lost.  The piece has a few times where I had to jump to an earlier spot in the music and be aware of the number of bars of rest before beginning again.  I got it wrong.

It wasn’t like I was having some physical event.  I just didn’t know where I was, or where the pianist was.

My teacher Lieven came up onto the stage and pointed on the music to where I needed to play.  I was embarrassed … and thankful.

(Sigh)

I’m pleased that I didn’t crawl inside an emotional shell.  I bowed to the audience at the end and smiled at them.  After the concert, I approached four of my fellow cellists and congratulated them on their playing.

***

Now it’s a day later.  My sadness has dimmed.  Yes, I failed to play well yesterday.  I failed to keep track of where I was in the piece.  But I’m remembering what my neighbour Dirk told me the day before the concert.  He quoted the playwright Samuel Beckett:

If you fail, fail again

Thank you Dirk, Samuel, Lieven

Thank you everyone

On I go

Clearly a courageous shop owner, trusting that people will move past the sign and into the store.  Good for her or him.

It gets me thinking … What do I really need?

Certainly enough food, clothing and shelter to keep the body going.  But not caviar, Gucci and a mansion.

I need a deep connection with other human beings, especially when we’re 1-1.  Not sex.  Sure, it would be nice, but not essential.

I need periods of quiet, ideally including a daily period of meditation.  I don’t need supreme soundproofing between my neighbours and me … the rumble of nearby noise is part of life.

I need to watch or read stories about folks and the people they love, and the people they don’t love.  Real moments … tender or distant.  I don’t need to binge watch the seven seasons of Outlander on Netflix.

I need beauty in my life … of colour, shape,  movement, song and poem.  I don’t need to be inundated with TV images that flash by in a second.

I need home.  Kicking off my shoes and sprawling on the couch.  I tell myself that I need Gent as home but maybe almost anywhere on the planet would do nicely.

I need to sing, play cello and write as ways to reach people.  I don’t need to be good at these things.  I just need to be passionate in the doing.

***

And I don’t need a longer list of needs

Marina Abramovic is a “performance artist”.   Mostly she sits onstage in front of an audience and does next to nothing … for hours.  And the people stay to watch.

In The Artist Is Present (2012), for three months she sits across a table from a person, looking directly into their eyes, for eight hours every day, without ever moving or taking a single sip of water.

“Gaps appear in the thinking, the gaps get bigger, and at one point you enter into a nonthinking state.  For the first time you really see the person – and the person becomes highly emotional, because they see that I can see them, and they start seeing me too.  It’s vibrational.  The connection is incredible – that opening is very special, and then the heart opens.  The effect ripples out to the audience – they see what I am seeing and are deeply affected.  People wait for hours to come and sit with me.  Even the guards who’ve been watching every day change into ordinary clothes on the weekend and wait in line to sit.  We have seventy-six people who came more than twelve times, who have created a club just to talk about their experience.

Such astounding connection

Such longevity of contact

Such mystery

I was all set to sing at an open mic session last night, in the café of Minard.  Out of my mouth would flow the words of Stan Rogers’ “45 Years”.  That’s him in the pic.

I knew the schedule – last Monday of each month.  Except this time it wasn’t.  Another event occupied the space.  Open mic time was last Tuesday.  (Sigh)

Yes, I was nervous to sing, but far more excited than that.  So I started my slow slump home.

I dropped into my favourite hangout spot – Izy Coffee on the Langemunt.  I told my sad story to the barista and three customers sitting nearby.  And then …

“May I sing you the song?”

They smiled and nodded.  The barista turned off the radio.

And there I stood, waiting for the first line to emerge.  It didn’t.

Where the ______ shows its bones

Of wind-broken stone

What was that word?  Four human beings gazed at me.  Still nothing.  More slumping.

I told the barista that he could turn the music back on.  I put my mittens back on and turned to leave.

Defeat

One of the customers called out something like “Please sing.”  I looked into his eyes.  I sensed the bigness of the moment.  Teetering on the edge of my future.

I took off my mittens.  I returned to the four fellows.  The radio filled the room.

And the word “earth” came to mind.

I sang

I woke up this morning with the desire to dance … in a long golden dress.

I have little experience with this type of garment – basically just going to a screening of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.  But so what?  Men also get to pirouette. 

See the gracious turn, with the fabric following in agreement.  The right arm lifted high.  The grand staircase awaiting our arrival.

Here’s another rendition of the moment:

The breeze blows.  The stars and halo may be within or without.  Either way, the being glows as she and he are taken.

***

Other realms of beauty are here for the asking

May our eyes open to it all

Partway through this morning’s Music Theory class, our teacher walked us to a school courtyard, where we’d need to go if there was a fire.

As the group of us headed to our destination, a young woman who’d been sitting near me came up and said “Tell me about your life.”

I was stopped … and thoroughly pleased.  Very few people have asked me this.  Been curious about my adventures.

As we stood in the courtyard waiting for instructions, I opened my mouth and remembered the important stuff.  I love telling stories.

Back in class, I leaned over to her and said “Thank you for asking.”

My new friend told me that her parents taught her to teach out to people.  Good parents.

My version with people usually comes out as “Tell me what’s important to you.”  I too seek to know the other human being.

I think of the magnificent John Denver song “Islands”:

And the mighty blue ocean
Keeps rolling on every shore
Like the spirit that binds us together
We are so much more than islands

***

Thank you for the moment of asking

Dear fellow student of music

Deep down, all of us just want someone to notice us
Notice when we’re hurting
Notice when we’re scared
Notice when we’re happy
Notice when we’re brave

My daughter gave me her school progress report. It was full of good check marks, except for one that stood out.

“How am I doing, Mom?” she asked, looking up at me. Her glasses were a little crooked and smudged. She pointed to her teacher’s comment next to the one different check mark.

It said: “Distracted in large groups.”

But I already knew that. I had seen it since she was a little girl. She has always been very aware of the world around her.

After telling her all the good things on the report, I gently read her the comment. She gave a small smile and said quietly, “I do look around a lot.”

Before she could feel bad, I knelt down to look into her eyes. I didn’t just want her to hear what I was about to say—I wanted her to feel it.

“Yes,” I said. “You do look around a lot. You noticed when Sam was sitting alone with a skinned knee on the field trip, and you went to help him.

You noticed that Banjo had a runny nose, and the vet said it was good we brought him in early.

You noticed how hard our waitress was working and said we should give her a bigger tip.

You noticed Grandpa walking slowly and chose to stay with him.

And every time we cross the bridge to swim practice, you notice the view.”

Then I smiled and said, “And you know what? I never want you to stop noticing. That’s your special gift. It’s something you bring to the world.”

Her face lit up with pride. In that moment, I saw how powerful her way of seeing the world really is.

Because deep down, all of us just want someone to notice us.
Notice when we’re hurting.
Notice when we’re scared.
Notice when we’re happy.
Notice when we’re brave.

And the person who notices—that person is a rare and beautiful gift.

My urge to put finger to screen has faded away again.  It’s a mystery … neither good nor bad.  The yearning just walks away, without any decision or intention.  Apparently without any me.

I trust in the rhythms of my life.  Expanding … contracting … expanding again …

It’s only been five days, and I am sitting with my phone once more, composing a phrase or two.  Something short is a beginning.

***

A friend sent me this photo, one among many.  Although there’s an orange and a pink on the edges, mostly the image is black and brown.

Although the woman is throwing her body around in gay abandon, mostly the image is vertical and stationary.

***

I’ll take the un-mostly, thank you

I sat in Jaggers on the Vrijdagmarkt this morning.  It’s my favourite breakfast place.  Franky, Zita, Jo, Karin and Jill treat me so well.

There’s a sign that has been with me for two years, but one that I’ve never absorbed:

Good Food Good Mood

First of all it’s true.  Add in kind service and a friend or two and you have a fine meal out.

But today I’m also seeing something else.  The four words have the same “oo” spelling but for two of them the sound is “uh”.  For the other two it sounds just like it looks – “oo”.

I think of someone learning English.  And the question comes … “Why?”  I’ve said the same during my efforts to learn Dutch.

Now broader.  “I don’t know” has gradually crept into my life, and now it burns bright.  In the big questions, such as “Who am I?” and “Where am I?”  But also in the sense of not having the knowledge or skill to do something, such as learning a language.

And then there’s empathy.  Although “Good Food Good Mood” rolls off my tongue so easily, other folks may just stare.  Incomprehensible pronunciation.

***

So be kind, Bruce

What I know, they may not

What they know, I may not

The most common word in English is “the”, followed closely by other function words like “be”, “to”, “of” and “and”.  These words are essential for sentence structure and form the backbone of everyday communication.

Good to know.

And you’ll be pleased to discover that I consistently misspell Word Number One.

Most of my writing is done on the device I’m holding: a Samsung S25 phone.

As you can see, spelling t-h-e is a simple thing.  Start with “t”, then down to the right at a 45° angle for the “h”, finishing with the “e” way to the left and up a bit.  Piece of cake.

I have no problem with the first and last, but the middle consistently eludes me.  And the word becomes …

tge

There’s a lesson here.  Right now it seems obvious, but maybe nothing in life is truly that.  So I will leave the question unanswered in print.

***

The small … The big

Somewhere between the two I live

On October 23, 2014 I wrote about the Tibetan Buddhist practice of tonglen in these pages.  Eleven years later, I return.

A silly thought just came … Will I write about tonglen as well as I did years ago?

Who cares?  “Good writing” just isn’t important.  May my heart be in the words then and now.

A week ago I felt tonglen re-emerge … in a meditation session.  I knew once more that the in-breath was for drawing forth the pain of us worldly beings.  The out-breath was for pouring love into us all.

I thought of a few friends who are suffering right now.  In came the sadness, the hurt, the despair.  They dissolved in my heart.  Out went love to the dear ones … and to everyone.

Love, peace, happiness – they’re all fine words.  And each of us is deserving of them.  I contribute to their unfurling.

Now it’s Izy Coffee.  Big windows.  Humans within and without.  I breathe in, not knowing the stories of their lives.  And I breathe out, something good pouring from above, filling their blood vessels, muscles and organs.

It’s so quiet.  So natural.  So perfectly now.

***

No one knows I’m doing it

People keep sitting and walking

People keep talking

I’m silently invisible

All is well